ZELDA FITZGERALD

Zelda Fitzgerald, wife of "Jazz Age" writer, F. Scott Fitzgerald, was born Zelda Sayre in Montgomery, Alabama on July 24, 1900. The quintessential Flapper, independent Zelda was the muse for many of her husband’s characters in novels and short stories. Her own agility with words was evident in the autobiographical novel, Save Me the Waltz, published in 1932. The artistic Scott and the audacious Zelda Fitzgerald possessed the fame quotient of Roaring Twenties' movie stars.

Named after a gypsy queen in a novel, Zelda Sayre was the daughter of an aloof, strict federal judge and a warm, permissive mother. Lacking inhibition, Zelda rebelled against social conventions and did what she wanted when she wanted, without guilt. The combination of her beauty and social position as the judge’s daughter meant she suffered no consequences. Frequently absent from school, Zelda almost failed; rather than studying, she passed her time going to dances. Zelda said she only cared about boys and swimming.

In Save Me the Waltz, Zelda Fitzgerald depicted her first meeting at age 17 with F. Scott Fitzgerald at a Montgomery country club dance: "There seemed to be some heavenly support beneath his shoulder blades that lifted his feet from the ground in ecstatic suspension, as if he secretly enjoyed the ability to fly but was walking as a compromise to convention" (35). Awed by Zelda’s loveliness, brash behavior, and currency with men, Scott was desperate to have her as his own. Hedging her bets, Zelda refused to commit herself to Scott until 1920 when his future seemed more secure with the publication of his first novel, This Side of Paradise. In 1921, Scott and Zelda Fitzgeralds’ daughter and only child, Frances Scott "Scottie" Fitzgerald was born.

 

A personal diary, as well as personal letters were kept by Zelda Fitzgerald; Fitzgerald drew on these writings for his work. In 1922, the New York Tribune had a mock review in which Zelda said, "Mr. Fitzgerald—I believe that is how he spells his name—seems to believe that plagiarism begins at home." In order to receive more money for her own short stories, Zelda Fitzgerald said she sold some of them under her husband’s name.

Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald had matching dreams of life lived on a grand scale. Unable to manage money, Fitzgerald had to write short stories for magazines to help sustain their lifestyle. The heavy drinking, hard partying couple lived many places, highlighted by New York. After spending time in Europe, primarily France, Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald became expatriates, part of what Gertrude Stein named "The Lost Generation."

In 1930, ten years after her marriage, Zelda Fitzgerald was stricken with schizophrenia and spent the rest of her life in and out of mental institutions. Tender is the Night, published in 1934, was F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel about a psychiatrist, Dick Diver, and his wife, Nicole, a mental patient. Fitzgerald based the character of Nicole on his own wife. Zelda’s serious mental illness, coupled with Scott’s emotional and mental decline due to dissipation, filled their lives with struggle and misery. Zelda Fitzgerald died on March 10, 1948 at age 47 in a fire at Highland Mental Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina.

 

 

 

Bibliography

Save Me The Waltz, Zelda Fitzgerald, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1932

Collected Writings, Zelda Fitzgerald, Author, Matthew Bruccoli, Editor, Little, Brown & Co., 1992

Zelda: A Biography, Nancy Milford, Harper & Row, 1970