Abstract
One of the world's great boxing writers and Oscar-winning screenwriter talks about the fight game, growing up in Hollywood, F. Scott Fitzgerald, with whom he collaborated on a movie script, and how his first novel, What Makes Sammy Run?, gave him his professional freedom: "I started to realise that I could make a living writing short stories in the Saturday Evening Post and Esquire. I was married also, but knew I wouldn't have to rely upon Hollywood for a living. My father had said to me when he read the manuscript of Sammy, 'After they read this book, you'll never be allowed back here again. How are you going to live?' He couldn't picture how I would survive. So the short story writing was a way out, because they were paying pretty well and I started making a thousand bucks a piece. It may not have been what Scott Fitzgerald was getting, but at that time, in 1938, a thousand bucks was very good money."
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.