Scott Fitzgerald’s America

I wonder what would have happened to Scott Fitzgerald if T. S. Eliot had reviewed The Great Gatsby in print instead of in a private letter. Eliot’s authority just might have spared him those years of neglect, when his books were out of print and his name forgotten. Even more important, a serious review by Eliot perhaps could have steadied him on his proper course as a writer between 1925, when Gatsby appeared, and 1934, when he published Tender Is the Night. Something went badly wrong during those nine years. This comes through clearly in his letters. Fitzgerald seems to lose his sense of who and how valuable he is, and becomes overly dependent upon various kinds of “advice.” But Eliot’s understanding of Gatsby was of a kind that really might have helped, something those essays by Edmund Wilson and others did not and, good as they often were, could not do.

The Great Gatsby, Eliot wrote to Fitzgerald in 1925, “has interested and excited me more than any new novel I have seen, either English or American, for a number of years. When I have time I should like to write to you more fully and tell you exactly why it seems to me such a remarkable book. In fact it seems to me to be the first step that American fiction has taken since Henry James.” Unfortunately, Eliot never did write more fully on these matters, but it is not difficult to guess at the nature of his interest and excitement.

About the Author

Jeffrey Hart

Jeffrey Hart is a contributor to National Review.

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I wonder what would have happened to Scott Fitzgerald if T. S. Eliot had reviewed The Great Gatsby in print instead of in a private letter. Eliot’s authority just might have spared him those years of neglect, when his books were out of print and his name forgotten. Even more important, a serious review by Eliot perhaps could have steadied him on his proper course as a writer between 1925, when Gatsby appeared, and 1934, when he published Tender Is the Night. Something went badly wrong during those nine years. This comes through clearly in his letters. Fitzgerald seems to lose his sense of who and how valuable he is, and becomes overly dependent upon various kinds of “advice.” But Eliot’s understanding of Gatsby was of a kind that really might have helped, something those essays by Edmund Wilson and others did not and, good as they often were, could not do.

The Great Gatsby, Eliot wrote to Fitzgerald in 1925, “has interested and excited me more than any new novel I have seen, either English or American, for a number of years. When I have time I should like to write to you more fully and tell you exactly why it seems to me such a remarkable book. In fact it seems to me to be the first step that American fiction has taken since Henry James.” Unfortunately, Eliot never did write more fully on these matters, but it is not difficult to guess at the nature of his interest and excitement.