Literary Friday, Gatsby Edition

It’s finally here. The day we’ve all been waiting for since the first trailer was released last spring. “The Great Gatsby” actually opened last night at 10 p.m., but today it’s in theaters everywhere and we want you to be prepared. We’ve been celebrating Gatsby Week here since Monday, but today we compile the best of the week’s links, plus offer a Gatsby companion reading list, review of two books about Zelda Fitzgerald and even a few cocktail recipes to keep you hydrated during all the hype.

We hope you’ll comment and report back your thoughts on the movie. And if you’ve been meaning to re-read the book or – gasp – read it for the first time, it’s now or never.

Our Gatsby Week Links

How Great is Gatsby Again? Our own Rebecca Lynn Aulph re-reads the book for the first time since high school and isn’t disappointed.

Zelda Gets Her Day, a review of two new books about Zelda Fitzgerald’s life and marriage.

Get Your Gatsby On with our style guide and get the backstory on the movie’s partnership with Tiffany & Co. in this video:

“Sometimes to be truly faithful, you must be unfaithful.” Thoughts on the movie from some of the book’s biggest fans.

Director Willie Thompson blames the raucous party at the Fitzgerald Museum’s annual gala on Scott and Zelda in a recap of the event with photos.

Best Gatsby Links From The Week

The New York Times has a story on real estate developers inspired by Gatsby over the years.

A new documentary from the BBC, The Great Gatsby: Midnight in Manhattan, is now available on DVD and explores the life and dark creative spirit of F. Scott Fitzgerald, with contributions from his granddaughter.

We’ve shared this Great Gatsby Character Map from Simon & Schuster before, but it’s helpful for those needing a refresher.

Blog Food 52 compiled A Spirited Great Gatsby Gathering menu that includes a few Southern favorites in honor of Zelda.

Epicurious also has a Movie Menu for Gatsby, and Food & Wine’s slideshow of gin cocktails offers 2o options for mixing F. Scott Fitzgerald’s favorite libation.

Discover The Great Gatsby’s South Carolina Connections from Columbia to Aiken. And check out The Willcox Hotel’s Great Gatsby Menu, being served all month long.

“We are quite convinced after reading The Great Gatsby that  Mr. Fitzgerald is not one of the great American writers of to-day” and seven of the other Meanest Things 1920s Critics Said About “The Great Gatsby.”

And then there are those today, like Kathryn Schulz, who wrote Why I Despise The Great Gatsby for New York Magazine.

Stephen Colbert payed homage to the book this week with his Oprah-esque Gatsby Book Club and invited Carey Mulligan to stop by and give him the Cliffs Notes version of the plot.

Esquire calls Baz Luhrmann’s Gatsby “a masterpiece” but Rolling Stone disagrees, calling it “artificial and boring.” (More movie review links coming up next week so as not to provide too many spoilers today.)

New in Southern Voice 

A Man by the Pond, a story about meeting Thoreau by Jacob Lambert, who lives on Zelda Road in Montgomery, Alabama.

To find out more about Southern authors’ haunts and hangouts, including the Fitzgerald Museum in Montgomery and Zelda’s other hometown locations, download the Deep South Literary Trail App, now available direct from iTunes and for Android.