Within and Without: The History of The Great Gatsby's Dust Jacket
Jun 10, 2026 · 55 min · 10 segments
Within and Without: The History of *The Great Gatsby*’s Dust Jacket is a podcast about one of the most famous book covers of all time — and why it still matters. University of Alberta graduates Katie…
Brandy GoddardGuest
Andrea KordaGuestKatie O'ConnorHost
Olivia O'NeillHostWorking in the height of modernism, Fitzgerald met many other creatives who were associated with the movement and its time.
He was considered one of the lost generation, a group of writers who grew up during World War I and experienced the immense cultural shift after the war, feeling lost as the values they grew up with became irrelevant.
Gertrude Stein, an American writer who lived in Paris for more than four decades, came up with the term.
In Paris, Stein's home functioned as a salon, a place to share ideas for many artists and writers between the wars, including Fitzgerald.
Stein was credited with coining this term, the lost generation, by another important writer whom Fitzgerald had a close and complicated relationship with, Ernest Hemingway.
Hemingway and his writing are commonly categorized as being hyper-masculine, even rugged, and by contrast, Fitzgerald was seen as being more concerned with his social status and having everything just so.
There has been some speculation about a romantic relationship between the two, but what is certain is that they had a strained relationship as both friends and rivals.
On the subject of the Great Gatsby's book cover, Hemingway wrote, quote, This claim is one of the reasons that the eyes on the cover have been so commonly attributed to being the eyes of T.J. Ekelberg, but it cannot be verified that Hemingway was telling the truth.
While Fitzgerald and Hemingway now rest in the canon of acclaimed writers, the artist who actually created this image is not given the same privilege.
In the article, Francis Cugat, the Other Cugat, Joan Barbara outlines the biography of this artist that has gone unnoticed time and time again.
Once he moved to the United States, He worked for the Chicago Opera Association, creating images of the various opera stars and main figures in the opera.
These images have a very similar style to the Gatsby cover, with fine line details and color blocking.
He moved to New York City around the beginning of the prohibition and was apparently paid $100 for the Gatsby image.
Now, this original cover has been sold for almost $200,000, and one mint condition copy was sold for $360,000.
After he married another painter, Ruth Cougat Wadler, he and his wife moved to California in 1925, and he became an artistic director.
He still did some illustration commissions, including an etching of George Gershwin, which has some stylistic similarities to the cover of The Great Gatsby.
This image of Gershwin was used as a poster for the premiere of An American in Paris at Carnegie Hall.
During the Second World War, Cougat traveled and painted, creating very idyllic images that you could probably see in a living room or apartment.
When he was working in Hollywood, he was a technical consultant of Technicolor and worked on a lot of movies over 60, including The Colorado Man, Red Pony, and others before retiring on the East Coast.
Matthew Briccoli did significant work to collect all of Cougat's paintings, writings, and drawings.
What his biography does indicate is the variety of life as an artist and some potential precursors to the unique style he used on the cover itself.
Following our conversation with Neil Barnholden, who studies book history in the English Literature Department, we wanted to dig more into the visual aspects of book design with some professors of art history at the University of Alberta.
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Working in the height of modernism, Fitzgerald met many other creatives who were associated with the movement and its time.
He was considered one of the lost generation, a group of writers who grew up during World War I and experienced the immense cultural shift after the war, feeling lost as the values they grew up with became irrelevant.
Gertrude Stein, an American writer who lived in Paris for more than four decades, came up with the term.
In Paris, Stein's home functioned as a salon, a place to share ideas for many artists and writers between the wars, including Fitzgerald.
Stein was credited with coining this term, the lost generation, by another important writer whom Fitzgerald had a close and complicated relationship with, Ernest Hemingway.
Hemingway and his writing are commonly categorized as being hyper-masculine, even rugged, and by contrast, Fitzgerald was seen as being more concerned with his social status and having everything just so.
There has been some speculation about a romantic relationship between the two, but what is certain is that they had a strained relationship as both friends and rivals.
On the subject of the Great Gatsby's book cover, Hemingway wrote, quote, This claim is one of the reasons that the eyes on the cover have been so commonly attributed to being the eyes of T.J. Ekelberg, but it cannot be verified that Hemingway was telling the truth.
While Fitzgerald and Hemingway now rest in the canon of acclaimed writers, the artist who actually created this image is not given the same privilege.
In the article, Francis Cugat, the Other Cugat, Joan Barbara outlines the biography of this artist that has gone unnoticed time and time again.
Once he moved to the United States, He worked for the Chicago Opera Association, creating images of the various opera stars and main figures in the opera.
These images have a very similar style to the Gatsby cover, with fine line details and color blocking.
He moved to New York City around the beginning of the prohibition and was apparently paid $100 for the Gatsby image.
Now, this original cover has been sold for almost $200,000, and one mint condition copy was sold for $360,000.
After he married another painter, Ruth Cougat Wadler, he and his wife moved to California in 1925, and he became an artistic director.
He still did some illustration commissions, including an etching of George Gershwin, which has some stylistic similarities to the cover of The Great Gatsby.
This image of Gershwin was used as a poster for the premiere of An American in Paris at Carnegie Hall.
During the Second World War, Cougat traveled and painted, creating very idyllic images that you could probably see in a living room or apartment.
When he was working in Hollywood, he was a technical consultant of Technicolor and worked on a lot of movies over 60, including The Colorado Man, Red Pony, and others before retiring on the East Coast.
Matthew Briccoli did significant work to collect all of Cougat's paintings, writings, and drawings.
What his biography does indicate is the variety of life as an artist and some potential precursors to the unique style he used on the cover itself.
Following our conversation with Neil Barnholden, who studies book history in the English Literature Department, we wanted to dig more into the visual aspects of book design with some professors of art history at the University of Alberta.