Zelda Fitzgerald

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Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald (July 24, 1900 - March 10, 1948), born Zelda Sayre in Montgomery, Alabama, was the wife of writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, whom she married in 1920. She published an autobiographical novel, Save Me the Waltz, in 1932. Considered by many of her era to embody the quintessential flapper, Fitzgerald gained notoriety as much for her own exploits and demise as for her role in inspiring many of her husband's most famous characters, especially Nicole Diver of Tender is the Night.

In 1930 she suffered her first mental breakdown, which eventually led to her being sent to a mental hospital. She died at the age of 47 in a fire at the Highland Mental Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina. Eight other patients were also killed.

Biography

Born in 1900, Zelda was known as a fearless child. She was totally indulged by her mother, who spoiled her, but her father, one of Alabama's leading jurists, was a stern and remote man.

Her school career was notable only for her failing grades and her utterly careless attitude regarding the consequences of her often outrageous actions. She had few friends among girls, but enjoyed an active social life with many admirers; with her naturally blonde hair, flawless skin and striking dark eyes, she was widely regarded as one of the most beautiful girls in the state. On one occasion during her courtship with Fitzgerald, when she attended a ball in another town, she was met at the train by four college boys, each of whom she had separately promised could be her escort for the weekend.

Zelda met Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald shortly before the end of World War I, while he was stationed at an army base near Montgomery. Her courtship with Scott was one riddled with obstacles. He resented that she dated other men while pledging her love to him; she was jealous of his writing ability but she also considered him weak and indecisive.

These rivalries festered throughout their subsequent marriage in 1920, which was punctuated by Scott's escalating alcoholism -- although both he and Zelda drank very heavily and almost constantly throughout the 1920s -- and by Zelda's gradual mental deterioration, which was eventually diagnosed as schizophrenia.

The couple originally settled in New York, where they met the leading lights of American letters, but after Scott achieved major success as a writer they were able to travel overseas, making numerous trips to Europe. During this period the beautiful, carefree Zelda and the handsome Scott came to epitomise the youthful spirit of the Twenties, and they were regularly feted by the press, elevated to a status more or less on a par with the biggest movie stars of the time.

But the endless round of parties and the massive quantities of alcohol they consumed began to take a toll on the couple's health and relationship, and they squandered virtually all the money Scott made from his writing, spending as much as US$30,000 per year -- a colossal figure for the time. By the mid-Twenties Scott had become a notoriously heavy drinker (he even had his own private bootlegger) and when not writing he would typically binge-drink until he passed out and was sent home in a taxi.

While living in Paris, Scott Fitzgerald -- by then an international literary star -- met rising American author Ernest Hemingway, whose career he did much to promote. Hemingway and Fitzgerald became firm friends (although they later became estranged) but as biographer Nancy Milford reports, it is notable that Zelda disliked Hemingway from the start, openly describing him as "bogus" and "as phoney as a rubber check", and considering Hemingway's domineering macho persona to be merely a posture.

For the most part, Zelda's dislike for Hemingway was obviously due to jealousy -- she once feigned jumping off a 100-foot cliff at a party because Scott, engrossed in talking to Isadora Duncan, was ignoring her -- but it is fascinating in retrospect to reflect on Zelda's estimation of Hemingway's character, given what has been written in recent years concerning the supposedly fetishistic aspects of Hemingway's writing and his alleged obsession with gender roles. It is also curious to note that one of the most serious rifts between Zelda and Scott took place because Zelda became convinced (albeit with no credible evidence) that Hemingway was "a fairy" and that he and Scott were having a homosexual affair.

The birth of their only child, Frances "Scottie" Fitzgerald in 1921 did little to slow the pace of their lives, and although Zelda was fond of the child and wrote to her frequently, Scottie was almost entirely brought up by nannies and was often apart from her parents.

In 1924, during one of the first of their several trips to France, Zelda had a brief affair (or at least became infatuated) with a dashing young French pilot, Edouard Jozan. This prompted her husband to lock her in their house to keep her from seeing him again; later, they would embellish the story by claiming that Jozan had committed suicide. It is possible that Zelda's long descent into schizophrenia began during this period. She wrote a number of short stories beginning in 1925, but many of these were published under Scott's name, another possible factor of her growing discontent; three other stories, written just before her first breakdown, were later lost. Image:Last Flapper Act 1 10-8 151 0001.jpg Scott drew heavily upon his wife’s intense personality in his writings, often directly quoting segments from her personal diaries in his work. She never commented on this, other than a pithy remark in a review that “It seems to me that on one page I recognized a portion of an old diary of mine which mysteriously disappeared shortly after my marriage, and also scraps of letters which, though considerably edited, sound to me vaguely familiar. In fact, Mr. Fitzgerald — I believe that is how he spells his name — seems to believe that plagiarism begins at home.”

While in Paris, at age 27, Zelda became obsessed with ballet, which she had studied as a girl. She had been praised for her dancing skills as a child, and although the opinions of their friends vary as to her skill, it appears that she did have a fair degree of talent. But Scott was totally dismissive of his wife's desire to become a professional dancer, considering it a waste of time.

Ironically, much of the conflict between them stemmed from the boredom and isolation Zelda experienced when Scott was writing -- she would often interrrupt him when he was working -- but Scott conversely became increasingly determined to keeping Zelda at home, presumably because he feared that she might begin another affair. Zelda evidently had a deep desire to develop a talent that was entirely her own, no doubt a reaction to Scott's fame and success as a writer. Sadly, she rekindled her studies too late in life to become a truly exceptional dancer, but she obsessively insisted on gruelling daily practice (up to eight hours a day) that contributed to her subsequent physical and mental exhaustion -- the secondary state of her breakdown continued into obsessive compulsive disorder. In 1930, she was admitted to a sanatorium in France where, after months of observation and treatment and a consultation with one of Europe's leading psychiatrists, she was officially diagnosed as schizophrenic.

Zelda Fitzgerald spent the remaining eighteen years of her life in various stages of mental distress. However, in her few periods of lucidity, she composed some of her best work, including her only novel, Save Me the Waltz, and numerous abstract paintings. She died in 1948, with her few remaining unpublished bits of work, her last letters to Scott before he died, the last remnants of her tragic life.

Trivia

• The popular video game series The Legend of Zelda, and the recurring major character Princess Zelda of Hyrule, were named after Zelda Fitzgerald.

• The Pet Shop Boys song "Being Boring" is named for a citation attributed to Fitzgerald: “She refused to be bored chiefly because she wasn’t boring.”

• Zelda was named for a gypsy queen in a novel her mother was reading around the time of her birth.de:Zelda Fitzgerald