Darlings, you'll never guess. I just got my hair bobbed! I was dying to look like my roommate Dot, who looks almost exactly like Louise Brooks (that's her up above--Louise Brooks, not my roommate).
Alas, I failed to take into consideration that my hair is neither black nor straight. So my hair turned out looking more like Nancy Carroll's.
Which isn't so bad, it's just not what I was expecting. Sort of a halo of frizz, wouldn't you say? Has something like that ever happened to you in the barber's chair?
Still, I feel so very modern with short hair!
Here in the 1920s, getting one's hair bobbed is quite controversial. I think it's glamorous, but some people think it's outrageous and not quite decent for a woman to chop her hair off like a boy's. Funny how in 2012, many of you ladies run around with short hair and no one thinks anything of it. In my day short hair was a STATEMENT. For an entertaining look at the controversy, read F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic story, Bernice Bobs Her Hair.
And now I'm off to heat the curling irons on top of the stove and see if I can tame this beast into some semblance of a style! Toodleoo for now.
Lollapalooza! It's all over town that a gentleman with the delightful name of Baz Lurhmann is making a new motion-picture version of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, starring a swoony matinee idol named Mr. Leonardo DiCaprio (correct me if I'm mistaken, but didn't poor Mr. DiCaprio go down with the Titanic? That story seemed to be all over your newspapers just last week . . .). Anyway, this new retelling of The Great Gatsby is set to come out later this year, and it's a talkie and everything. My stars, it will even be in COLOR! Hand me the smelling salts, I think I'm going to faint. The Orpheum in my hometown has never seen anything quite so lavish.
For those not familiar with F. Scott Fitzgerald, he's only one of the most prominent writers of my decade. I think I've already mentioned that he coined the term "Jazz Age" in his short-story collection "Tales of the Jazz Age." But his chef d'oevre is his novel The Great Gatsby, published in 1925. If you haven't read this classic story about the enigmatic Jay Gatsby and his beyond-reach sweetheart, Daisy Buchanan, run right out and get it (or read it online here, if you have the patience for that sort of thing--personally I like to read my novels while immersed in a steaming bubble bath, which is a place not compatible with these newfangled computer machines, I am to discover...). The story is set on Long Island in the heyday of--well, of my day. It will explain a lot of things about the era, although I certainly haven't been drinking cocktails at millionaire's estates and whatnot. Anyway, read it before the movie comes out. You'll be glad you did!
More about Mr. Fitzgerald and his wife, the fabulous Zelda, in a future post. Meanwhile, toodleoo, and don't take any wooden nickels!
