‘Gatsby of Cambridge’ admits lying her way into university
A SOCIAL media influencer known as the Great Gatsby of Cambridge has admitted lying on her entrance forms.
Caroline Calloway went viral in 2015 as she described her enviable undergraduate lifestyle at the university.
The 31-year- old American had hundreds of thousands of followers on Instagram and signed a sixfigure sum for a book deal on the strength of her appeal.
But she has admitted faking her qualifications to be accepted – at the third attempt – to study history of art at St Edmund’s College from 2013 to 2016. ‘I lied on my application. I forged my transcript when I got in,’ she told Vanity Fair.
A transcript is effectively a CV of academic qualifications, listing what courses have been taken and results obtained.
Ms Calloway shared her colourful student lifestyle through photos and captions on her Instagram account, which she set up a year before arriving at Cambridge. They showed her punting on the Cam, smiling outside King’s College Chapel, quaffing bubbly and partying in ball gowns, as well as sharing images of herself in swimsuits while holidaying in picturesque locations.
‘I feel like I’m Harry Potter, turning up for dinner in the grand hall in my robes and having beautiful three- course meals,’ the New
‘I love all the history’
Yorker told the Mail at the time.
‘I’m still getting used to which way to lean when they serve you. I can’t tell the amount of times I’ve had to Google etiquette.’
By 2015 she had signed a £400,000 deal to write School Girl, which would have expanded on her Cambridge experiences. But she failed to complete the book and ended up selling chapters online as she tried to repay the publisher.
More controversy followed in 2019 when a series of ‘creative workshops’ flopped. She later reimbursed customers.
That year former friend Natalie Beach claimed to have been largely responsible for Miss Calloway’s success, including her memorable Instagram captions.
Ms Calloway, who now lives in Sarasota, Florida, ended up wiping her Instagram account just after she admitted starting an Only Fans account to help pay off the debts to her publisher. She posed for ‘cerebral softcore porn’ in which she went topless as characters from literature. She has just announced a new book, Scammer.
St Edmund’s failed to respond to a request for comment yesterday but has told student university newspaper, Varsity: ‘We cannot comment on individual students, however, we take statements like this very seriously.’
Published in 1925 by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby was narrated by Nick Carraway and details his relationship with Jay Gatsby, the young, mysterious tycoon who lives a gilded life.