Meet MacKenzie Scott, the philanthropist determined to give away her fortune to charity, who was married to Jeff Bezos, and just filed for divorce from her second husband

Áine CainSep 30, 2022, 01:06 IST

MacKenzie Scott is an award-winning novelist.Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott and her second husband, Dan Jewett, filed for divorce.
She is an award-winning novelist, who's had literary ambitions since she was 6 years old.

When Jeff Bezos told his then-wife MacKenzie Scott about his idea for a new company, she was immediately on board.

She traveled with her husband to Seattle, where she worked for the fledgling Amazon as an accountant. The move was a bit of a departure for the Princeton grad, who had long dreamed of becoming a writer. But she was eager to support her husband.

"To me, watching your spouse, somebody that you love, have an adventure — what is better than that?" Scott said during an interview with CBS.

Since the early days of Amazon, Scott has gone on to pursue her literary dreams, publishing two novels, "The Testing of Luther Albright" in 2005 and "Traps" in 2013.

The couple announced their plans to divorce in January 2019, and declared that they had finalized the terms of their divorce on April 4, 2019. In a tweet, Scott explained that she would be passing on "all of my interests in the Washington Post and Blue Origin, and 75% of our Amazon stock plus voting control of my shares to support his continued contributions with the teams of those incredible companies." The divorce left her with a 3% stake in Amazon.

In 2021, Scott remarried, tying the knot with school teacher Dan Jewett. In September 2022, the couple filed for divorce. Today, Scott has a net worth of $27.8 billion, as per the Bloomberg's Billionaires Index. She has extensively pursued philanthropic efforts, and vowed to give away her fortune.

Here's a look at the career of award-winning novelist and philanthropist:

Scott grew up in San Francisco. She told Vogue she was a shy child who would often stay in her bedroom writing "elaborate stories."

A stock image of someone writing a letter.iStock/Getty Images

Source: Vogue

She authored her first book — "The Book Worm" — at the age of 6. The handwritten, 142-page novel was later lost in a flood, according to her Amazon author bio.

Astrakan Images/Getty Images

Source: Amazon

She authored her first book — "The Book Worm" — at the age of 6. The handwritten, 142-page novel was later lost in a flood, according to her Amazon author bio.

Source: Amazon

For high school, Scott attended Hotchkiss, a Connecticut boarding school, then went on to Princeton to study fiction with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Toni Morrison.

People walk through the Princeton University campus in Princeton, N.J., Thursday, April 5, 2018.AP Photo/Seth Wenig

Source: Vogue

Morrison told Vogue that Scott was "one of the best students I've ever had in my creative-writing classes ... really one of the best."

FILE - In this Nov. 25, 2005 file photo, author Toni Morrison listens to Mexicos Carlos Monsivais during the Julio Cortazar professorship conference at the Guadalajara's University in Guadalajara City, Mexico. The Nobel Prize-winning author has died. Publisher Alfred A. Knopf says Morrison died Monday, Aug. 5, 2019 at Montefiore Medical Center in New York. She was 88.AP Photo/Guillermo Arias

Source: Vogue

During college, Scott also worked as a dishwasher, waitress, clothing salesperson, deli cashier, restaurant hostess, library monitor, data entry clerk, tutor, nanny, and research assistant to Toni Morrison, according to her Amazon bio.

Mariah Tauger/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

Source: Vogue

During college, Scott also worked as a dishwasher, waitress, clothing salesperson, deli cashier, restaurant hostess, library monitor, data entry clerk, tutor, nanny, and research assistant to Toni Morrison, according to her Amazon bio.

After graduation, Scott took a job "to pay the bills while she wrote," according to Vogue. She went to work as a research associate for investment management firm D.E. Shaw.

Erin Cadigan/Shutterstock

Source: Business Insider, Forbes, Vogue

After graduation, Scott took a job "to pay the bills while she wrote," according to Vogue. She went to work as a research associate for investment management firm D.E. Shaw.

Source: Business Insider, Forbes, Vogue

Her future husband and fellow Princeton grad Jeff Bezos, who was one of the firm's vice presidents at the time, was the first person to interview her. Later on, she asked him out to lunch.

Mackenzie Scott and Jeff Bezos back in 2018.Mike Coppola/VF18/Getty Images for VF

Source: Business Insider, Forbes, Vogue

Her future husband and fellow Princeton grad Jeff Bezos, who was one of the firm's vice presidents at the time, was the first person to interview her. Later on, she asked him out to lunch.

Source: Business Insider, Forbes, Vogue

They became engaged three months later, and wed three months after that. The following year, in 1994, the couple quit their jobs and traveled to Seattle to found Amazon.

Seattle's skyline.David Ryder/Getty Images)

Source: Business Insider, CBS This Morning

They became engaged three months later, and wed three months after that. The following year, in 1994, the couple quit their jobs and traveled to Seattle to found Amazon.

Source: Business Insider, CBS This Morning

Scott became an accountant for her then-husband's new company and was one of Amazon's earliest employees.

Mackenzie Scott and Jeff Bezos in 2017.Jerod Harris/Getty Images

Source: Business Insider, CBS This Morning

Bezos told Vogue he would sometimes wake up during vacations to find his then-wife working on her first novel in hotel bathrooms. It ultimately took Scott 10 years to write and publish "The Testing of Luther Albright."

Jeff Bezos.Samir Hussein/WireImage

Source: Vogue

Bezos told Vogue he would sometimes wake up during vacations to find his then-wife working on her first novel in hotel bathrooms. It ultimately took Scott 10 years to write and publish "The Testing of Luther Albright."

Scott told Vogue her growing family took precedence over her writing. "After the third child, I knew I couldn't be the kind of parent I wanted to be and continue writing. Those years were just too busy."

MacKenzie Scott and Jeff Bezos.Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Source: Vogue

Scott told Vogue her growing family took precedence over her writing. "After the third child, I knew I couldn't be the kind of parent I wanted to be and continue writing. Those years were just too busy."

Scott's first novel won an American Book Award in 2005. For her second novel, "Traps," she decided to motivate herself by not sharing her incomplete work with her then-husband.

Jeff Bezos.aul Ellis - Pool/Getty Images

Source: Heavy.com, Vogue

Scott's first novel won an American Book Award in 2005. For her second novel, "Traps," she decided to motivate herself by not sharing her incomplete work with her then-husband.

Source: Heavy.com, Vogue

She also told Vogue the strategy was a difficult one, because Bezos was her "best reader." He'd often drop other plans to read and carefully review manuscripts of her first novel.

Jeff Bezos.Emma McIntyre/Getty Images

Source: Vogue

She also told Vogue the strategy was a difficult one, because Bezos was her "best reader." He'd often drop other plans to read and carefully review manuscripts of her first novel.

To eliminate any distractions, Scott would work in her own small apartment. There, she'd write until it was time to pick the kids up from school.

Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Scott.Paul Mounce/Corbis via Getty Images

Source: Vogue

"The sooner I finished, the sooner I could share it with him and talk about these characters who had been taking up so much space in my head," Scott told Vogue. "By the last three months, they were so real and important to me, I could start crying just thinking about them while driving to pick up the kids from school."

MacKenzie Scott and Jeff Bezos.Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

Source: Heavy.com, Vogue

"The sooner I finished, the sooner I could share it with him and talk about these characters who had been taking up so much space in my head," Scott told Vogue. "By the last three months, they were so real and important to me, I could start crying just thinking about them while driving to pick up the kids from school."

Source: Heavy.com, Vogue

Once "Traps" was published in 2013, Scott didn't sign on for Amazon's new publishing imprint. "We are calling her the fish that got away," Jeff told Vogue.

Jeff Bezos.Dave J Hogan/Dave J. Hogan/Getty Images

Source: Heavy.com, Vogue

Scott strived to write daily to be "engaged with the story." "I have to keep up these pretend people in order for them to have space in my life," she told Seattle Met. "Basically, it works best for me to get up early and write a little bit before I talk to anybody, so I'll usually write in two chunks: one before the kids get up — and then I'll have my morning with them — and then while they're at school I'll write some more."

Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Scott.MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images

Source: Seattle Met

Scott strived to write daily to be "engaged with the story." "I have to keep up these pretend people in order for them to have space in my life," she told Seattle Met. "Basically, it works best for me to get up early and write a little bit before I talk to anybody, so I'll usually write in two chunks: one before the kids get up — and then I'll have my morning with them — and then while they're at school I'll write some more."

Source: Seattle Met

In a post on publisher Weidenfeld and Nicolson's blog, Scott said of publishing "Traps": "I have no specific hopes about what anyone might think or feel reading 'Traps' except that they have fun, and that it feels real and powerful enough to them to affect how they see their own lives a little bit."

MacKenzie Scott and Jeff Bezos.Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Moet & Chandon

Source: Weidenfeld and Nicolson

In a post on publisher Weidenfeld and Nicolson's blog, Scott said of publishing "Traps": "I have no specific hopes about what anyone might think or feel reading 'Traps' except that they have fun, and that it feels real and powerful enough to them to affect how they see their own lives a little bit."

Source: Weidenfeld and Nicolson

"One of my favorite things about books is the collaboration between the writer's imagination and each reader's personal experience," she wrote. She said she could pick up a book she'd read 10 years before and "in many ways it will feel like a different story to me because my own struggles and preoccupations focus my attention on different things."

MacKenzie Scott and Jeff Bezos.Stephen Lovekin/FilmMagic/Getty Images

Source: Weidenfeld and Nicolson

"One of my favorite things about books is the collaboration between the writer's imagination and each reader's personal experience," she wrote. She said she could pick up a book she'd read 10 years before and "in many ways it will feel like a different story to me because my own struggles and preoccupations focus my attention on different things."

Source: Weidenfeld and Nicolson

The writer was thrust into the news in 2019, due to her highly publicized divorce from the Amazon founder.

Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Source: Business Insider

On April 4, 2019, she announced that she would grant her ex-husband 75% of their jointly owned Amazon stock, leaving her with an estimated $35.7 billion stake.

Amazon packages at a Baltimore facility.REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne

Source: Business Insider

That kind of money would still leave Scott as, according to different publications, either the third- or fourth-richest woman on the planet.

MacKenzie Scott.Greg Doherty/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

Source: Business Insider

Since divorcing Bezos, Scott married a teacher named Dan Jewett in 2021, but the couple filed for divorce in September 2022.

MacKenzie Scott.Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Amazon Studios

Source: Insider

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Meet MacKenzie Scott, the philanthropist determined to give away her fortune to charity, who was married to Jeff Bezos, and just filed for divorce from her second husband

Scott grew up in San Francisco. She told Vogue she was a shy child who would often stay in her bedroom writing "elaborate stories."

She authored her first book — "The Book Worm" — at the age of 6. The handwritten, 142-page novel was later lost in a flood, according to her Amazon author bio.

For high school, Scott attended Hotchkiss, a Connecticut boarding school, then went on to Princeton to study fiction with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Toni Morrison.

Morrison told Vogue that Scott was "one of the best students I've ever had in my creative-writing classes ... really one of the best."

During college, Scott also worked as a dishwasher, waitress, clothing salesperson, deli cashier, restaurant hostess, library monitor, data entry clerk, tutor, nanny, and research assistant to Toni Morrison, according to her Amazon bio.

After graduation, Scott took a job "to pay the bills while she wrote," according to Vogue. She went to work as a research associate for investment management firm D.E. Shaw.

Her future husband and fellow Princeton grad Jeff Bezos, who was one of the firm's vice presidents at the time, was the first person to interview her. Later on, she asked him out to lunch.

They became engaged three months later, and wed three months after that. The following year, in 1994, the couple quit their jobs and traveled to Seattle to found Amazon.

Scott became an accountant for her then-husband's new company and was one of Amazon's earliest employees.

Bezos told Vogue he would sometimes wake up during vacations to find his then-wife working on her first novel in hotel bathrooms. It ultimately took Scott 10 years to write and publish "The Testing of Luther Albright."

Scott told Vogue her growing family took precedence over her writing. "After the third child, I knew I couldn't be the kind of parent I wanted to be and continue writing. Those years were just too busy."

Scott's first novel won an American Book Award in 2005. For her second novel, "Traps," she decided to motivate herself by not sharing her incomplete work with her then-husband.

She also told Vogue the strategy was a difficult one, because Bezos was her "best reader." He'd often drop other plans to read and carefully review manuscripts of her first novel.

To eliminate any distractions, Scott would work in her own small apartment. There, she'd write until it was time to pick the kids up from school.

Once "Traps" was published in 2013, Scott didn't sign on for Amazon's new publishing imprint. "We are calling her the fish that got away," Jeff told Vogue.

The writer was thrust into the news in 2019, due to her highly publicized divorce from the Amazon founder.

On April 4, 2019, she announced that she would grant her ex-husband 75% of their jointly owned Amazon stock, leaving her with an estimated $35.7 billion stake.

That kind of money would still leave Scott as, according to different publications, either the third- or fourth-richest woman on the planet.

Since divorcing Bezos, Scott married a teacher named Dan Jewett in 2021, but the couple filed for divorce in September 2022.