The Failures and Succeses of F. Scott Fitzgerald

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What’s behind the brilliant mind that created The Great Gatsby and other F. Scott Fitzgerald works? Every author has their own set of inspirations and an eventual downfall of sorts. Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was brought up to succeed in his writing, wholly inspired by the love of his life, Zelda Sayre, and eventually torn down by stress and alcoholism. Fitzgerald’s life came to be in September of 1896 in St. Paul, Minnesota. His father, Edward Fitzgerald, an alcoholic and failed wicker furniture maker, had a proud aristocracy, which his wife, Mary (Mollie) McQuillan, was appreciative of. Mollie had an abundance of inheritance, but no family name to live up too. The family of Catholics lived in upstate New York until Edward was dismissed as a salesman. They then moved back to St. Paul to live off of Mollie’s hefty inheritance. At the tender age of thirteen, Fitzgerald attended the St. Paul Academy. The boring aspects of academics, perhaps, could be the reason Fitzgerald got so into his writing hobby. The academy saw his potential and mistakenly encouraged his passion for writing over his schoolwork. His writing was also strongly encouraged by his mentor, Father Sigourney Fay, at the catholic prep school he began attending at the age of fifteen. Despite his lack of attention towards his schoolwork, Fitzgerald began to attend Princeton University in 1914 on a literacy apprenticeship. He wrote scripts and lyrics for the Princeton Tiger and the Nassau Literary Magazine to fill his time there. Fitzgerald began too neglect his studies, as he had always been known to do, and was placed on academic probation. Due to his academic probation, he was not likely to graduate with the Princeton Class of 1917, and he joined the army as... ... middle of paper ... ...wspapers and magazines and they were unwilling to pay great amounts for his mediocre stories. He was dependant on Tender is the Night to support him while he went into debt with his alcoholism, Zelda’s medical bills, and Scottie’s schooling; the book was a failure. Fitzgerald was on the verge of a mental breakdown. He moved to Hollywood, California, and continued to attempt writing and movie making. He still suffered from not taking his work as seriously as he should. Fitzgerald died of a heart attack in 1940; Zelda followed in death from a fire at Highland Hospital in North Carolina in 1948. The jazz age playboy’s total success didn’t come until many years after his death. Suring his lifetime, his success quickly turned into a downward spiral when he let his early years, his live and inspiration, Zelda Sayre, and his alcoholism effect his passion for writing.

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