Tender Is the Night seems to come up a lot as the novel to read next by F. Scott Fitzgerald if you like
The Great Gatsby. People genuinely seem to go for it. The
1998 Modern Library list of greatest 20th-century novels, for example—which has
Gatsby at #2 (behind the inevitable
Ulysses)—puts
Tender Is the Night at no less than #28. It's ahead of, among others,
All the King's Men,
The Call of the Wild,
Death Comes for the Archbishop,
The Maltese Falcon,
Pale Fire,
The Postman Always Rings Twice,
Sister Carrie, and many others that seem plainly much better to me. I will echo the sentiment that if you like
Gatsby you might as well try
Tender, but in my experience it's a sad pile of fragments by comparison. This may be partly a reflection of how much I like
The Great Gatsby—a favorite of mine for its brilliant structuring, its perfect vantage from which to observe the '20s high life on Long Island, the way it subtly expands to encompass something as universal and persistent as the American Dream itself, and of course for the beauty of the language. The language in
Tender Is the Night is about as beautiful as ever, I can confirm that. That was Fitzgerald's enduring gift, and it's there at least in flashes in practically everything he did. I can also throw in the personal caveat that the whole Zelda / Paris-in-the-'20s thing (see the Woody Allen movie
Midnight in Paris for a primer on the basic cliches) has never much impressed me. I recall a time when it seemed like everyone I knew was reading Nancy Milford's
Zelda biography and mooning over the romance. Maybe I missed an opportunity. Maybe reading it would help me understand
Tender Is the Night better. But I do think fiction has to stand on its own, without the necessity of "understanding" factual underpinnings. And honestly, the ignorance on display in
Tender Is the Night about mental illness should be enough to put anyone off nowadays. It's certainly something anyone reading it should bear in mind. Fitzgerald's fictionalized retelling of his and Zelda's trials and tribulations, while affecting in moments, feels constantly labored and overworked to me. A miasma of all too understandable depression hangs over it—understandable, but not a winning formula. It's often unpleasant too; there is something between the principals but it doesn't feel like love. It's not much surprise to learn the novel can also be taken as one more artifact from perhaps the most painful case of writer's block in literary history. Approach with caution.
In case it's not at the library.
