Zelda: A Biography

“Profound, overwhelmingly moving . . . a richly
complex love story.” — New York Times

Acclaimed
biographer Nancy Milford brings to life the tormented, elusive personality of
Zelda Sayre and clarifies as never before Zelda’s relationship with her husband
F. Scott Fitzgerald—tracing the inner disintegration of a gifted, despairing
woman, torn by the clash between her husband’s career and her own talent.

Zelda
Sayre’s stormy life spanned from notoriety as a spirited Southern beauty to
success as a gifted novelist and international celebrity at the side of her
husband, F. Scott Fitzgerald. Zelda and Fitzgerald were one of the most visible
couples of the Jazz Age, inhabiting and creating around them a world of
excitement, romance, art, and promise. Yet their tumultuous relationship
precipitated a descent into depression and mental instability for Zelda,
leaving her to spend the final twenty years of her life in hospital care, until
a fire at a sanitarium claimed her life.

Incorporating years of exhaustive research and interviews, Milford illuminates
Zelda’s nuanced and elusive personality, giving character to both her artistic
vibrancy and to her catastrophic collapse.

Zelda Sayre started out as a Southern beauty, became an international wonder, and died by fire in a madhouse. With her husband, F. Scott Fitzgerald, she moved in a golden aura of excitement, romance, and promise. The epitome of the Jazz Age, they rode the crest of the era to its collapse and their own.

As a result of years of exhaustive research, Nancy Milford brings alive the tormented, elusive personality of Zelda and clarifies as never before her relationship with Scott Fitzgerald. Zelda traces the inner disintegration of a gifted, despairing woman, torn by the clash between her husband’s career and her own talent.

“Profound, overwhelmingly moving…a richly complex love story.” - New York Times

“Milford’s fine book is itself a work of art.” - Wall Street Journal

“Some of us are born rebellious. Reading the story of Zelda Fitzgerald by Nancy Milford, I identified with her mutinous spirit.” - Patti Smith, from Just Kids

“Nancy Milford has sought to make us see Zelda as a separate person and, by that, the Fitzgeralds through a woman’s eyes . . . . A superb portrait.” - Washington Post Book World