The Beautiful and Damned takes place in New York City (1913-1921). New York provides the perfect backdrop to a story about wealth, privilege, and social status. Both Gloria and Anthony revel in the company of the city's high society; they attend parties and listen to music for pleasure in the homes and halls of the city's wealthiest people. Anthony so values his place in New York society that he insists on maintaining his city apartment despite having to pay for Gloria's little country house. The couple visits Marietta, a suburb just north of the city, but they return when the summer ends. The city remains the novel's geographic focal point.
In terms of the time period, this novel takes place amidst three significant historical periods. The first is the very beginning of the Jazz Age. Known for prosperity and luxury, the Jazz Age also represented freedom to live by one's own code of conduct. Gloria embodies the female flapper (a rebelliously-styled woman who wore slinky dresses and danced freely among men and women). The second historical aspect of the novel is that its main action occurs between 1914 and 1918 during World War I. The characters remain aware of the war yet never engage with its significance. This demonstrates their self-obsession and their ignorance of the world at large. And finally, the novel spans the years just before and during the Prohibition era, which banned the trade of alcohol in 1920. The richest characters flout this new law, but the story demonstrates time and again that excessive drinking leads to bad decisions.
