Life of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Amanda Benson, Emmanuel Soto, and Brittany Troup

Early Life Born on September 24, 1896 in

St. Paul, Minnesota. Son of Edward Fitzgerald, an

alcoholic that couldn’t keep a job, and Mary McQuillan, whose family had made a small fortune as wholesale grocers.

His first piece of writing appeared in the school newspaper.

At the Newman School, a prestigious Catholic Preparatory School, he met Father Sigourney Fay, who noticed his talent and encouraged him to write

University Went to Princeton University Wrote scripts for Princeton’s

famous Triangle Club musicals, articles for the humor magazine, the Princeton Tiger, and stories for the Nassau Literary Magazine

However, he was placed on academic probation and dropped out of school in 1917 to join the World War I U.S. Army.

Love Life Met Zelda Sayre while commissioned as a

second lieutenant outside of Montgomery, Alabama and fell in love.

Married in New York in 1920. Had a daughter, Frances Scott Fitzgerald

in 1921

Career Breakthroughs This Side of Paradise, published in 1920, turned Fitzgerald into one

of the country’s most promising writers. Supported himself financially by writing short stories for The

Saturday Evening Post and Esquire Notable stories include "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz," "The

Curious Case of Benjamin Button," "The Camel's Back" and "The Last of the Belles.“

Published his second novel in 1922, The Beautiful and Damned, which was about a troubled marriage

Satire of wealth, extravagance, and ambition was common in his work.

The Great Gatsby In 1924, Fitzgerald

moved to France and wrote his greatest novel, The Great Gatsby, a portrayal of the Jazz Age, with critiques of materialism, love, and the American dream. It wasn’t until long after his death that the book became popular.

Later Life Fitzgerald became an alcoholic with

writers block Zelda suffered from mental health

issues and they moved back and forth between France and Delaware. She was treated at many hospitals and mental heath clinics.

In 1934 Fitzgerald published Tender is the Night, about an American psychiatrist

While working on another novel, The Love of the Last Tycoon, he died of a heart attack in California on December 21, 1940. He was 44.

Sources http://

www.biography.com/people/f-scott-fitzgerald-9296261

http://www.pbs.org/kteh/amstorytellers/bios.html

http://www.history.com/topics/f-scott-fitzgerald