Best Selling Books by Nancy Milford

“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.

Thirty years after the smashing success of Zelda, Nancy Milford returns with a stunning second act. Savage Beauty is the portrait of a passionate, fearless woman who obsessed American ever as she tormented herself. If F. Scott Fitzgerald was the hero of the Jazz Age, Edna St. Vincent Millay, as flamboyant in her love affairs as she was in her art, was its heroine. The first woman ever to win the Pulitzer Prize, Millay was dazzling in the performance of herself. Her voice was likened to an instrument of seduction and her impact on crowds, and on men, was legendary. Yet beneath her studied act, all was not well. Milford calls her book "a family romance"—for the love between the three Millay sisters and their mother was so deep as to be dangerous. As a family, they were like real-life Little Women, with a touch of Mommie Dearest. Nancy Milford was given exclusive access to Millay''s papers, and what she found was an extraordinary treasure. Boxes and boxes of letter flew back and forth among the three sisters and their mother—and Millay kept the most intimate diary, one whose ruthless honesty brings to mind Sylvia Plath. Written with passion and flair, Savage Beauty is an iconic portrait of a woman''s life.

"Now, Wilmarth''s legacy is recaptured in this illustrated book by art critic, historian, and poet Steven Henry Madoff. The first in-depth look at Wilmarth''s extraordinary life as an artist, the book explores both the light and the darkness that underlie his work. Madoff offers a critical overview of the artist''s career, examining the sculptor''s response not only to historical masters such as Cezanne, Brancusi, Matisse, and Giacometti, but also to the art world of his times - particularly the dominant influence of Minimalism. Using the newly created Wilmarth archive at Harvard University''s Fogg Art Museum, Madoff anchors this moving interpretation with the sculptor''s own writings unearthed from journals, student notebooks, artist sketchbooks, and letters." "Madoff draws as well from interviews, articles, and poems that Wilmarth published in his lifetime, along with the body of criticism covering Wilmarth''s development over the years."--BOOK JACKET.