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| Name | Elmore Leonard |
|---|---|
| Birthdate | October 11, 1925 |
| Birthplace | New Orleans, Louisiana |
| Occupation | author, screenwriter |
| Influences | Ernest Hemingway |
| Influenced | Quentin Tarantino |
| Genre | Pulp fiction, Westerns, crime fiction |
Among his best-known works are Get Shorty, Out of Sight, Hombre, Mr. Majestyk and Rum Punch, which was filmed as Jackie Brown. Leonard's short stories include ones that became the films 3:10 to Yuma and The Tall T, as well as the current TV series on FX, Justified.
In the 1930s, two major events occurred that would influence many of his works. Gangsters such as Bonnie and Clyde were making national headlines, as were the Detroit Tigers baseball team. From about 1931 until they were killed in May, 1934, Bonnie and Clyde were on a rampage. The Tigers made it to the World Series in 1934. Leonard developed lifelong fascinations with both sports and guns.
He graduated from the University of Detroit Jesuit High School in 1943, and immediately joined the Navy, where he served with the Seabees for three years in the south Pacific. Enrolling at the University of Detroit in 1946, he pursued writing more seriously, entering his work in short story contests and sending it off to magazines. A year before he graduated, he got a job as a copy writer with Campbell-Ewald Advertising agency, a position he kept for several years and wrote on the side. He graduated in 1950 with a degree in English and Philosophy.
Leonard had his first success in 1951 when Argosy published the short story "Trail of the Apaches". During the 1950s and early 1960s, he continued writing westerns, publishing over 30 short stories. He wrote his first novel, The Bounty Hunters, in 1953 and followed this with four other novels. Two of his stories were turned into movies at this time: The Tall T and 3:10 to Yuma.
Leonard—or "Dutch," as he is sometimes called—got his first break in the fiction market during the 1950s, regularly publishing pulp western novels. He has since forayed into mystery, crime, and more topical genres, as well as screenwriting.
Leonard now lives with his family in Oakland County, Michigan.
Elmore Leonard has been called "the Dickens of Detroit" because of his intimate portraits of people from that city; however, Leonard has said, "If I lived in Buffalo, I'd write about Buffalo." His ear for dialogue and ability to render same on the printed page are considered by some admirers to be uncanny and have been praised by writers such as Saul Bellow, Martin Amis, and Stephen King. "Your prose makes Raymond Chandler look clumsy," Amis told Leonard at a Writers Guild event in Beverly Hills in 1998. Stephen King has called him "the great American writer."
The 1967 film Hombre starring Paul Newman was an adaptation of Leonard's novel of the same name.
His short story "Three-Ten to Yuma" and novels The Big Bounce and 52 Pick-Up have each been filmed twice.
A 2001 comedy film, Bandits, was originally meant to be an adaptation of Leonard's novel by that name, to which Bruce Willis owns the film rights. However, the producers brought in writer Harley Peyton to write a new script from scratch that bears little or no resemblance to Leonard's book.
Other novels filmed include:
Freaky Deaky is scheduled to be filmed in 2011.
The 2010 FX series Justified is based around the popular Leonard character U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens from the novels Pronto and Riding the Rap and the short story "Fire in the Hole."
Leonard was referenced in the television show Leverage in episode 105 "The Bank Shot Job" when Aldis Hodge as Alec Hardison and Beth Riesgraf as Parker introduced themselves to police officers as FBI agents Leonard and Elmore.
Leonard was the recipient of the 2006 Louisiana Writer Award.
In October 2008 Leonard received the F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Award for outstanding achievement in American literature during the 13th Annual F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Conference held at Montgomery College in Rockville, Maryland, United States.
Category:1925 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century novelists Category:21st-century novelists Category:American crime fiction writers Category:American novelists Category:Authors of books about writing fiction Category:Cartier Diamond Dagger winners Category:Edgar Award winners Category:People from Detroit, Michigan Category:People from New Orleans, Louisiana Category:People from Oakland County, Michigan Category:University of Detroit Jesuit High School alumni Category:University of Detroit Mercy alumni Category:Western (genre) writers Category:Writers from Florida Category:Writers from Louisiana Category:Writers from Michigan
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| Name | F. Scott Key Fitzgerald |
|---|---|
| Caption | F. Scott Fitzgerald, photographed by Carl van Vechten in 1937 |
| Birthdate | September 24, 1896 |
| Birthplace | St. Paul, Minnesota, USA |
| Deathdate | December 21, 1940 |
| Deathplace | Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA |
| Occupation | novelist, short story writer, poet |
| Nationality | American |
| Period | 1920–40 |
| Genre | Modernism |
| Movement | Lost Generation |
Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigm writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost Generation" of the 1920s. He finished four novels, This Side of Paradise, The Beautiful and Damned, Tender Is the Night and his most famous, the celebrated classic, The Great Gatsby. A fifth, unfinished novel, The Love of the Last Tycoon was published posthumously. Fitzgerald also wrote many short stories that treat themes of youth and promise along with despair and age. His novels such as The Great Gatsby and Tender is the Night were turned into movies and in 1958 his life from 1937-1940 was picturized in the film Beloved Infidel.
Fitzgerald suffered two heart attacks in late 1940. After the first, in Schwab's Drug Store, he was ordered by his doctor to avoid strenuous exertion. He moved in with Sheilah Graham, who lived in Hollywood on North Hayworth Ave., one block east of Fitzgerald's apartment on North Laurel Ave. Fitzgerald had two flights of stairs to get to his apartment; Graham's was a ground floor apartment. On the night of December 20, 1940, Fitzgerald and Sheilah Graham attended the premiere of "This Thing Called Love" starring Melvyn Douglas and Rosalind Russell. As the two were leaving the Pantages Theater, Fitzgerald experienced a dizzy spell and had trouble leaving the theater; upset, he said to Ms. Graham, "They think I am drunk, don't they?"
The following day, as Scott ate a candy bar and made notes in his newly arrived Princeton Alumni Weekly, Ms. Graham saw him jump from his armchair, grab the mantelpiece, gasp, and fall to the floor. She ran to the manager of the building, Harry Culver, founder of Culver City. Upon entering the apartment and assisting Scott, he stated, "I'm afraid he's dead." Fitzgerald died of a massive heart attack. His body was removed to the Pierce Brothers Mortuary. , inscribed with the final sentence of The Great Gatsby]]
Among the attendants at a visitation held at a funeral home was Dorothy Parker, who reportedly cried and murmured "the poor son-of-a-bitch," a line from Jay Gatsby's funeral in Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. The remains were shipped to Baltimore, Maryland, where his funeral was attended by twenty or thirty people in Bethesda; among the attendants were his only child, Frances "Scottie" Fitzgerald Lanahan Smith, and his editor, Maxwell Perkins. Fitzgerald was originally buried in Rockville Union Cemetery. Zelda died in 1948, in a fire at the Highland Mental Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina. Frances "Scottie" Fitzgerald Lanahan Smith worked to overturn the Archdiocese of Baltimore's ruling that Fitzgerald died a non-practicing Catholic, so that he could be at rest at the Roman Catholic Saint Mary's Cemetery where his father's family was interred. Both Scott's and Zelda's remains were moved to the family plot in Saint Mary's Cemetery, in Rockville, Maryland, in 1975.
Fitzgerald died before he could complete The Love of the Last Tycoon. His manuscript, which included extensive notes for the unwritten part of the novel's story, was edited by his friend, the literary critic Edmund Wilson, and published in 1941 as The Last Tycoon. In 1994 the book was reissued under the original title The Love of the Last Tycoon, which is now agreed to have been Fitzgerald's preferred title.
Into the 21st century, millions of copies of The Great Gatsby and his other works have been sold, and Gatsby, a constant best-seller, is required reading in many high school and college classes.
Fitzgerald is a 2009 inductee of the New Jersey Hall of Fame.
Fitzgerald was the first cousin once removed of Mary Surratt, hanged in 1865 for conspiring to assassinate Abraham Lincoln.
The Japanese Takarazuka Revue has also created a musical adaptation of Fitzgerald's life. Entitled The Last Party: S. Fitzgerald's Last Day, it was produced in 2004 and 2006. Yuhi Oozora and Yūga Yamato starred as Fitzgerald, while Zelda was played by Kanami Ayano and Rui Shijou.
Fitzgerald was portrayed by the actor Malcolm Gets in the 1994 film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle.
The last years of Fitzgerald and his relation with Ms. Graham was the theme of the movie Beloved Infidel (1959). Gregory Peck portrayed Fitzgerald in this film, and Deborah Kerr portrayed Ms Graham.
The Beautiful and the Damned, starring Keira Knightley as Zelda and Leonardo DiCaprio as Scott, is going into production as of 2010.
Zelda Fitzgerald published an autobiographically-charged novel, Save Me the Waltz, in 1934.
The film Beloved Infidel (1959) depicts Fitzgerald (played by Gregory Peck) during his final years as a Hollywood scenarist. The film concentrates on Fitzgerald's relationship with Sheilah Graham (played by Deborah Kerr), the Hollywood gossip columnist with whom he had a years-long affair while his wife, Zelda, was institutionalized. Another film, Last Call (2002) (Jeremy Irons plays Fitzgerald) describes the relationship with Frances Kroll during his last two years of life. The film was based on the memoir of Frances Kroll Ring, titled (1985), that records her experience as secretary to Fitzgerald for the last 20 months of his life.
The standard biographies of Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald are Arthur Mizener's The Far Side of Paradise (1951, 1965) and Matthew Bruccoli's Some Sort of Epic Grandeur (1981). Fitzgerald's letters have also been published in various editions such as Dear Scott, Dearest Zelda: The Love Letters of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, ed. Jackson R. Bryer and Cathy W. Banks (2002); Correspondence of F. Scott Fitzgerald, ed. Matthew Bruccoli and Margaret Duggan (1980), and F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Life in Letters, ed. Matthew Bruccoli (1994).
Fitzgerald appears alongside Pablo Picasso and Ernest Hemingway in the play Villa America by British playwright Crispin Whittell which premiered at Williamstown Theatre Festival (2007).
;Short Story Collections
;Short Stories
;Other
;The Cambridge Edition of the Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald Cambridge University Press is publishing the complete works of F. Scott Fitzgerald in authoritative annotated editions. Twelve volumes have been published.
Category:1896 births Category:1940 deaths Category:Alcohol-related deaths in California Category:American novelists Category:American Roman Catholic writers Category:American short story writers Category:Cardiovascular disease deaths in California Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:American writers of Irish descent Category:People from Saint Paul, Minnesota Category:People self-identifying as alcoholics Category:People with bipolar disorder Category:Writers from Minnesota
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| Name | Raymond Chandler |
|---|---|
| Birthdate | July 23, 1888 |
| Birthplace | Chicago, Illinois, United States |
| Deathdate | March 26, 1959 |
| Deathplace | San Diego, California, United States |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Nationality | American (1888–1907, 1956–1959)British (1907–1956) |
| Period | 1933–1959 |
| Genre | crime fiction, suspense, hardboiled |
| Influences | Dashiell Hammett |
| Influenced | Robert B. Parker, Paul D. Marks, Michael Connelly, Robert Crais, Kelli Stanley, John Shannon |
Chandler disliked the servility of the civil service and resigned, to the consternation of his family, becoming a reporter for the Daily Express and the Bristol Western Gazette newspapers. He was an unsuccessful journalist, published reviews and continued writing romantic poetry. Accounting for that time he said, "Of course in those days as now there were...clever young men who made a decent living as freelances for the numerous literary weeklies..." but "...I was distinctly not a clever young man. Nor was I at all a happy young man."
In 1912, he borrowed money from his uncle (who expected it to be repaid with interest), and returned to North America, eventually settling in Los Angeles with his mother in 1913. He strung tennis rackets, picked fruit and endured a lonely time of scrimping and saving. Finally, he took a correspondence bookkeeping course, finished ahead of schedule, and found steady employment. In 1917, when the US entered World War I, he enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, saw combat in the trenches in France with the Gordon Highlanders, and was undergoing flight training in the fledgling Royal Air Force (RAF) in the United Kingdom at war’s end. By 1932, during his bookkeeping career, he became a highly-paid vice-president of the Dabney Oil Syndicate, but a year later, his alcoholism, absenteeism, and threatened suicide After her death his subsequent loneliness worsened his natural propensity for clinical depression; he returned to drink, never quitting it for long, and the quality and quantity of his writing suffered.
After a respite in England (Chandler regained US citizenship in 1956. Although his swift-moving, hardboiled style was inspired mostly by Dashiell Hammett, his sharp and lyrical similes are original: "The muzzle of the Luger looked like the mouth of the Second Street tunnel;" "He had a heart as big as one of Mae West's hips;" "Dead men are heavier than broken hearts;" "I went back to the seasteps and moved down them as cautiously as a cat on a wet floor." Chandler's writing redefined the private eye fiction genre, led to the coining of the adjective 'Chandleresque', and inevitably became the subject of parody and pastiche. Yet the detective Philip Marlowe is not a stereotypical tough guy, but a complex, sometimes sentimental man with few friends who attended university, speaks some Spanish and sometimes admires Mexicans, and is a student of chess and classical music. He will refuse a prospective client’s money if he is ethically unsatisfied with a job.
The high regard in which Chandler is generally held today is in contrast to the critical sniping that stung the author during his lifetime. In a March 1942 letter to Mrs. Blanche Knopf, published in Selected Letters of Raymond Chandler, Chandler complained, "The thing that rather gets me down is that when I write something that is tough and fast and full of mayhem and murder, I get panned for being tough and fast and full of mayhem and murder, and then when I try to tone down a bit and develop the mental and emotional side of a situation, I get panned for leaving out what I was panned for putting in the first time."
Although his work enjoys general acclaim today, Chandler has been criticised for certain aspects of his work; Washington Post reviewer Patrick Anderson once described his plots as "rambling at best and incoherent at worst", and chastised his treatment of black, female, and homosexual characters, calling him a "rather nasty man". Anderson also acknowledged Chandler's importance as a lyrical writer, and said that, despite his flaws, "he often wrote truly beautiful scenes and descriptions."
Chandler’s short stories and novels are evocatively written, conveying the time, place and ambience of Los Angeles and environs in the 1930s and 1940s. The places are real, if pseudonymous: Bay City is Santa Monica, Gray Lake is Silver Lake, and Idle Valley a synthesis of rich San Fernando Valley communities.
Raymond Chandler was also a perceptive critic of pulp fiction; his essay "The Simple Art of Murder" is the standard reference work in the field.
All but one of his novels have been cinematically adapted. Most notable was The Big Sleep (1946), by Howard Hawks, with Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe. William Faulkner was a co-writer on the screenplay. Raymond Chandler's few screen writing efforts and the cinematic adaptation of his novels proved stylistically and thematically influential upon the American film noir genre.
Category:1888 births Category:1959 deaths Category:American crime fiction writers Category:American mystery writers Category:American novelists Category:American screenwriters Category:English crime fiction writers Category:English mystery writers Category:English novelists Category:English screenwriters Category:Writers from California Category:Edgar Award winners Category:American people of English descent Category:American writers of Irish descent Category:Old Alleynians Category:People from Chicago, Illinois Category:Pulp fiction writers Category:Burials in California Category:Alcohol-related deaths in California Category:Royal Air Force officers
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