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Dear Abhi,

As you will be well aware (!) proving a negative is often difficult. I can
only say that:

There is no record, to my knowledge, of a book by F. Scott Fitzgerald, or
by Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay in the library at Bateman's (Kipling's home
from 1902), or at Wimpole Hall (his daughter's home, to which some of his
library was taken). I did try searches using the alternate spellings of the
latter. (I was amused to see that you had copy/pasted the spelling
yourself; so did I, initially.).

According to my notes, there are no mentions of a meeting with, or of
correspondence with, F. Scott Fitzgerald.

You will know that there exists a copy of Kipling's *Departmental
Ditties * with
Fitzgerald's rather inaccurate transcription of *The Way Through the
Woods* written
into the back, in pencil, so the influence of our man is clear.

http://library.sc.edu/develop/bruccoli.html

Then there is Kipling's *The Story of the Gadsby's * and Hemingway's hint
that F.S.G. "swiped" titles. Personally, I feel that is no more or less
likely than the use of a hotel name from Mark Twain's *A Tramp Abroad. *

For *Tender is the Night, * we can point up similarities with *The Light
that Failed; *both are semi-autobiographical, covering lost love. The
'heroes' have similar names: Dick Diver and Dick Heldar. Indeed, Maisie,
and Daisy from *T.G.G. * have many similarities... We could go on.

The answer has to be, I think, that you can point to Fitzgerald's own
admission of Kipling's influence, but not suggest that they met or wrote.

For Chattopadhyay, I would welcome an indication of your reason for
suspecting a connection.

I am sorry that I cannot be more positive.

John

John Walker,
Honorary Librarian,
The Kipling Society.