ABSTRACT
Contained within Fitzgerald's 1920 collection Flappers and Philosophers, “Bernice Bobs Her Hair” has enjoyed much critical attention and is considered one of Fitzgerald's best stories. “The Offshore Pirate,” on the other hand, has been largely neglected as one of his weaker offerings. In spite of both negative and nonexistent criticism, this essay places “The Offshore Pirate” into direct conversation with “Bernice Bobs Her Hair.” What emerges from this discourse is the theoretical model of the “Marjorie archetype,” best-defined as “a young, high-society woman that inevitably becomes jaded and cynical and subsequently enacts or has enacted upon them some type of performative grandeur or dramatic disruption of normalcy in order to feel satisfied or contented once more.” Through the lens of this interpretive tool, Ardita, despite being anchored in a “lesser” Fitzgerald story, can be equated with Marjorie, one of Fitzgerald's most famous characters, in that they both retreat into theatrics in order to satisfy what can be perceived as a dull or empty perception of high-class life.
