F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Great Gatsby

The “F” in the author’s name stands for Francis. He was named after his ancestor Francis Scott Key, who was the author of “The Star Spangled Banner”, The national anthem of the United States.

F. Scott Fitzgerald was born on September 24, 1896, in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Mother: Mary McQuillan (Irish/Catholic grocer, who made a small fortune in this business)Father: Edward Fitzgerald (Opened a wicker furniture business; then became a salesman for Procter & Gamble but lost his job in 1908.

Do you know what the “F” stands for?

When he was 13 years old he saw his first piece of writing appear in print (a detective story published in his school’s newspaper). When he was in high school he was encouraged by a catholic priest to pursue his writing career and went on to Princeton University to do this. But his writing career came at the expense of his coursework and in 1917 he dropped out of school and joined the army.

Early Years

He was afraid of dying in World War I so he wrote a novel, The Romantic Egotist, but it was rejected by a publisher. The novel’s new incarnation, This Side of Paradise, was published in 1920 and turned Fitzgerald into one of America’s most prominent young writers. He got married a week later to Zelda Sayre, his longtime sweetheart, and in 1921 a daughter was born to them.

Early Years

After becoming a celebrity Fitzgerald embarked on an extravagant lifestyle that earned him a reputation of a playboy and his reputation as a serious literary writer hindered. He began to write short stories after this such as “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” and “The Diamond as Big as the Ritz.” In 1922 he published his second novel, The Beautiful and the Damned, which helped to cement his status as one of the greatest chroniclers and satirists of the culture of wealth, extravagance and ambition that emerged during the 1920s, also known as The Jazz Age.

Later Years

In 1924 he moved to France and there he wrote his greatest novel, The Great Gatsby, published in 1925. The book was well received when published but it wasn’t until the 1950s and 60s, long after his death, that it received its stature as “the definite portrait of the roaring twenties and one of the greatest American novels ever written.”

Later Years

Fitzgerald was a heavy drinker; his wife suffered from some mental health issues as well because they moved back and forth from Delaware and France in the 1920s.

Fitzgerald died on December 21, 1940 at the age of 44 from a heart attack. He died thinking himself a failure. Since his death, Fitzgerald has gained a reputation as one of the preeminent authors in the history of American literature due mainly to The Great Gatsby.

Final Years

In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald offers a vivid picture of the artistic, social, political and economic climate of the decade preceding the stock market crash and the Great Depression; it discloses the psychological outburst of release and relief after the sacrifice and deprivation associated with World War I.

The Novel

During this time the American economy soared, bringing unprecedented levels of prosperity to the nation. Prohibition, the ban on the sale and consumption of alcohol mandated by the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution (1919), made millionaires out of bootleggers (people who made alcoholic liquor illegally) and an underground culture of revelry sprang up. The chaos and violence of World War I left America in a state of shock, and the generation that fought the war turned to wild and extravagant living to compensate.

The Novel

The novel is often associated with the American Dream, the hope and search for happiness, success and fulfillment. It also depicts its counterpart; the failure of that dream because of corruption, intolerance and self-interest.

The Novel

The Great Gatsby is rich in imagery, figurative language, symbols, foreshadowing, irony, paradox, diction and syntax.

Fitzgerald criticizes society here, materialistic society.

The Novel