Any lit blogger worth his or her salt should be able to come up with a fictional character that resides at the Chelsea. This proved to be more difficult than I thought. I wanted to identify a character from a big literary work and submit it to Randy Cohen for his mapping Manhattan project. After spending an afternoon searching through Thomas Wolfe’s Look Homeward Angel, which I thought would be my best bet, I consulted a person who knows more about the Chelsea than anybody – a high placed knowledgeable individual (HPKI).
After I explained the project to HPKI he exclaimed, "In Ethan Hawke's "Chelsea Walls" all of the characters live in the Chelsea." I didn't like that suggestion. After I saw the movie, I wanted to move out of the Chelsea. The movie is very loosely based on Dylan Thomas play "Under Milkwood." The characters in "Under Milkwood" do not reside in the Chelsea.
We need a big literary work to get the hotel on the map, I explained. "Well, what about Sparkle Hayter's book The Chelsea Girl Murders. The female detective lives in the Hotel." At least that's a better suggestion than Chelsea Walls. However, that was my obvious fallback plan. Finally, after giving it a bit of thought, HPKI said "In Saul Bellow's Herzog the main character's father-in-law lives in the Chelsea." That gave me something to work with at least.
I went and bought a copy of Herzog and spent several evenings scouring the book. Here is what I found. A description of Madeline's apartment. "...The fixtures were old-fashion in this place. These had been luxury apartments in the 1890s... The tiles were a faded cherry color, and the toothbrush rack, the fixtures, were ornate, old nickel."
I went back to HPKI and explained that I didn't find squat about the Chelsea in Herzog beyond the previously mentioned reference to an old, elegant apartment building. "That's it," the HPKI screamed, "Madeline, Herzog's lover, lived in the Chelsea."
Blogger Rodney Welch has considered the same question and taken a different approach to the answer. He suggests "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowland," a character in a song written by Bob Dylan while he was living at the Chelsea. I don't think Sad Eyed Lady qualifies since she is clearly based on Dylan's wife Sara. Two other songs written by Dylan, "Leopard Skin Pill Box Hat" and "Just Like A Woman," were reputedly inspired by Chelsea resident Edie Sedgwick.
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