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In the summer of 1919, during the courtship that would lead to marriage the following year, Zelda Sayre wrote Scott Fitzgerald a letter in which she observed,"Men think I'm purely decorative, and they're just fools for not knowing better . . . I love being rather unfathomable . . . Men love me cause I'm pretty ' and they're always afraid of mental wickedness ' and men love me cause I'm clever and they're always afraid of my prettiness ' One or two have even loved me cause I'm lovable, and then, of course, I was acting."
Well before her celebrated marriage, Zelda was nothing if not elusive ' and a master of the non sequitur besides. In "Zelda Fitzgerald: Her Voice in Paradise," Sally Cline makes use of the linguistic romps found in her subject's letters, diaries and novels in a way that allows the reader to hear the voice of one of the Jazz Age's most celebrated and controversial women. That voice, arguably the best guide to Zelda's complex mind is a remarkable one, and by relying on it the biographer has created a narrative that pulses with vivid, angry, joyous, despairing immediacy. In Ms. Cline's treatment the unfathomable Zelda becomes less so.
Ms. Cline straightforwardly relates Zelda's upbringing as a Southern belle, her courtship and marriage to F. Scott Fitzgerald, their life together as his career took flight, the birth of their daughter Scottie, Scott's alcoholism, the disintegration of the marriage and her madness and subsequent hospitalization for the still debated diagnosis of schizophrenia. Accounts of the various treatments Zelda endured while hospitalized, which included electro-shock therapy and injections of horse serum, are appalling.
The author is at pains not to tinker with the historical record the way Nancy Milford did in her1970 biography of Zelda, written at the height of feminist revisionism and what-ifs. Ms. Cline is very clear that in writing this book she hoped to show that "during Zelda's life her ballet, like her writing and painting, was subsumed under the greater interest of her marriage. As Zelda's biographer, I have tried to balance the account." What that means for the book is greater exposure to these endeavors. While the biographer makes a convincing case that Zelda was a fine writer, she is less persuasive about the merits of her dancing (begun at the age of 27) and her painting.
Ms. Cline does a masterful job of presenting the intoxicating (and intoxicated) sights, sounds and fixations of Jazz Age America from New York to Hollywood, with significant detours to Scott Fitzgerald's Minnesota, and back again. The writing is strong, the research exhaustive. Close to 100 pages of notes follow the book's index.
Zelda Sayre was born in Montgomery, Ala. on July 12, 1900. Her father was a judge and though not wealthy the family occupied a home in that part of town where old money thrived. Zelda quickly became part of a social set that included the city's wealthiest and most beautiful girls, and several of the friendships forged in childhood would remain with her throughout her life. These included Tallulah Bankhead (who became a Hollywood star) and Sara Haardt, a writer who married H.L Mencken.
Zelda met Scott in 1917 "when Montgomery was besieged by soldiers from nearby Camp Sheridan and aviators from Camp Taylor." The circumstance of war gave Zelda and her friends more social opportunities. As one of friends recalled, "We had a different date every night of the week. One night there was a young fellow from St. Paul, Minnesota. He was a blonde first lieutenant of the 67th Infantry, whom she would later draw as a paper doll with pink shirt, red tie and brown angel's wings."
Change came quickly and not always harmoniously into their lives. "Romance in Montgomery had seen Zelda as a celebrity dominating a struggling writer. Marriage in New York changed that. Scott was no longer struggling and she was no longer a celebrity. He had friends while she had none. Nor her family. "
Scott's ascendancy, while nearly overwhelming the marriage, also made it possible for Zelda to enjoy a lavish lifestyle in New York's best hotels. Though burdened with debt and the inability to keep one residence after another in order (as a bona fide Southern belle, Zelda never learned how to be a good housekeeper), the couple, become famous, partied with even greater frequency and intensity and counted among their friends (and enemies) the most illustrious men and women of the day.
John Dos Passos, Edmund Wilson, Dorothy Parker, H.L Mencken, Ernest Hemingway come alive in these pages. And Zelda, far from being simply the flapper goddess of one myth or the unreconstructed harpy of another, proves to be both ' and talented, genuinely talented, too. But the marriage was filled with violent argument.
One of the most striking of these came during Zelda's hospitalization and the publication of "Save Me the Waltz" was at issue. The confrontation was strong and required the intervention of one of Zelda's doctor's, Dr. Thomas Rennie, who acted as mediator, with a stenographer present. At the height of the battle, "Scott could not contain himself. 'So you are taking my material, is that right?'
"'Is that your material' Zelda asked. The asylums? The madness? the terrors? Were they yours?' Funny, she hadn't noticed.
"'Everything we have done is mine. If we make a trip . . . and you and I go around ' I am the professional novelist and I am supporting you. That is all my material. None of it is your material.'" And around they went. The irony is that Scott helped himself to Zelda's diary entries and letters for verbatim use in some of his earlier novels, a habit Ms. Cline substantiates.
The sparks that flew between the pair persisted until Scott's death in 1940.
In truth, after that event, the book loses some of its appeal, perhaps because the tension of the legendary marriage is removed, the dark passion dimmed. The book ends with the couple reunited in death. In a cemetery in Rockville, Md., they are buried side by side.
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