Z. Un roman despre Zelda Fitzgerald

• Published in: Cultural intertexts Vol. 3; p. 154
• Main Author: Bontila, Ruxanda
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cluj-Napoca Dunarea de Jos University Faculty of Letters Galati 01.01.2015
• Subjects: American literature; Austrian literature; Authorship; Biographies; British & Irish literature; Canetti, Elias (1905-1994); Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns) (1888-1965); Feminism; Fitzgerald, Zelda (1900-1948); Fowler, Therese Anne; French language; Historians; Literature; Novels; Personality; Reading; Ricci, Christina; Stress; Writers; Writing; New York; Capri (Island); United States > US; Irish Sea; Montgomery Alabama
• ISSN: 2393-0624; 2393-1078

The professor, the historian, the writer When a literature professor speaks about a writer, she mainly concentrates on the minutiae of the fictional universe, which might provide understanding of the respective world of representation; if the writer's life casts a shadow upon that world of representation, then she speaks about the fictionalization of the self or about a split self in search of the other-within-the self; but most often, the professor can't stress enough that the real writer is not to be confounded with the narrator/writer-in-the-text, who lives a life independent of that of its creator. [...]forth, we are taken to real places (the American South-Montgomery, Alabama-, New York, Great Neck, Paris, Capri, The French Riviera, etc.), we meet real people (family members, nannies, friends, artists-writers, critics, editors, film producers, actors, painters, dancers), fact which gives the reader the titillation of déjà-vu/lu towards reinforcing l'effet de réel so much coveted with such literary productions. Of special interest to the novelist is the trio-relationship Zelda-Scott-Ernest (Hemingway), which is tentatively explored to the purpose of, on the one hand, flavouring the avant-garde world even more, and on the other hand, tackling the conflictual/schizophrenic disposition of Zelda Seyre-vacillating between a traditional Southerner with deeply embedded conservative views on most things, sex included, a "flapper" defying convention and eager to try on new experiences, and a postfeminist avant-la-lettre, who ironically contemplates the feminist movement of her time while striving hard for artistic self-affirmation in dance, writing and painting.