Jacob's Ladder by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald | Published: August 20, 1927

Jacob's Ladder Synopsis

"Jacob's Ladder" is a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald. It was published in The Saturday Evening Post on August 20, 1927. Jacob Booth, a 30-year-old man, falls in love with Jenny Delehanty, a 16-year-old girl whom he met during a murder trial. Jacob helps kickstart Jenny's career as an actress by introducing her to a movie director named Billy Farelly. Jenny is oblivious to Jacob's affection, and so does he, until it's too late.

Excerpt from Jacob's Ladder Online Book

It was a particularly sordid and degraded murder trial. Jacob Booth, writhing quietly on a spectators' bench, felt that he had childishly gobbled something without being hungry, simply because it was there. The newspapers had humanized the case, made a cheap, neat problem play out of an affair of the jungle, so passes that actually admitted one to the court room were hard to get. Such a pass had been tendered him the evening before.

Jacob looked around at the doors, where a hundred people, inhaling and exhaling with difficulty, generated excitement by their eagerness, their breathless escape from their own private lives. The day was hot and there was sweat upon the crowd--obvious sweat in large dewy beads that would shake off on Jacob if he fought his way through to the doors. Someone behind him guessed that the jury wouldn't be out half an hour.

About F. Scott Fitzgerald

F. Scott Fitzgerald was born in 1896 in St Paul, Minnesota. His first novel, This Side of Paradise, established him as an important literary figure and earned him immediate success and recognition. He is one of the twentieth century's most renowned and celebrated American authors. The Jazz Age was an era depicted in Fitzgerald's work; he encapsulated the spirit of that time with his vivid descriptions of life in 1920s America. Find out more about F. Scott Fitzgerald at sevenov.com.