Cocktail Trivia

• At the supper party in Paris where, thanks to the publisher and bookseller Sylvia Beach, he first met Joyce, Fitzgerald impetuously offered to prove his devotion to Joyce by throwing himself out of a window; in the copy of Gatsby he gave to Joyce after the party, Fitzgerald drew Joyce with a halo and himself on his knees, worshipping (Daniel, 11)
• During World War II, the non-profit organization, Editions for Armed Services, distributed pocket sized versions of The Great Gatsby to soldiers.
  
• Fitzgerald misused the term "flapper." Originally, it did not mean a dancing girl, who smoked or drank, but rather, was "English slang, and it meant a society girl who had made her debut and hadn't found a husband."
  
• Gertrude Stein wrote of The Great Gatsby "[I]t is a good book. I like the melody of your dedication it shows that you have a background of beauty and tenderness and that is a comfort. The next good thing is that you write naturally in sentences and that too is a comfort."
• For more facts about Fitzgerald and Gatsby, check out the University of South Carolina Fitzgerald site.