Author of Zelda Fitzgerald Novel at Thursday Lunch

By DJ McAneny

This Thursday, Sept. 19, New Canaan Library is hosting its annual fundraising Literary Luncheon event with featured guest speaker Therese Anne Fowler. The lunch takes place from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Woodway Country Club, 540 Hoyt St., Darien.


Fowler is the author of Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald, and looks at the life of Zelda, and her husband F. Scott Fitzgerald, who were a "charismatic, brilliant and mercurial," couple, according to the New Canaan Library. The event is the sixth annual installment of the annual fundraiser and is one of the library's biggest money-raising efforts.

"It's really important fundraiser for us and it's a really fun luncheon and fundraiser," said Library Director of Development and Programs Susan LaPerla. "The luncheon contributes significantly to [our annual fundraising] goals and it's a nice tradition"

The library needs to raise more than $400,000 a year in donations to supplement their yearly budget, LaPerla said. She anticipates the luncheon this year will be particularly interesting, focusing on Fitzgerald near the height of interest in the name with the recent theatric release of The Great Gatsby.

[The movie is playing at 10 a.m. Wednesday at Darien Library, for free.]

"Though [Zelda and F. Scott] were both possessed their own specific demons, Zelda in particular has been portrayed in many different and often unflattering, ways," said LaPerla.

"What emerges in Ms. Fowler’s book is a complex, three-dimensional and very human Zelda Fitzgerald, who was a talented writer and artist in her own right, overshadowed and derailed by her husband. Therese Anne Fowler tells the story of Zelda with brilliant insight and imagination, bringing us Zelda’s irresistible story as she herself might have told it."

[F. Scott Fitzgerald's manuscript of The Great Gatsby may have been edited in New Canaan by Max Perkins, at his home just yards from the New Canaan train station.]

The luncheon, themed around the Great Gatsby era, is offering tickets starting at $100 and tables of 10 available for purchase. For additional information on the event, or to purchase tickets please visit newcanaanlibrary.org, or call 203-594-5025.

For more information on books, authors, literature and literary events in and around Darien, see the new "Books and Authors" category on Darien Patch. You can also bookmark it and subscribe to the category to make it easier to get to the bookish news in the area.

This article originally was published in slightly different form by New Canaan Patch.