It was a really tough call, but while Fitzgerald is eloquent to the point of magnificence, and captured a certain Zeitgeist, Hemingway wrote of the human condition, and attempted to redefine prose as he did so. He was an innovator, and Fitzgerald wasn’t. So he gets my vote.
He also won a Nobel prize for his efforts, thus validating my conclusion.
I thought *For Whom the Bell Tolls *was all right. *The Great Gatsby *was tolerable. Of the other works I’ve encountered by these two authors (evil, evil English teachers), I really don’t like any of them.
I don’t think it’s fair to call him an “imitator”. Influenced, of course, but that’s what happens. I still feel he took what Stein gave him, pushed it further and expanded it in terms of innovation, clarity, and “truth”. Sometimes the student exceeds the mentor. He certainly did more to promote the innovations of modernism than any of the other.
I agree, by the way, that Hemingway was an absolute shit to those close to him, in particular Fitzgerald - see A Moveable Feast (and more evidenced in A Very Short Story), but that doesn’t detract from his writing, IMO.
I don’t know what the question is. Several possibilities did come to mind:
Of the two
Who is your favorite?
Who was the better writer?
Who had the greatest range?
Who was the “deepest”?
Who had a greater impact on subsequent writers?
Who will be studied in college english classes the longest?
Who will be read by the average person the longest?
Who is the most quotable?
I would give different answers depending on the question you are asking.