The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" is a short story written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. First published in Collier's Magazine on May 27, 1922, it was subsequently anthologized in Fitzgerald's book Tales of the Jazz Age, which is occasionally published as The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Other Jazz Age Stories. It also was later adapted into the 2008 namesake film and in 2019 into a stage musical.

In 1860 Baltimore, Benjamin is born with the physical appearance of an 80-year-old man, already capable of speech. His father Roger invites neighborhood boys to play with him and orders him to play with children's toys, but Benjamin obeys only to please his father. At five, Benjamin is sent to kindergarten but is quickly withdrawn after he repeatedly falls asleep during child activities.

At the age of 18, Benjamin enrolls in Yale College, but is sent home by officials, who think he is a 50-year-old lunatic. When Benjamin turns 20, the Button family realizes that he is aging backwards.

In 1880, when Benjamin is 20, his father gives him a control of Roger Button & Co. Wholesale Hardware. He meets the young Hildegarde Moncrief, a daughter of General Moncrief, and falls in love with her. Hildegarde mistakes Benjamin for a 50-year-old brother of Roger Button; she prefers older men and marries him six months later, but remains ignorant of his condition. Years later, Benjamin's business has been successful, but he is tired of Hildegarde because her beauty has faded and she nags him.