A great social success is a pretty girl who plays her cards as carefully as if she were plain.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that social success often requires humility and strategy, regardless of one's appearance.
F. Scott Fitzgerald's quote reflects the idea that success in social situations is not solely dependent on physical attractiveness but rather on one's ability to navigate social dynamics with care and thoughtfulness. The metaphor of a 'pretty girl playing her cards carefully' implies that even those who may seem to have an advantage should not rely solely on their looks; instead, they must be strategic and wise in their interactions, much like someone deemed less attractive might need to be to gain social acceptance.
In practice
This quote could be used at a social skills workshop to emphasize the importance of strategy in social interactions.
Don't be so anxious about it,' she laughed. 'I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do; I never got the trick of it.' She looked down at him, shy and fatigued. 'So here we are. I told you years ago that I had the makings of Cinderella.' He took her hand; she drew it back instinctively and then replaced it in his. 'Beg your pardon. Not even used to being touched. But I'm not afraid of you, if you stay quiet and don't move suddenly.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
It was about then [1920] that I wrote a line which certain people will not let me forget: "She was a faded but still lovely woman of twenty-seven."
The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby.
But you can love more than just one person, can't you?
A sudden gust of rain blew over them and then another - as if small liquid clouds were bouncing along the land. Lightning entered the sea far off and the air blew full of crackling thunder. The table cloths blew around the pillars. They blew and blew and blew. The flags twisted around the red chairs like live things, the banners were ragged, the corners of the table tore off through the burbling billowing ends of the cloths.
Now, look, baby, 'Union' is spelled with 5 letters. It is not a four-letter word.
Once I heard my mother say that each of us lives in a separate universe, one we have dreamed into being. We love pople when their dream coincides with ours, the way two cutout designs laid one on top of the other might match. But dream worlds are not static like cutouts; sooner or later they change shape, leading to misunderstanding, loneliness and loss of love.
Above all we need, particularly as children, the reassuring presence of a visible community, an intimate group that enfolds us with understanding and love, and that becomes an object of our spontaneous loyalty, as a criterion and point of reference for the rest of the human race.
Anything that takes you out of the context of being separate is healing. Anything that takes you out of the context of separateness is intimacy.
But a man is not forgotten, as long as there are two people left under the sky. One, to tell the story; the other, to hear it.
A woman, I always say, should be like a good suspense movie: The more left to the imagination, the more excitement there is. This should be her aim - to create suspense, to let a man discover things about her without her having to tell him.
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