Who really said it

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time

Q: Did F. Scott Fitzgerald say "The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time"?

Yes. From Fitzgerald's confessional essay "The Crack-Up," first published in Esquire magazine in February 1936. His exact sentence reads "the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function" — the popular version quoted here has quietly dropped the word "the."

Written by F. Scott Fitzgerald 1896–1940 · American novelist & essayist

Verified In copyright

From Fitzgerald’s confessional essay “The Crack-Up,” first published in Esquire magazine in February 1936. His exact sentence reads “the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function” — the popular version quoted here has quietly dropped the word “the.”

Last verified 8 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time” F. Scott Fitzgerald, "The Crack-Up," Esquire, February 1936

Can you use it?

Still under copyright (rights held by Estate of F. Scott Fitzgerald, published by New Directions Publishing Corp.). A short, credited quote is generally fine for talks, teaching, and internal decks; for commercial, published, or large-scale reuse, get permission.

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Evoking the world of F. Scott Fitzgerald — American novelist & essayist, author of The Great Gatsby. Theme: "The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

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Provenance

The source

Work: “The Crack-Up” (essay)
First published: Esquire magazine, February 1936
Collected in: The Crack-Up (New Directions, 1945, ed. Edmund Wilson)

Before I go on with this short history, let me make a general observation—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. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. The Crack-Up, Esquire, Feb. 1936

The commonly quoted version trims “the” before “mind” and is often cut off before Fitzgerald’s actual point — retaining the ability to function.

Read the full text of "The Crack-Up"

How we verified this

First published in Esquire magazine, February 1936 ↗, as the opening piece of the three-part “Crack-Up” series.
Collected the following decade in The Crack-Up (New Directions, 1945) ↗, edited by Fitzgerald’s friend Edmund Wilson.
The exact passage, including the surrounding sentence about “the ability to function,” is documented by Quote Investigator ↗, which also traces how the wording drifted in later popular use.

In copyright

“The Crack-Up” first appeared in 1936 and was collected in book form in 1945 — both well after the U.S. public-domain cutoff of 1930 — so the essay remains under copyright, currently kept in print by New Directions Publishing ↗.

Fact-check

Often misattributed

The authorship here is not in question — but the wording that circulates online has drifted from what Fitzgerald actually wrote.

Popular quotation sites and social media

Widely reproduce the line as “hold two opposed ideas in mind” and often stop there, whereas Fitzgerald’s original reads “in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function” — a clause that carries his actual point. Quote Investigator ↗ documents the original 1936 wording and how the phrasing evolved over time.

Fitzgerald genuinely wrote this sentence, in his 1936 essay “The Crack-Up” ↗; the version quoted around the internet is simply a lightly trimmed paraphrase of his own words, not a fabrication or a misattribution to the wrong author.

Context

Why it mattered

Fitzgerald wrote “The Crack-Up” during one of the lowest points of his life — broke, drinking heavily, and watching his once-celebrated career stall while his wife Zelda was institutionalized. The essay was startlingly candid for its time: a famous novelist publicly admitting psychological collapse, at a moment when such confessions were rare in American letters.

The line about “first-rate intelligence” appears early in the essay as a general observation before Fitzgerald turns to his own story, describing how he had once been able to hold contradictory beliefs — seeing life as both futile and worth striving in — without being paralyzed by the contradiction.

One should be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Wisdom Doubt

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Full text of "The Crack-Up"pbs.org

PBS American Masters reprint of the complete 1936 essay

Quote Origin: The Test of a First-Rate Intelligencequoteinvestigator.com

Detailed sourcing and history of wording variants

The Crack-Up (1945 collection)ndbooks.com

Publisher page for the book collecting the essay, current rights holder

The Crack-Upen.wikipedia.org

Background on the essay collection and its 1936 Esquire publication

The crack-up with other pieces and storiesarchive.org

Internet Archive catalog record for a print edition of the collection

The author

About F. Scott Fitzgerald

F. Scott Fitzgerald

1896–1940 · American novelist & essayist, author of The Great Gatsby

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was a leading voice of the American “Jazz Age,” best known for the 1925 novel The Great Gatsby. In the mid-1930s, financially strained and in declining health, he wrote a series of unusually candid personal essays for Esquire chronicling his psychological breakdown, later collected as The Crack-Up.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source — Chicago

Fitzgerald, F. Scott. “The Crack-Up.” Esquire, February 1936. Collected in The Crack-Up, edited by Edmund Wilson (New York: New Directions, 1945).

MLA (9th ed.)

Fitzgerald, F. Scott. “The Crack-Up.” The Crack-Up, edited by Edmund Wilson, New Directions, 1945.

APA (7th ed.)

Fitzgerald, F. S. (1945). The crack-up (E. Wilson, Ed.). New Directions. (Original work published 1936)

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time’?” Last verified 8 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/the-test-of-a-first-rate-intelligence-is-the-ability-to