Despite numerous attempts to portray legendary American author F. Scott Fitzgerald as a harsh critic of American market capitalism as though this meant he was in favor of communism, he is quoted with several anti-communism expressions.
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In his critique of the revisionist biography by David S. Brown, that depicts Fitzgerald as a critic of market capitalism, Edward Short writes,”Fitzgerald can scarcely be credited with criticizing market capitalists by reminding them of a well-known reality. Second, Fitzgerald was nothing if not a lifelong fan of capitalism’s fruits”.
These are some of the quotes that F. Scott Fitzgerald is credited as having said or written at some point during his life.
from goodreads.com
“Communism as I see it has no place in the United States, and the American people will not stand for its teachings.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald
“I could never be a Communist. I could never be regimented. I could never be told what to write.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Great Gatsby
Born Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald on September 24, 1896, the legendary American author of the Great Gatsby was born into an upper-middle class family in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Fitzgerald dropped out of Princeton University in 1917 to join the U.S. Army. During this time period he met the socialite Zelda Sayre in Alabama. She marreid him reluctantly, because of his lower financial status, after his publishing of This Side Of Paradise.
The characters of The Great Gatsby are based on the people in Fitzgerald’s life. Jay Gatsby is supposedly based on World War I officer, Max Gerlach.
One of the characters, Meyer Wolfsheim, is a clear allusion of Arnold Rothstein, who fixed the 1919 World Series.
F. Scott Fitzgerald Anti-Communism In Later Works
Other works, such as the collection of correspondence between author F. Scott Fitzgerald and his editor, Maxwell Perkins, shed light on his criticism of the ideology of communism.
In Dear Scott/Dear Max: The F. Scott Fitzgerald – Maxwell Perkins Correspondence Fitzgerald writes, “Communism…must of necessity be a saddening process for anyone who has ever tasted the intellectual pleasures of the world we live in.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald Was Anti-Communist?
Fitzgerald is characterized as having a low opinion indeed of communism, based on these quotes that he is credited as having said or written during his life.
Others describe the author as “uninterested in politics or economies”.
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