In 1922, Fitzgerald published his second novel, The Beautiful and Damned, the story of the troubled marriage of Anthony and Gloria Patch. He eagerly embraced his newly minted celebrity status and embarked on an extravagant lifestyle that earned him a reputation as a playboy and hindered his reputation as a serious literary writer.
Almost overnight, it turned Fitzgerald, at the age of 24, into one of the country's most promising young writers. The novel was published in 1920 to glowing reviews. The story was centered on Amory Blaine, an ambitious Midwesterner who falls in love with, but is ultimately rejected by, two girls from high-class families. This Side of Paradise is a largely autobiographical story about love and greed. He quit his job after only a few months, however, and returned to St.
Upon his discharge, he moved to New York City hoping to launch a career in advertising lucrative enough to convince his girlfriend, Zelda, to marry him. The war ended in November 1918, before Fitzgerald was ever deployed. Though the publisher, Charles Scribner's Sons, rejected the novel, the reviewer noted its originality and encouraged Fitzgerald to submit more work in the future.įitzgerald was commissioned a second lieutenant in the infantry and assigned to Camp Sheridan outside of Montgomery, Alabama. Afraid that he might die in World War I with his literary dreams unfulfilled, in the weeks before reporting to duty, Fitzgerald hastily wrote a novel called The Romantic Egotist. He was placed on academic probation, and, in 1917, he dropped out of school to join the U.S. However, Fitzgerald's writing came at the expense of his coursework. At Princeton, he firmly dedicated himself to honing his craft as a writer, writing scripts for Princeton's famous Triangle Club musicals as well as frequent articles for the Princeton Tiger humor magazine and stories for the Nassau Literary Magazine. There, he met Father Sigourney Fay, who noticed his incipient talent with the written word and encouraged him to pursue his literary ambitions.Īfter graduating from the Newman School in 1913, Fitzgerald decided to stay in New Jersey to continue his artistic development at Princeton University. In 1911, when Fitzgerald was 15 years old, his parents sent him to the Newman School, a prestigious Catholic preparatory school in New Jersey. When he was 13, he saw his first piece of writing appear in print: a detective story published in the school newspaper. Paul in 1908 to live off of his mother's inheritance.įitzgerald was a bright, handsome and ambitious boy, the pride and joy of his parents and especially his mother. When Fitzgerald was 12, Edward lost his job with Procter & Gamble, and the family moved back to St. During the first decade of Fitzgerald's life, his father’s job took the family back and forth between Buffalo and Syracuse in upstate New York. Paul, and, when it failed, took a job as a salesman for Procter & Gamble. His father, Edward Fitzgerald, had opened a wicker furniture business in St. Fitzgerald’s namesake (and second cousin three times removed on his father's side) was Francis Scott Key, who wrote the lyrics to the "Star-Spangled Banner."įitzgerald's mother, Mary McQuillan, was from an Irish-Catholic family that made a small fortune in Minnesota as wholesale grocers. Family, Education and Early Lifeįrancis Scott Fitzgerald was born on September 24, 1896, in St. He died of a heart attack in 1940, at age 44, his final novel only half completed. Following the unsuccessful Tender Is the Night, Fitzgerald moved to Hollywood and became a scriptwriter. However by the end of the 1920s Fitzgerald descended into drinking, and Zelda had a mental breakdown. One week later, he married the woman he loved and his muse, Zelda Sayre. Perhaps the quintessential American novel, as well as a definitive social history of the Jazz Age, The Great Gatsby has become required reading for virtually every American high school student and has had a transportive effect on generation after generation of readers.Īt the age of 24, the success of his first novel, This Side of Paradise, made Fitzgerald famous. Scott Fitzgerald was a short story writer and novelist considered one of the pre-eminent authors in the history of American literature due almost entirely to the enormous posthumous success of his third book, The Great Gatsby.
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