It was nice to read a classic and the plot was interesting enough but the story didn’t really hook me. I didn’t like the relationships or how they played out. It’s not one of the classic books you want to read again and again.

I’m still livid that a title this good was squandered on such a spiteful, self-aggrandizing, mean-spirited novel as this. The worst people you know will find honesty in it. But honesty requires personal interrogation, and Fitzgerald at this point in his life is too busy simpering and begging for the reader’s sympathies to turn his critical gaze inward. He casts himself as put-upon victim in a hermetic fantasy where he holds all the power. And his worst sin is not that he used that power irresponsibly, but that he wielded it so boringly.

Not sure why I found this, a novel I've always held up as a great disappointment, suddenly piquing at me like a specter. Or actually, I do: I began to wonder if this was a text I encountered at the wrong point of my life. And that turned out to be exactly the case, as it really does require a certain maturity & enough life experience to understand the specific type of grief one feels for a paradise lost.

If recent revisits to formative texts This Side of Paradise & The Great Gatsby was to experience something of Babylon Revisited's reckoning with the loss one's youth, then this reading of Tender is the Night felt like laughing with a teenage nemesis over a shared recognition that you'll make quite excellent friends now.

Which is not to say that this novel isn't profoundly flawed; one viscerally feels Fitzgerald's strain & eventual defeat in molding this material into the perfected forms of his best work. Long passages are gloopy, characterization are often shaky, the narrative constantly seems to lose the thread. I was profoundly uninvested in the extended mid-novel flashback into Dick Diver's past. But all these technical problems cobweb across some of the most sublimely gorgeous individual lines & paragraphs to be found in ALL literature (there were moments I gasped).

Somehow there's a profound beauty in this novel's defectiveness, the gaps somehow gesturing toward something ineffable—& ultimately profound.

Rating bumped from two stars to four.

"Then he put in a call for Nicole in Zürich, remembering so many things as he waited, and wishing he had always been as good as he had intended to be."

While I didn't particularly enjoy the story or characters, Fitzgerald's writing makes approaching this novel worth it. There's so much beautiful literary imagery that it became hard not to write down each little gem I encountered.

The story is not nearly as compelling as The Great Gatsby, but two familiar themes emerge: the adoration and idolization of a beautiful, charasmatic man, and the disillusionment that follows. Interestingly, the same undercurrents of homosexual attention are present. Though presented through a young woman's perspective in Tender is the Night, the attention placed on the form and person of the primary male character is very similar to that of Nick on Gatsby, and it's enough to make me wonder if these characters were proxies for the author's gaze.

The characters and story are pretty flaccid. There's all the show of glamor and interest, but it's pretty boring and uneventful, even considering duels of honor, affairs, murder, etc. Halfway through the novel we change narrative perspective, bringing us more intimately into the inner workings of the primary characters. If it was Fitzgerald's intention to make commentary on the futility of beauty, riches, and notoriety, this move would make sense. But I couldn't get a read on exactly how autobiographical this novel was meant to be, and knowing the lavish lifestyle he and Zelda lived makes me wonder if insisting on commentary is a mistake.

Regardless, I'd recommend this book only to lovers of literature. The language is beautiful, even if the story and characters are lacking.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1934 novel Tender is the Night is a powerful and beautiful book that stands next to The Great Gatsby as his other masterpiece. Much like Gatsby, Tender is the Night was underrated upon its original publication and has only grown in stature throughout the years.

Tender is the Night tells the story of Dick and Nicole Diver’s marriage and Dick’s subsequent descent into alcoholism. The novel opens on the beach of the French Riviera. We first see the Divers through the eyes of Rosemary Hoyt, an eighteen year-old actress so young that “the dew was still on her.” (p.4) Rosemary becomes fascinated with the Divers very quickly, especially the charming Dick. Rosemary imagines that the Divers’ glamourous lives are free from worries: “Rosemary envied them their fun, imagining a life of leisure unlike her own. She knew little of leisure but she had the respect for it of those who have never had it. She thought of it as a resting, without realizing that the Divers were as far from relaxing as she was herself.” (p.99)

Rosemary is absent from the novel during the beginning of part II, as the narration flashes back to flesh out Dick’s backstory. We see him as a young psychologist who meets Nicole Warren, successfully treats her, and falls in love with her. Part III of the novel is set several years after Part I, and we witness Dick’s dissipation.

Because The Great Gatsby, published in April, 1925, had not become the huge success that Fitzgerald thought it would be, he quickly started work on a follow-up, optimistically thinking that he could deliver another novel soon, with his first target date being the fall of 1926. However, Tender is the Night went through an extraordinarily long and painful gestation period, and it was not published until April, 1934, nine years to the month after Gatsby. During those nine long years many things happened to Francis Scott Fitzgerald, and many of the events of his life would help to shape the plot of Tender is the Night. As Fitzgerald biographer and scholar Scott Donaldson wrote in his essay on the composition of Tender is the Night, “The novel could not possibly have achieved the power of its final form without the passage of nine years between inception and completion.” (Fitzgerald and Hemingway: Works and Days, p.126) Fitzgerald himself said to a friend, “The man who started the novel is not the man who finished it.” (Some Sort of Epic Grandeur, by Matthew Bruccoli, p.365)

Fitzgerald always worked extremely hard at his writing, but his previous novels had come together much quicker than Tender is the Night. It’s telling of Fitzgerald’s struggle with writing the novel that “progress, lack of” is one of the longest categories for Tender is the Night in the index of Matthew Bruccoli’s biography of Fitzgerald, Some Sort of Epic Grandeur.

Fitzgerald’s alcoholism, which was always problematic, spiraled out of control during the years he was writing Tender is the Night. During that same period his marriage to Zelda Sayre was rapidly disintegrating, and she also suffered a series of mental breakdowns, in 1930, 1932, and 1934.

It’s overly simplistic to say that Fitzgerald was Dick Diver, and Zelda was Nicole Warren Diver, but there were certainly similarities. Fitzgerald always mined his own life and his own experiences, and Zelda’s as well, for his fiction, and he did so in Tender is the Night.

In Arthur Mizener’s 1965 edition of his biography of Fitzgerald, The Far Side of Paradise, Mizener reprints notes that Fitzgerald made about characters in Tender is the Night. Some of these notes further underscore the connection between Fitzgerald and Dick Diver, as Fitzgerald wrote, “For his external qualities, use anything of Gerald, Ernest, Ben Finny, Archie Mcliesh, Charley McArthur or myself. He looks, though, like me.” (The Far Side of Paradise, p.348) The Ernest in the quotation is Hemingway, and Gerald is Gerald Murphy, another likely model for aspects of Dick Diver. Gerald and Sara Murphy were wealthy American expatriates who lived in France in the 1920’s and were renowned for their parties and the wide social circle of artists they knew. Scott and Zelda were good friends of the Murphys’, although Scott’s bad behavior did get him ejected from several of the Murphys’ parties, and Fitzgerald dedicated Tender is the Night to them. Certainly the bon vivant Dick Diver of Part I of Tender is the Night owes a large debt to Gerald Murphy, although Murphy did not slide into dissipated alcoholism the way Diver did.

Under notes for Nicole Diver, Fitzgerald wrote: “Portrait of Zelda—that is, a part of Zelda.” (Paradise, p.350) It seems clear that Fitzgerald used some of Zelda’s characteristics in creating Nicole Diver, but even in this note he makes it clear that he used only a part of Zelda, and not her whole personality.

While I think that Dick Diver is not simply a stand-in for F. Scott Fitzgerald, there are several interesting similarities between author and character. In the beginning of the novel, Diver is described as someone who gives “carnivals of affection” to people. (p.27) Sober, Fitzgerald was an extremely charming man, and there are many stories about the effect his personality had on people. Andrew Turnbull was a biographer of Fitzgerald’s who also knew him. Fitzgerald rented a house on the Turnbull’s property in Maryland in 1932, when Andrew was 11 years old. Turnbull wrote of him: “Fitzgerald focused on you—even riveted on you—and if there was one thing you were sure of, it was that whatever you happened to be talking about was the most important matter in the world.” (Scott Fitzgerald, p.225) Turnbull also wrote of him: “…there was always something of the magician in Fitzgerald. He was the inventor, the creator, the tireless impresario who brightened our days and made other adult company seem dull and profitless. It wasn’t so much any particular skill of his as a quality of caring, of believing, of pouring his whole soul and imagination into whatever he did with us.” (Turnbull, p.229)

In a 1938 letter Fitzgerald wrote about Diver: “Dick’s curiosity and interest in people was real—he didn’t stare at them—he glanced at them and felt them.” (Fool for Love, by Scott Donaldson, p.196) Although this is a subjective judgment, I would bet that Fitzgerald was like that too. He was a highly sensitive man who was fascinated by people and would often pepper them with questions at parties.

Fitzgerald mined his real life in the passages describing Dick Diver’s father. Fitzgerald’s father Edward died in 1931, and in an unfinished essay, “The Death of My Father,” Fitzgerald reflected on his importance to his own upbringing:

“I loved my father—always deep in my subconscious I have referred judgements back to him, to what he would have thought or done. He loved me—and felt a deep responsibility for me—I was born several months after the sudden death of my two elder sisters and he felt what the effect of this would be on my mother, that he would be my only moral guide. He became that to the best of his ability. He came from tired old stock with very little left of vitality and mental energy but he managed to raise a little for me.” (A Short Autobiography, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, 2011, p.118)

This passage is repeated almost word for word when Dick learns of his father’s death:

“Dick loved his father—again and again he referred judgements to what his father would probably have thought or done. Dick was born several months after the death of two young sisters and his father, guessing what would be the effect on Dick’s mother, had saved him from a spoiling by becoming his moral guide. He was of tired stock yet he raised himself to that effort.” (Tender is the Night, p.203)

When a young Dick Diver is asked about his plans, he replies, “I’ve only got one, Franz, and that’s to be a good psychologist—maybe to be the greatest one that ever lived.” (p.132) This quote mirrors what Fitzgerald said to his friend Edmund Wilson—Wilson recalled Fitzgerald saying to him, after they had attended Princeton together, “I want to be one of the greatest writers who have ever lived, don’t you?” (Fool for Love, p.37)

Dick Diver is also a habitual flirt, as was Fitzgerald. “He was in love with every pretty woman he saw now, their forms at a distance, their shadows on a wall.” (p.201) Fitzgerald’s infatuations could begin with just a glance as well. The actress Carmel Myers recalled introducing Fitzgerald to a woman at a party in Hollywood. Fitzgerald’s first words to the woman were, “I love you, I love you, I love you.” (Fool for Love, p.53)

The most obvious parallel between Dick Diver and Fitzgerald is their drinking. During the period he was writing Tender is the Night, Fitzgerald’s drinking became extremely problematic. Fitzgerald had always been a heavy drinker, but now his alcoholism was taking a toll on his friendships and his ability to focus on his writing. One of the most beautiful, sad lines in Tender is the Night is when Nicole says to Dick, “But you used to want to create things—now you seem to want to smash them up.” (p.267) I think this line rings true for Fitzgerald as well. For whatever reason, Fitzgerald behaved in very self-destructive ways and lost many friendships because of this, especially during the period when he was writing Tender is the Night. Fitzgerald biographer Scott Donaldson wrote: “In his papers at Princeton are at least three lists of snubs, with the longest of them naming a total of sixty-six people who had snubbed him during the 1925-29 period. To have been put down by so many in so short a time suggests (1) that some of the snubs were imaginary rather than real, though it was during these years that he and Zelda became personae non gratae because of their drinking and quarreling, and (2) that out of masochism or self-hatred he was actually courting the disapproval of others.” (Fool for Love, p.181)

When he was drunk, Fitzgerald’s personality underwent a radical transformation. The charming and intelligent man disappeared and he became belligerent and mean. Fitzgerald tried the patience of Gerald and Sara Murphy, as he threw ashtrays at one party and deliberately broke wineglasses at another. The incident at the end of Tender is the Night, the nadir of Dick Diver’s descent into drink, where he gets into a fight with an Italian taxi driver, and gets beaten up and taken to jail, actually happened to Fitzgerald himself. (Fool for Love, p.164-5)

Another subject of Tender is the Night is marital infidelity, which was yet another issue that the Fitzgeralds dealt with. Both Scott and Zelda were attractive people who enjoyed flirting, but a serious threat to their marriage developed during the summer of 1924. As Scott was finishing up The Great Gatsby, Zelda was spending more and more time with French aviator Edouard Jozan. Whether or not Zelda and Jozan actually had a physical affair is a subject of debate among Fitzgerald scholars, but whatever the particulars were, their relationship created a great deal of tension between Scott and Zelda. Scott wrote years later in his notebooks, “That September 1924, I knew something had happened that could never be repaired.” (The Notebooks of F. Scott Fitzgerald, p.113) Scott had a relationship with actress Lois Moran, who was only seventeen when they met in 1927. Moran became the model for Rosemary Hoyt in Tender is the Night, who is in many ways presented as Nicole Diver’s opposite.

Insanity is another prominent theme in Tender is the Night, and yet another way that Fitzgerald’s turbulent personal life found its way into his fiction. Zelda’s breakdowns prompted Scott to make mental health a theme of the novel. Nicole’s sister Baby Warren asks Dick, “Well, how can anyone tell what’s eccentric and what’s crazy?” (p.151) This quote seems especially apropos of Zelda and Scott’s behavior, both drunken and sober. Is it crazy or eccentric to throw yourself down a flight of stone steps? (Zelda) Is it crazy or eccentric to burn your clothes in a bathtub in a fit of jealousy? (Zelda) Is it crazy or eccentric to jump into the fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel? (Scott) Is it crazy or eccentric to throw ashtrays at a fancy dinner party? (Scott) The list could go on and on.

Zelda actually wrote her own novel during the time Scott was laboring over his long-awaited book. Titled Save Me the Waltz, it was written in only a month or two while Zelda was undergoing treatment at Johns Hopkins. The mere existence of the book deeply angered Scott, as he did not know Zelda was writing a novel, and was probably jealous that Zelda had written her book so quickly while he was laboring through numerous drafts and revisions of his own novel. Save Me the Waltz added considerably to what was now a state of continual tension and resentment between Scott and Zelda. Scott was hopeful that Save Me the Waltz would earn enough money so he could discharge his debt to Scribner’s, who had been advancing him money throughout the writing of Tender is the Night. That did not happen, as Save Me the Waltz was published in October, 1932 to little fanfare and not much interest from the book-buying public.

As befitting the difficult writing, even the title of Tender is the Night was a long time in coming. The book went through many possible titles. Among the early titles were Our Type, The World’s Fair, The Melarky Case, and The Boy Who Killed His Mother. (Works and Days, p.120) Even as the novel took shape, the title still kept changing, from The Drunkard’s Holiday, to Doctor Diver’s Holiday, to Richard Diver, and then finally, to Tender is the Night, from a line in John Keats’ poem, “Ode to a Nightingale.” (Works and Days, p.135)

Tender is the Night was published to generally positive reviews, and the book sold respectably, but, as usual, not as well as Fitzgerald had hoped. Fitzgerald scholar Matthew Bruccoli wrote of the reception of Tender is the Night, “As a consequence of Fitzgerald’s commercial magazine work and his playboy image it had become increasingly difficult for critics to appraise the serious novelist…Fitzgerald’s wastrel reputation impeded the recognition of his best work.” (Some Sort of Epic Grandeur, p.366)

Fitzgerald’s disappointment over the sales of Tender is the Night led him to second-guess the novel’s structure, and by late 1938 or early 1939 he was attempting to re-structure the book in chronological order, thinking this might make it more appealing to readers. After Fitzgerald’s death, Malcolm Cowley used Fitzgerald’s notes for his planned re-structuring as the basis for the 1951 revision of Tender is the Night. Today Cowley’s version is out of print, and most scholars and critics prefer Fitzgerald’s original 1934 version of the novel. Fitzgerald’s tinkering with Tender is the Night may show his insecurities, but it is also further proof of his dedication to his craft and his seriousness about writing. He was constantly rewriting and editing, making numerous changes to the novel between the magazine serialization in Scribner’s and the final book publication.

Scott Donaldson wrote of Tender is the Night, “It was a novel undervalued in its own time, one whose reputation has developed over the decades.” (Works and Days, p.138) Now Fitzgerald fans put the novel alongside The Great Gatsby as one of Fitzgerald’s masterpieces.

Towards the end of the novel, Fitzgerald writes of Nicole: “She felt the nameless fear which precedes all emotions, joyous or sorrowful, inevitable as a hum of thunder precedes a storm.” (p.294) This is just one of the many beautiful, moving sentences from a novel written by an author who felt so deeply the pain and ecstasy of human existence, and described it all so well.

Zelda Fitzgerald’s writing was inevitably overshadowed during her own lifetime by the writing of her husband, F. Scott Fitzgerald, but Zelda published several short stories of her own, and one novel in 1932, Save Me the Waltz.

Save Me the Waltz tells the story of Alabama Beggs and her husband David Knight. The characters of Alabama and David are stand-ins for Zelda and Scott, and the novel closely parallels the Fitzgeralds’ married life. Scott Fitzgerald’s writing often drew from his own life experiences but Save Me the Waltz is nakedly autobiographical in a way that his writing seldom was.

Zelda Fitzgerald’s writing style falls into the “you’ll either love it or hate it” category. Similes and metaphors collide and crash together, and there are times where the reader can barely hold on to what’s happening. Here’s an example: “A shooting star, ectoplasmic arrow, sped through the nebular hypothesis like a wanton hummingbird. From Venus to Mars to Neptune it trailed the ghost of comprehension, illuminating far horizons over the pale battlefields of reality.” (p.73) I can’t tell you what those two sentences mean. It’s surprising that Zelda never wrote poetry, because her writing style was quite poetic. Some of her more surreal flights of fancy, like the above passage, might have been more effective if set in a poem rather than in the framework of a novel.

In Save Me the Waltz, Alabama and David, who is a painter, move to the south of France, where Alabama meets a handsome French aviator. In real life, Zelda and Scott moved to the south of France, where Zelda met Edouard Jozan, a handsome French aviator. Much ink has been spilled over whatever happened between Scott, Zelda, and Edouard Jozan during the summer of 1924. Fitzgerald biographer Scott Donaldson wrote an entire chapter in his book The Impossible Craft about how 14 different biographers, Donaldson included, treated the relationship between Zelda and Jozan. Was this merely a flirtation, or was it something more serious? Well, there are 14 different answers to that question. Donaldson points out some interesting differences: “A majority of the female biographers...tend to deny that the affair actually took place and assume that the crisis it generated was more or less fabricated by the Fitzgeralds. Most of the male biographers...follow the lead of Mizener and Turnbull in believing that Zelda and Josan’s relationship was indeed adulterous.” (p.175)

Donaldson astutely writes of the differing accounts of the relationship, “It can safely be said that the single trait all biographers share is a certain arrogance as they undertake to understand how it must have been, say, for Zelda and Scott and Edouard a long time ago...This illustrates what has often been remarked: that every biography conceals within itself the autobiography of its author.” (p.187)

Much of what biographers have theorized about Zelda and Jozan has come from Save Me the Waltz. Biographers often cite this passage: “He drew her body against him till she felt the blades of his bones carving her own. He was bronze and smelled of the sand and sun; she felt him naked underneath the starched linen. She didn’t think of David. She hoped he hadn’t seen; she didn’t care. She felt as if she would like to be kissing Jacques Chevre-Feuille on the top of the Arc de Triomphe.” (p.92)

Zelda’s biographer Nancy Milford thinks that Alabama does not sleep with the French aviator, therefore Zelda did not sleep with Jozan. But Milford oddly chose to ignore the above passage in her biography. Is the above passage proof that Zelda had sex with Jozan? Not really, it’s from a work of fiction. Maybe Zelda just imagined “feeling him naked underneath the starched linen.” But it’s certainly a steamy passage.

The French aviator eventually has to go away. He writes Alabama a farewell letter. Does Alabama read the letter? Nope. “Alabama could not read the letter. It was in French. She tore it in a hundred little pieces...” (p.101) This drove me nuts. If you were in love with someone, even if you knew it was doomed, even if you couldn’t read French, wouldn’t you try a little harder to read the farewell letter they sent you? Or maybe find a French friend who could translate the letter for you?

In retaliation for whatever happened between Alabama and the French aviator, David has an affair with Gabrielle Gibbs, who is an actress playing a dancer. Gibbs seems to be a stand-in for the ballerina Isadora Duncan. I don’t think any biographer has claimed that Isadora Duncan had a fling with Scott, but they apparently flirted so much when they met that Zelda threw herself down a flight of stone steps. Miraculously, Zelda was unharmed.

Save Me the Waltz made me wonder if the Fitzgerald’s acquaintance with Isadora Duncan was the spark that re-ignited Zelda’s passion for ballet? It’s after David’s affair with Gabrielle Gibbs that Alabama throws herself into the ballet. For me, the novel improved once Alabama took up the ballet, as it gave the book more narrative focus.

As in Zelda’s real life, the ballet becomes an all-consuming obsession for Alabama. In the novel, Alabama takes a job dancing in Naples, away from her husband and daughter Bonnie. The tragedy of Save Me the Waltz is that just as Alabama seems to find some meaning in her life through the ballet, she loses everything else. Her relationship with David becomes more strained. For me, the saddest part of the novel was when Alabama is with Bonnie in Naples, and she can’t relate to her daughter at all—the only thing she can think about is the ballet. Alabama has become a shell of a person. If this is any indication of what Zelda was actually like in 1929, it’s easy to see that she was headed towards a mental breakdown, which occurred in April of 1930.

What is one to make of Save Me the Waltz? Zelda’s unorthodox writing style makes it a hard book to get into. But worse than that, Zelda has somehow made the story of Scott and Zelda dull. Alabama is a blank, a cipher that the reader has little access to, and David is an unappealing narcissist.

Even Nancy Milford has trouble defending the novel on artistic grounds: “She has trouble sustaining a longer narrative and Save Me the Waltz is not an easy book to read.” (p.223) And Milford highlights the key flaw of the novel: “Perhaps that is the larger problem presented by this novel—that because it is so deeply autobiographical, the transmutation of reality into art is incomplete.” (p.224) Save Me the Waltz feels like a catalogue of events that happen, rather than a novel that has been shaped towards a definite end.

All that being said, it’s a remarkable achievement for Zelda Fitzgerald that Save Me the Waltz was written at all. After her mental breakdown in April of 1930, Zelda spent 15 months in Swiss sanitariums, then returned home to Montgomery, Alabama. Her father died two months later. In February 1932, Zelda had her second mental breakdown. She finished the first draft of the novel very quickly, just a month later.

And there are passages in Save Me the Waltz of clear writing and sharp dialogue, as when David says, “People are like almanacs, Bonnie—you never can find the information you’re looking for, but the casual reading is well worth the trouble.” (p.181) That’s just brilliant.

After initially being rather perturbed that his wife had written a novel and sent it to his editor Maxwell Perkins without telling him, Scott had praise for Save Me the Waltz, writing to Perkins in May 1932, “It is a good novel now, perhaps a very good novel—I am too close to it to tell. It has the faults & virtues of a first novel. It is more the expression of a powerful personality, like Look Homeward, Angel than the work of a finished artist like Ernest Hemmingway. It should interest the many thousands interested in dancing. It is about something & absolutely new, & should sell.” (Dear Scott/Dear Max, p.176) Yes, Fitzgerald hardly ever spelled Hemingway’s last name correctly. And Scott was quite right to compare Save Me the Waltz to Thomas Wolfe’s debut novel, Look Homeward, Angel, as both novels have the same quality of being nakedly autobiographical.

In the same letter, Scott, knowing that Hemingway had a book in the works, had some advice for Perkins: “Ernest told me once he would ‘never publish a book in the same season with me,’ meaning it would lead to ill-feeling. I advise you, if he is in New York, (and always granting you like Zelda’s book) do not praise it, or even talk about it to him!...There is no possible conflict between the books but there has always been a subtle struggle between Ernest & Zelda & any opposition might have curiously grave consequences—curious, that is, to un-jealous men like you and me.” (p.176) This letter just makes me laugh, thinking about poor Scott, trying to keep both his friend and his wife happy, wanting to avoid the “curiously grave consequences.” As it happened, Save Me the Waltz was released just two weeks after Hemingway’s non-fiction book about bullfighting, Death in the Afternoon.

Save Me the Waltz was not a sales success. The first printing was roughly 3,000 copies, and slightly fewer than half of them were sold: 1,392, according to Nancy Milford’s biography. (p.264) The novel was out of print for many years, before finally being reissued in 1967. Save Me the Waltz remains essential reading for anyone interested in the life stories of Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald.