Amory Blaine is born to middle-class, Midwestern parents. He spends most of his childhood traveling with his mother, Beatrice Blaine, and developing a taste for luxury. When Amory is 13 years old, Beatrice sends him to live with his aunt and uncle in Minneapolis. Amory struggles in school—he is well-educated and cultured, and his classmates consider him pretentious.
After two years in Minneapolis, Amory is both egotistical and insecure. Beatrice agrees to send Amory to St. Regis, a boarding school in Connecticut. Before starting at St. Regis, Amory visits Monsignor Darcy, a Catholic priest in upstate New York, a friend of Beatrice’s, who immediately becomes a mentor to Amory. Amory has a difficult time at St. Regis, but his experience improves in his second year, especially as he becomes a school football star. At the end of his senior year, he decides to attend Princeton.
When Amory arrives at Princeton, he feels left out of the social scene, which is dominated by groups of upper-class boys from other elite New England prep schools. Amory soon befriends Thomas Parke D’Invilliers (Tom), who writes poetry for the school newspaper and shares Amory’s interest in literature.
In his sophomore year, Amory becomes popular in the Princeton social scene. On his winter break in Minneapolis, he meets Isabelle Borgé, a beautiful young socialite. They immediately become mutually infatuated. That spring, Amory neglects his schoolwork and devotes most of his energy to partying, socializing, and maintaining a romantic correspondence with Isabelle. Amory remembers this period as one of the happiest times of his life and the high point of his youth. Near the end of the semester, Dick Humbird, a fellow student whom Amory admires, dies in a car crash. Amory travels to Long Island to visit Isabelle. After they kiss for the first time, they argue; Amory realizes that he doesn’t love her, and he ends their affair.
At the beginning of the next year, Amory fails an exam and reverts to the lazy, rebellious manners of his youth. He is removed from his extracurricular activities and withdraws from the social scene. Amory’s father, Stephen Blaine, dies, and Amory worries about his family’s diminishing wealth. On a visit to Monsignor Darcy, Amory feels dispirited, but Darcy convinces him that he should not give up on college. World War I has begun, and Amory’s friend Kerry Holiday leaves Princeton to enlist in the army. On a trip to New York City, Amory believes he sees the devil watching him.
In Amory’s senior year, he becomes close friends with Burne Holiday, Kerry’s strange brother. Amory begins to enjoy college again, though he develops a reputation for being eccentric. Amory visits his poor, widowed cousin, Clara Page. He falls in love with her, but she refuses to marry him. When the United States enters the war, Amory enlists and leaves Princeton with sadness.
In a brief interlude during the war, Beatrice dies, leaving Amory penniless. In a letter to Tom, Amory reveals that their friends Kerry Holiday and Jesse Ferrenby have died in the war, while Burne has gone missing. After the war, Amory moves to New York City and lives in an apartment with Tom and Alec Connage, another friend from Princeton.
Amory falls in love with Rosalind Connage, Alec’s beautiful, materialistic, and selfish younger sister, and they soon talk about marrying. Amory takes a job at an advertising agency to make enough money to satisfy her, but she breaks off their engagement because of his lacking finances. Devasted, Amory spends week drinking excessively to avoid his pain. He quits his job, which he finds meaningless.
Prohibition of alcohol begins, forcing Amory to confront his feelings uninhibited. Amory revives his interest in reading literature, yet he still feels aimless and bored. Amory and Tom lament the state of contemporary writing and intellectual life.
Amory goes to visit an uncle in Maryland, where he meets Eleanor Savage, a beautiful and intelligent young woman who shares his interest in poetry. Amory and Eleanor spend much of the summer enjoying their love affair in the countryside. On the couple’s last night there, they argue about marriage and atheism. In a fit of anger, Eleanor attempts suicide by riding her horse over a cliff, though she stops herself at the last minute. This event ruins their love.
In Atlantic City, Amory meets Alec and agrees to spend the night with him and another woman in a hotel room. When detectives knock on their door trying to catch an unmarried man and woman having sex with each other, Amory takes the blame for Alec. The police don’t arrest them, but their misdeed is published in a newspaper. In the same newspaper, Amory learns that Rosalind is engaged to Dawson Ryder, a much wealthier man. Soon after, Amory learns both that his family’s money has run out and that Monsignor Darcy has died.
In New York, as he prepares to return to Princeton, Amory reflects on his life and character. He begins to get over his egotism and wants to focus on being a better man. Amory decides to walk to Princeton because he cannot afford a train ticket. On the way, a man who turns out to be Jesse Ferrenby’s father gives him a ride. They discuss politics and modern life, and Amory declares his support for socialism and his rejection of the values of his era. At Princeton, he feels nostalgia for his youth and realizes that the only thing he can know with certainty is “himself.”
