F Scott Fitzgerald

Fitzgerald was born in 1896 to an upper middle class American family. He went to expensive schools and Princeton University (although he never got a degree). He joined the Army when he left university but never fought, as the First World War finished before he got to Europe. He married the woman he loved, Zelda, after he published his first novel. He went on to write three more, but spent most of his time on short stories, not because he preferred these but because they brought him more money. His friend in Paris, Ernest Hemingway, blamed Zelda for her husband’s lazy writing habits. Her love of spending money meant that Fitzgerald could never earn enough from his novels. Zelda became mentally ill with schizophrenia in 1930 and had to live in hospital. Fitzgerald died of a heart attack in 1940. Many of his friends blamed drinking for his early death. However, he left behind him one of the greatest novels of all American literature, ‘The Great Gatsby’.