The Cut-Glass Bowl
short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald
"The Cut-Glass Bowl" is a short story by American author F. Scott Fitzgerald, first published in the May 1920 issue of Scribner's Magazine, and included later that year in his first short story collection Flappers and Philosophers. The story follows the lives of a married couple, Evylyn and Harold Piper, through difficult or tragic events that involve a cut glass bowl they received as a wedding gift. In a copy of Flappers and Philosophers given to literary critic H. L. Mencken, Fitzgerald wrote that he deemed the story to be "worth reading" in contrast to others in the volume which he dismissed as either "amusing" or "trash."
Plot summary
Mrs. Roger Fairboalt, an elderly gossip, visits the younger Evylyn Piper at her home. The older woman is a snoop who is curious about Mrs. Piper and her rumored affair with Freddy Gedney. They discuss the furnishings in the house, including the china. Mrs. Fairboalt focuses on a large cut-glass bowl. Evelyn explains that it was a wedding gift from a friend, someone she saw socially before she married.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “The Cut-Glass Bowl” is short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Cut-Glass, Bowl and short, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7728512. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1920.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “The Cut-Glass Bowl”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow The Cut-Glass Bowl primary sources, The Cut-Glass Bowl archive and Cut-Glass research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “The Cut-Glass Bowl”?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “The Cut-Glass Bowl” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.