F. Scott Fitzgerald

Born in Saint Paul in 1896, Fitzgerald dropped out of Princeton to join the Army in 1917, where he met Zelda Sayre, a Montgomery debutante who refused him until This Side of Paradise became a sensation in 1920. The Beautiful and Damned followed in 1922, and he spent the decade in Europe among the Lost Generation, grinding out magazine stories to fund the lifestyle. The Great Gatsby arrived in 1925 to faint praise and fewer than 23,000 sales. Zelda's schizophrenia and institutionalization shadowed Tender Is the Night in 1934; the Depression killed his market, and he limped to Hollywood for screenwriting work that never took. He died of a heart attack in December 1940, sober at last, leaving The Last Tycoon unfinished.