Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald: An American Woman’s Life

By Linda Wagner-Martin

Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald was born at the dawn of the twentieth century, destined for celebrity as one half of the infamous darlings of the Jazz Age literary world. A southern belle from Montgomery, Alabama, Fitzgerald epitomized the “New Woman” of the modern era in New York and Paris, all the while living on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Linda Wagner-Martin has created a cultural biography, told from Zelda’s perspective instead of from her famous spouse, F Scott Fitzgerald. Using previously neglected information from the Princeton archives, Wagner-Martin vividly illustrates Zelda’s psychological landscape, from the roots of her alcoholism to her enviable artistic gifts and achievements: novels, essays, short stories, ballet and even painting. This is a riveting and provocative portrayal of a talented woman’s professional and emotional conflicts, as relevant today as half a century ago.