I’ll be posting about the Hemingway/Fitzgerald connection in a few weeks. However, this is timely.
I just read the above review in the New York Times. I’m a few weeks behind on my reading but this is the review of a play depicting a last meeting between Hemingway and Fitzgerald. It’s fictional and takes place in 1937, about 4 years before Fitzgerald died of a heart attack and Hem was working fairly well around that time. There is a comment that Hemingway is “slyly” trying to undermine Scott’s comeback. I don’t know why so many commentators feel the need to emphasize–unfairly and incorrectly, in my opinion–Hemingway’s bluster and dominance. He was all that but I see little effort to equally point out his generosity and kindness. And while there is no question that he felt literary rivalry with Scott, there is little if any evidence that he tried to undermine him or sabotage his success. While he took a swipe at Scott in A Moveable Feast, let’s recall that Hem never edited or finished it. It was published post-humously and edited first by Mary and a subsequent edition by his grandson. That whole section may have gone out or been amended significantly had Hemingway lived to complete it himself.
Anyway, both Hemingway and Fitzgerald continue to be a draw and to fascinate the next generation, perhaps equally for their lives and their legend as for their writing.
