The Beautiful and Damned tells the story of Anthony Patch, a 1910s socialite and presumptive heir to a tycoon`s fortune, and his courtship and relationship with his wife Gloria Gilbert. It describes his brief service in the Army during World War I, and the couple`s post-war partying life in New York, and his later alcoholism. Gloria and Anthony’s love story is much more than just a couple falling in love. Their story deals with the hardships of a relationship, especially when each character has a tendency to be selfish. Joanna Stolarek suggests, Fitzgerald draws on “Zelda, the object of the writer’s literary passion”.