Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald´s biography

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald, an author well known for his short stories and novels, was born on September 24th, 1896 in Saint Paul, Minnesota to an upper middle-class family. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest writer’s American soil has produced in the 20th century.

Being from a practicing Catholic family, Scott started his education from Catholic schools in 1903. Since early age Scott developed a reputation of being a boy with unusual aptitude and keen interest in literature. Young Scott’s first publication The Mystery of the Raymond Mortgage was a detective story issued in school’s newspaper at the age of 13. In 1913 Scott was enrolled in Princeton University where his love for theater and writing really came to the fore. He wrote many short stories for Princeton Tiger, a college humor magazine published by Princeton University and scripts for Princeton Triangle Club, a musical comedy society. His association with Triangle Club provided him with an opportunity to submit his first novel, The Romantic Egoist to Charles Scribner’s Sons a renowned publisher and editor of his time. Charles though praised the writing yet rejected the book. Although, it proved to be a great success when finally published after three revisions as This Side of Paradise. In 1917 Fitzgerald left university to join army during World War I. However; war ended soon after his acceptance in army. In 1919 Scott moved to New York City after his discharge from the army.

THIS SIDE OF PARADISE SUMMARY

Amory Blaine is a spoiled little rich kid from Minnesota whose mother constantly dotes on him. He's basically Veruca Salt, only he doesn't fall victim to a bunch of psychotic super-smart squirrels. As he grows up, Amory develops a huge ego and a shallow knowledge of the world, concerning himself more with impressing people than with actually knowing anything. But when he gets old enough to leave home, Amory learns that there's more to life than what his mother has taught him. But it's extremely tough to overcome the years of ego-inflation he's had. He can try to act modest but being modest ain't so easy.

Despite his laziness, Amory gets good enough grades to go to Princeton for his undergraduate degree. The guy knows he's cruising through life, and it's almost as if he wants to fail so he can finally get down to thinking about what matters to him. World War I start before he gets the chance to fail, though, and he spends the last years of his youth fighting in the trenches of Europe.

Amory is lucky enough to return from The Great War alive. But once he's back, he becomes obsessed with the question of what his larger purpose in life is. He thinks he finds his purpose when he starts going out with a beautiful girl named Rosalind. But Rosalind dumps him because he's not successful enough. This breakup seems to be the last straw for Amory, who falls into alcoholism and spends the next year or so killing himself with booze. The only thing that really saves him is the start of Prohibition, which makes alcohol illegal in the U.S.

It'll take more than Prohibition to put Amory's life back on track, but the sad thing about this book is that Fitzgerald ends it without ever giving any kind of resolution to Amory's situation. This is (most likely) because Fitzgerald wrote this book when he was twenty-three, when he was still too young to have any answers himself.

by RICHARD PADRÓ