The text of the short story used to create this guide was taken from: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. Flappers and Philosophers: The Collected Short Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Penguin Classic, 2010. The story was originally published in the Saturday Evening Post on January 18th, 1930.

“Two Wrongs” follows wunderkind New York playwright Bill McChesney and aspiring young South Carolina dancer Emmy Pinkard as they fall in love, marry, and eventually fall out of love due to Bill’s bad behavior and Emmy’s increasing focus on her career as a ballet dancer.

The story begins with 18-year-old Emmy coming to 26-year-old Bill’s office to ask for a job. Bill takes Emmy out to lunch, declaring her the most beautiful person he has ever seen, then invites her up to his apartment. Protesting that Bill is engaged to someone else, Emmy rebuffs Bill’s sexual advances. Nevertheless, warm feelings are kindled between the two of them and Bill gives her a part in his play.

In the second section, Bill causes a scene the night of the play’s dress rehearsal. The lead actress, Bill’s fiancée Irene Rikker, is having an affair with the lead actor, Frank Llewellen. Bill insults Frank to the point of Frank punching Bill in the face. But even though this commotion could have derailed the entire play, Bill displays a certain nobility by swallowing his pride and regaining control of the room. It is this nobility that attracts Emmy, and over the course of the play’s successful run the two fall in love and are married.

The third section jumps forward in time three years into Bill and Emmy’s marriage. The two have had a child and Emmy is pregnant with their second. They are living in London due to the fact that Bill’s drinking and fighting have led to a series of flops in New York. During one of Bill’s particularly wild nights of carousing, Emmy goes to the hospital alone and delivers a stillborn baby. That Emmy fell out of the cab that took her to the hospital makes her feel that it is Bill’s fault that she lost the baby, and she realizes that she does not love him the way she used to.

In the fourth and final section, Bill and Emmy have returned to New York. Emmy, having thrown herself into her dance career with great discipline, discovers that she has an opportunity to have her début at the Metropolitan this season. At the same time, Bill discovers that his lungs are significantly damaged from smoking, and that he has been ordered by his doctor to Colorado to convalesce. In the end, Bill nobly decides to go to Colorado alone, and Emmy decides to stay in New York and focus on her career.