F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

F. Scott Fitzgerald is recognized as one of the main authors, not only in America, but of the Modernist literary movement in general. However, his figure has never been considered to be important until after his death. If you are curious to know a little bit more about one of the most brilliant authors of Modernist history, here you have a piece of his life.

Biography

According to the biography provided by the History website, F. Scott Fitzgerald was an American writer - born in 1866 and died in 1940 – who was an important figure that "rose to prominence as a chronicler of the jazz age". Born in St. Paul, Minnesota, he attended Princeton University, which he left in order to enlist in the US Army. 

In 1913, when he was already enrolled in Princeton he became close to Edmund Wilson and John Peale Bishop, and employed that time to write “lyrics for Triangle Club theatrical productionsand analyzing how to triumph over the school’s intricate social rituals.”  However, he did not even finish his studies and quit before graduating.

When he married his wife, Zelda, his life spiraled down towards excess; they left for the European city of Paris, where his days were all about drinking, dancing, and enyoing life to the fullest. Nevertheless, this was only a way of avoiding the truth, trying to run from real life; the reality was that of a writer who strove to make enough money out of his writings in order to continue with his pretentious life. 

After some years of prolific writings, he achieved certain recognition in the world of letters. But his personal life would never remain untroubled, his wife Zelda could not take the fame and the jealousy it produced inside of her; she became mentally insane when Fitzgerald started to shine up as a celebrity in the world of literature. He was forced to come back to America in 1931, and the former life they had led changed drastically; the Great Depression had left America broken to pieces, it was “a land no longer interested in flaming youth except to pillory them fortheir excesses.”

All these circumstances put an end to Fitzgerald’s prosperous years. From this point on, it only got worse, trying to struggle against his failure and his alcoholic tendency. He worked as a scriptwriter to earn a living, while he somehow managed to start writing The Last Tycoon (1941), his final and unfinished work; he was working on it when a heart attack ended his life. It was not until the fifties that F. Scott Fitzgerald started to be recognized as a brilliant and virtuous writer; it is in the middle of this 20^th century that the interest in this author increased, and his works were studied more in-depth. All in all, the most remarkable feature that defines F. Scott Fitzgerald as a literary figure is that he “has become himself an important context inseparable virtually inseparable from two of the most exciting, complex, and turbulent eras in American history: The Jazz Age and the Great Depression” (Mangum, 2013: xxi)

Although not many of his works are widely known, he was a very prolific writer. The webpage Wikipedia gathers a list of all the titles of all his works, including short stories. There are countless of them, but his most famous novels are the ones listed below.

Novels

• This Side of Paradise (1920)
• The Beautiful and Damned (1922)
• The Great Gatsby (1925)
• Tender Is the Night (1934)
• The Love of the Last Tycoon (1941)

       In the list mentioned above, The Great Gatsby is probably his most famous novel. The plot is developed in the roaring 20's, an era of excess and vices; here a gangster  moves to a rich neighborhood of New York, as he learns that the love of his life lives there. His intentions are to get her love back, but the decisions he makes along the way, and the circumstances surrounding them lead to an unexpected end.

       If you want to learn MORE ABOUT THE GREAT GATSBY click HERE

Reference List

“F. Scott Fitzgerald” History.com. Web 04 March 2015

Mangum, Bryant. F. Scott Fitzgerald in Context. Cambridge University Press, 2013. Print.

“Bibliography” Wikipedia.org. Web 04 March 2015 

“The Great Gatsby: Plot Overview” Litcharts.com. Web 17 April 2015