F. Scott (Francis Scott) Fitzgerald

Born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, in 1896, Fitzgerald became one of the defining writers of early 20th-century America. He attended Princeton University but left before graduating, later serving in the U.S. Army during World War I. His first novel, This Side of Paradise (1920), made him famous while he was still in his twenties.

He went on to write novels including The Beautiful and Damned, The Great Gatsby, and Tender Is the Night, along with more than 150 short stories. His fiction is closely linked with the Jazz Age, a phrase he helped popularize, and it often explores ambition, wealth, love, and the gap between dreams and reality.

His marriage to Zelda Sayre became almost as famous as his writing, and their restless, often difficult life in the United States and Europe has become part of his legend. Fitzgerald died in Hollywood in 1940, but his reputation only grew after his death, with The Great Gatsby in particular coming to be seen as one of the classics of American literature.