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Amory Blaine's "Mirrors" In Fitzgerald's This Side Of Paradise

Amory Blaine's "Mirrors" in Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise


In F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel This Side of Paradise, Amory Blaine
searches for his identity by "mirroring" people he admires.   However, these
"mirrors" actually block him from finding his true self.   He falls in love with
women whose personalities intrigue him; he mimics the actions of men he looks up
to.   Eleanor Savage and Burne Holiday serve as prime examples of this.   Until
Amory loses his pivotal "mirror," Monsignor Darcy, he searches for his soul in
all the wrong places.   When Monsignor Darcy dies, Amory has the spiritual
epiphany he needs to reach his "paradise" - the knowledge of who Amory Blaine
truly is.
Amory appears to be a rather vacuous choice for a protagonist.   He
relies mainly on his breathtaking handsomeness and wealth in order to get by in
life.   He has been endowed with brains, but it takes him years to learn how and
when to use them.   Amory spends his late high school and college years
frolicking with his peers and debutantes.   By constantly associating with others
Amory creates an image of himself that he maintains until he becomes bored or
finds a new personality to imitate.   Amory does not know who he really is, what
he truly feels, or what he thinks.   He merely cultivates his personality du jour
depending on how he believes he would like to be.   Essentially, Amory is
shopping at a personality store, trying each one on until he can find one that
fits.
This personality imitation began when Amory spent his adolescent years
in the presence of his flamboyant mother, Beatrice.   Beatrice raised Amory to be
what she wanted him to be, as long as it was stylish and acceptable to coeval
virtues.   When he goes to Princeton, the separation from his mother, who
essentially thought for him, leads Amory to search for himself.   However, his
idea of searching for his identity entails merely simulating the personalities
of those he admires.   This trend becomes obvious in the pattern of...