“Life is essentially a cheat and its conditions are those of defeat; the redeeming things are not happiness and pleasure but the deeper satisfactions that come out of struggle.”

American novelist and short story writer of the Jazz Age F. Scott Fitzgerald is best known for his novel *The Great Gatsby*, a sharp critique of the American Dream and the excesses of the 1920s. His prose, rich with lyrical detail and psychological insight, captures the disillusionment and ambition of his era.