F scott fitzgerald biography education

Paul, Minnesota, on September 24,the namesake and second cousin three times removed of the author of the National Anthem. His father, Edward, was from Maryland, with an allegiance to the Old South and its values. Both were Catholics. Edward Fitzgerald failed as a manufacturer of wicker furniture in St. After he was dismissed inwhen his son was twelve, the family returned to St.

Fitzgerald attended the St. Paul Academy; his first writing to appear in print was a detective story in the school newspaper when he was thirteen. During he attended the Newman School, a Catholic prep school in New Jersey, where he met Father Sigourney Fay, who encouraged his ambitions for personal distinction and achievement. As a member of the Princeton Class ofFitzgerald neglected his studies for his literary apprenticeship.

He wrote the scripts and lyrics for the Princeton Triangle Club musicals and was a contributor to the Princeton Tiger f scott fitzgerald biography education magazine and the Nassau Literary Magazine. On academic probation and unlikely to graduate, Fitzgerald joined the army in and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the infantry. There he fell in love with a celebrated belle, eighteen-year-old Zelda Sayre, the youngest daughter of an Alabama Supreme Court judge.

The war ended just before he was to be sent overseas; after his discharge in he went to New York City to seek his fortune in order to marry. Unwilling to wait while Fitzgerald succeeded in the advertisement business and unwilling to live on his small salary, Zelda Sayre broke their engagement. Fitzgerald quit his job in July and returned to St.

Paul to rewrite his novel as This Side of Paradise. It was accepted by editor Maxwell Perkins of Scribners in September. Barks eds. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald. Curnutt, Kirk. The Cambridge Introduction to F. New York: Cambridge University Press. An Historical Guide to F. New York: Oxford University Press. Donaldson, Scott. New York: Congdon and Weed.

Prigozy, Ruth. Scott Fitzgeraldbecame icons of the freedoms and excesses of the s Jazz Age and symbols of the emerging cultural fascination with youth, conspicuous consumption, and leisure. By her early adolescence, Zelda—named after the gypsy heroine of an obscure novel—was already a formidable presence in Montgomery social circles, starring in ballet recitals and basking in the glow of elite country club dances.

Scott Fitzgerald, a year-old army second lieutenant stationed at nearby Camp Sheridan. Such charges were given additional weight by the frequent addition of his name to her bylines on nearly two dozen stories and articles she produced between and In addition to writing, she returned to two childhood passions—art and dance. Instress resulting from her frustrated attempts to become a professional ballerina led to the first of what would be many psychological breakdowns.

Although Zelda was treated for schizophrenia, mental-health experts later would contest both the diagnosis and recovery regimen prescribed by her main physician, Dr. Oscar Forel. Scott deeply resented the book, blaming the financial burden of her hospitalization for his inability to complete Tender Is the Nightand he also accused Zelda of poaching its plot for her novel.

She then tried writing for the stage and produced the unsuccessful comedy Scandalabramounted by an amateur drama troupe in Baltimore in It was her last public writing effort. Zelda next turned to painting, but she fared no better. Morgan Le FayThe Fitzgeralds parted ways inalthough they never divorced. Their daughter was largely raised by nannies before entering boarding school.

From toZelda resided at Highland Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina, and Scott descended into alcoholism and literary obscurity, eventually relocating to Hollywood in the hope of establishing himself as a screenwriter. He died of a heart attack there on December 21, That year, Zelda returned to Montgomery, where she lived under the care of her mother.

Early F. Scott Fitzgerald biographers and critics tended to depict Zelda as equal parts liability and inspiration. The Collected Writings of Zelda Fitzgerald. Cline, Sally.

F scott fitzgerald biography education: He attended Princeton University where

With his stunning southern wife, Zelda, he headed for Paris and a mythic career of drinking from hip flasks, dancing until dawn, and jumping into outdoor fountains to end the party. Scott became an alcoholic and Zelda, jealous of his fame or in some versions, thwarted by itcollapsed into madness. They crept home in to an America in the grip of the Great Depression —a land no longer interested in flaming youth except to pillory them for their excesses.

The novel with which he had grappled for years, Tender Is the Nightabout a psychiatrist destroyed by his wealthy wife, was published in to lukewarm reviews and poor sales. Fitzgerald retreated to Hollywood. He made a precarious living as a scriptwriter and struggled to control his alcoholism.

F scott fitzgerald biography education: where he met Father

Miraculously he found the energy to begin another novel, The Last Tycoonabout a complex gifted movie producer. After wintering in Italy, the Fitzgeralds returned to France, where they alternated between Paris and the French Riviera until During this period, he became friends with writer Gertrude Steinbookseller Sylvia Beachnovelist James Joycepoet Ezra Pound and other members of the American expatriate community in Paris, [ ] some of whom would later be identified with the Lost Generation.

In contrast to his friendship with Scott, Hemingway disliked Zelda and described her as "insane" in his memoir, A Moveable Feast. Hemingway alleged that Zelda sought to destroy her husband, and she purportedly taunted Fitzgerald over his penis' size. Infilm producer John W. Considine Jr. While attending a lavish party at the Pickfair estate, Fitzgerald met year-old Lois Morana starlet who had gained widespread fame for her role in Stella Dallas Jealous of Fitzgerald and Moran, an irate Zelda set fire to her own expensive clothing in a bathtub as a self-destructive act.

The Fitzgeralds rented "Ellerslie", a mansion near Wilmington, Delawareuntil In Aprilwhen the psychiatric clinic allowed Zelda to travel with her husband, Fitzgerald took her to lunch with critic H. Mencken, by then the literary editor of The American Mercury. During this time, Fitzgerald rented the "La Paix" estate in the suburb of Towson, Marylandand worked on his next novel, which drew heavily on recent experiences.

Fitzgerald's own novel debuted in April as Tender Is the Night and received mixed reviews. At one time he understood it no more than the butterfly did and he did not know when it was brushed or marred. Later he became conscious of his damaged wings and of their construction and he learned to think and could not fly any more because the love of flight was gone and he could only remember when it had been effortless.

Amid the Great DepressionFitzgerald's works were deemed elitist and materialistic. Scott Fitzgerald as an age rather than a writer, and when the economic stroke of began to change the sheiks [ i ] and flappers into unemployed boys or underpaid girls, we consciously and a little belligerently turned our backs on Fitzgerald. He relied on loans from his agent, Harold Oberand publisher Perkins.

As he had been an alcoholic for many years, [ j ] [ ] Fitzgerald's heavy drinking undermined his health by the late s. Bruccoli contends Fitzgerald did in fact have recurring TB. Fitzgerald's deteriorating health, chronic alcoholism, and financial woes made for difficult years in Baltimore. His friend H. Mencken wrote in a June diary entry that "the case of F.

Scott Fitzgerald has become distressing. He is boozing in a wild manner and has become a nuisance. His wife, Zelda, who has been insane for years, is now confined at the Sheppard-Pratt Hospital, and he is living in Park Avenue with his little daughter, Scottie". By that same year, Zelda's intense suicidal mania necessitated her extended confinement at the Highland Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina.

Fitzgerald's dire financial straits compelled him to accept a lucrative contract as a screenwriter with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer MGM in that necessitated his relocation to Hollywood. In an effort to abstain from alcohol, Fitzgerald drank large amounts of Coca-Cola and ate many sweets. Estranged from Zelda, Fitzgerald attempted to reunite with his first love Ginevra King when the wealthy Chicago heiress visited Hollywood in Soon after, a lonely Fitzgerald began a relationship with nationally syndicated gossip columnist Sheilah Grahamhis final companion before his death.

Fitzgerald had to climb two f scotts fitzgerald biography education of stairs to his apartment, while Graham lived on the ground floor. Throughout their relationship, Graham claimed Fitzgerald felt constant guilt over Zelda's mental illness and confinement. Scott Fitzgerald. You've read my books. You've read The Great Gatsby, haven't you?

During this last phase of his career, Fitzgerald's screenwriting tasks included revisions on Madame Curie and an unused dialogue polish for Gone with the Wind —a book which Fitzgerald disparaged as unoriginal and an "old wives' tale". Director Billy Wilder described Fitzgerald's foray into Hollywood as like that of "a great sculptor who is hired to do a plumbing job".

This is my immediate duty—without this I am nothing. Fitzgerald achieved sobriety over a year before his death, and Graham described their last year together as one of the happiest times of their relationship. The following day, as Fitzgerald annotated his newly arrived Princeton Alumni Weekly[ ] Graham saw him jump from his armchair, grab the mantelpiece, and collapse on the floor without uttering a sound.

On learning of her father's death, Scottie telephoned Graham from Vassar and asked she not attend the funeral for social propriety. Zelda eulogized Fitzgerald in a letter to a friend: "He was as spiritually generous a soul as ever was It seems as if he was always planning happiness for Scottie and for me. Books to read—places to go. Life seemed so promising always when he was around.

Scott was the best friend a person could have to me". Fitzgerald was buried instead with a simple Protestant service at Rockville Cemetery. It has been the greatest credo in my life that I would rather be an artist than a careerist. I would rather impress my image upon the soul of a people I would as soon be as anonymous as Rimbaud if I could feel that I had accomplished that purpose.

At the time of his death, Fitzgerald believed that his life was a failure and his work was forgotten. Surveying these posthumous attacks, John Dos Passos opined that many literary critics in popular newspapers lacked the basic discernment about the art of writing. Within one year after his death, Edmund Wilson completed Fitzgerald's unfinished fifth novel The Last Tycoon using the author's extensive notes, [ l ] [ ] and he included The Great Gatsby within the edition, sparking new interest and discussion among critics.

By the 21st century, The Great Gatsby had sold millions of copies, and the novel is required reading in many high school and college classes. If you want to know about the South, you read Faulkner. If you want to know what America's like, you read The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald is the quintessential American writer. The Great Gatsby ' s popularity led to widespread interest in Fitzgerald himself.

Seven years later, Fitzgerald's friend Edmund Wilson remarked that he now received copious letters from female admirers of Fitzgerald's works and that his flawed alcoholic friend had posthumously become "a semi-divine personage" in the popular imagination. Decades after his death, Fitzgerald's childhood Summit Terrace home in St. Paul became a National Historic Landmark in More so than most contemporary writers of his era, F.

Scott Fitzgerald's authorial voice evolved and matured over time, [ ] and his each successive novel represented a discernible progression in literary quality. For his first novel, Fitzgerald used as his literary templates H. Wells ' work Tono-Bungay and Sir Compton Mackenzie 's novel Sinister Street[ ] which chronicled a young college student's coming-of-age at Oxford University.

Although f scotts fitzgerald biography education praised This Side of Paradise as highly original, they criticised its form and construction. For his sophomore effort, Fitzgerald discarded the trappings of collegiate bildungsromans and crafted an "ironical-pessimistic" [ sic ] novel in the style of Thomas Hardy 's oeuvre. Although critics deemed The Beautiful and Damned to be less ground-breaking than its predecessor, [ ] [ ] many recognized that the vast improvement in literary form and construction between his first and second novels augured great prospects for Fitzgerald's future.

Weaver predicted in that, as Fitzgerald matured as a writer, he would become regarded as one of the greatest authors of American literature. When composing The Great GatsbyFitzgerald chose to depart from the writing process of his previous novels and to fashion a conscious artistic achievement. With the publication of The Great GatsbyFitzgerald had refined his prose style and plot construction, and the literati now hailed him as a master of his craft.

F scott fitzgerald biography education: F. Scott Fitzgerald was

The realization that Fitzgerald had improved as a novelist to point that Gatsby was a masterwork was immediately evident to certain members of the literary world. Eliot believed it represented a turning point in American literature. By this time, the field of literature had greatly changed due to the onset of the Great Depressionand once popular writers such as Fitzgerald and Hemingway who wrote about upper-middle-class lifestyles were now disparaged in literary periodicals whereas so-called " proletarian novelists " enjoyed general applause.

Due to this change, although Fitzgerald showed a mastery of "verbal nuance, flexible rhythm, dramatic construction and essential tragi-comedy" in Tender Is the Night[ ] many reviewers dismissed the work for its disengagement with the political issues of the era. After Fitzgerald's death, writers such as John Dos Passos assayed Fitzgerald's gradual progression in literary quality and posited that his uncompleted fifth novel The Last Tycoon could have been Fitzgerald's greatest achievement.

In contrast to the discernible progression in literary quality and artistic maturity represented by his novels, [ ] Fitzgerald's short stories displayed the opposite tendency and attracted significant criticism. Although a dazzling extemporizer, Fitzgerald's short stories were criticized for lacking both thematic coherence and quality. Commenting upon this tendency in Fitzgerald's short stories, Dos Passos remarked that "everybody who has put pen to paper during the last twenty years has been daily plagued by the difficulty of deciding whether he's to do 'good' writing that will satisfy his conscience or 'cheap' writing that will satisfy his pocketbook A great deal of Fitzgerald's own life was made a hell by this sort of schizophrenia.

Here was a new generation, shouting the old cries, learning the old creeds, through a revery of long days and nights; destined finally to go out into that dirty gray turmoil to follow love and pride; a new generation dedicated more than the last to the fear of poverty and the worship of success; grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken.

For much of his literary career, cultural commentators hailed Fitzgerald as the foremost chronicler of the Jazz Age generation whose lives were defined by the societal transition towards modernity. With his debut novel, Fitzgerald became the first writer to turn the national spotlight upon this generation.