SOURCE: Bucker, Park. “‘Each Time in a New Disguise’: The Author as a Commercial Magazinist.” In F. Scott Fitzgerald: Centenary Exhibition, September 24, 1896-September 24, 1996, pp. 47-8. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press for The Thomas Cooper Library, 1996.

In the following excerpt, Bucker provides a brief overview of Fitzgerald's career as short story writer for commercial magazines.

On February 21, 1920, F. Scott Fitzgerald entered the commercial magazine marketplace when The Saturday Evening Post published “Head and Shoulders,” a bittersweet comedy of young love. With a circulation of more than 2,750,000 weekly readers and a cost of one nickel, the Post offered writers the highest prices and the widest outlet for popular fiction in America. By the end of May 1920, the Post published five more stories by Fitzgerald, placing them prominently and listing his name on the magazine's cover. That spring his first novel, This Side of Paradise, appeared to critical praise, and...