# F. Scott Fitzgerald's best quotes (with their source)

"So we beat on, boats against the current", the very rich who "are different from you and me" and the first-rate intelligence that holds two opposed ideas at once: F. Scott Fitzgerald's most quoted lines, from The Great Gatsby and The Crack-Up to his stories and letters, each with its source.

- 293 votes · 14 items
- Jan 12, 2021 · Grace Kelly
- https://even.best/en/l/5142/f-scott-fitzgerald-s-best-quotes-with-their-source

## Top 14

1. **Whenever you feel like criticizing any one... just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had.** (31 · ▲31 ▼0) — The Great Gatsby (1925).
2. **The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.** (24 · ▲25 ▼1) — The Crack-Up (1936).
3. **Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.** (20 · ▲21 ▼1) — "The Rich Boy" (1926).
4. **So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.** (18 · ▲20 ▼2) — The Great Gatsby (1925), closing lines.
5. **Either you think — or else others have to think for you and take power from you.** (17 · ▲20 ▼3) — Tender Is the Night (1934).
6. **There are no second acts in American lives.** (15 · ▲20 ▼5) — The Last Tycoon, notes (1941).
7. **All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath.** (14 · ▲16 ▼2) — Letter to his daughter Scottie (undated).
8. **One writes of scars healed, a loose parallel to the pathology of the skin, but there is no such thing in the life of an individual.** (13 · ▲13 ▼0) — Tender Is the Night (1934), bk. 2, ch. 11.
9. **In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day.** (11 · ▲17 ▼6) — The Crack-Up (1936).
10. **The victor belongs to the spoils.** (11 · ▲14 ▼3) — The Beautiful and Damned (1922).
11. **I have never been able to forgive the rich for being rich, and it has colored my entire life and works.** (11 · ▲14 ▼3) — Letter to Harold Ober (4 March 1938).
12. **Family quarrels are bitter things. They don't go according to any rules.** (9 · ▲14 ▼5) — "Babylon Revisited" (1931).
13. **My father has a diamond bigger than the Ritz-Carlton Hotel.** (8 · ▲13 ▼5) — "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz" (1922).
14. **It takes a genius to whine appealingly.** (1 · ▲10 ▼9) — Letter to Maxwell Perkins (October 1924).

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.