Tender is the night

PREFACE by Giancarlo Rossini

PREFACE by Giancarlo Rossini

“Tender is the night” had a very troubled and intermittent drafting lasted nine years (there are six versions), which is reflected in the reading of a rather complex novel, at all its levels. The story has as its protagonist the charismatic couple, composed of d**k Diver, a talented young doctor, and Nicole Warren, rich, cold and beautiful, around which revolve a myriad of characters of varying importance, many of whom are more than anything else the background to the staging of the show of seduction and youth, admirably interpreted by the couple.

Already at this level the first difficulty arises: d**k and Nicole are presented to the reader in the "heap" of minor characters, in short scenes that follow one another in a disordered way.

The second difficulty is structural. The story of the "entity" called "Dicole" (contraction of the two names that underlines the symbiosis) begins "in medias res", that is to say at the peak of their splendor as a close-knit, admired couple, which generously conveys in their "aura" the chosen ones he surrounds himself with, although d**k's encounter with Rosemary Hoyt, an actress at the start of a promising career, will cause a fatal crack within. The second part is a long flashback that tells about d**k's past, his becoming a successful doctor, his meeting with Nicole: a "case report" of particular complexity, a woman marked by a childhood trauma, unspeakably painful and incurable, the beginning of their relationship, marriage.

The third part is characterized by decadence as a couple and as individuals: d**k is increasingly persuaded that his wife's schizophrenia is like a time bomb ready to explode and increasingly difficult to manage, especially after the birth of two children; in addition, the story with Rosemary does not satisfy him, his personal charm is in sharp decline, the luxury with which his wife's family seems to have "bought" him, crushes him, so that the road to alcoholism is already drawn ; Nicole is disappointed by her husband, who appears less and less at the height of the charisma and vigor of youth, moreover, the woman senses the story with Rosemary and is in turn attracted by Tommy Barban, a crude mercenary soldier, and by the prospect of a new life away from her husband / therapist.

The one used by Fitzgerald is "a mobile point of view", at the beginning we find the omniscient narrator, who, however, proceeds for a "photographic and cinematographic type" exhibition, therefore, for scenes, in a rapid and fragmented way, which does not even allow us to identify which are the main characters, who appear in moments of little significance, "silhouettes without identity", as "randomly chosen" and developed at a later time. Suddenly we move to the fixed focus, that of Rosemary, who, subsequently, alternates with the omniscient narrator, while Nicole's point of view appears here and there, which is the most interesting one for understanding d**k's complex personality. The language, particularly inspired in the landscape descriptions, docilely adapts to various points of view, with the rhythm and elegance worthy of the one who has been defined "the philosopher of 'age of jazz ”.

Evidently, that of "Tender is the night" (original title of the work published in 1934) is a demanding reading, of great stylistic beauty and intensity, although not always constant in all its parts. It is a strongly autobiographical story, in fact, as Fitzgerald himself writes: d**k is "similar to me", Nicole is "a part of Zelda" (his wife repeatedly hospitalized in an asylum for schizophrenia) and the Divers are the Murphys, a couple of much loved friends, to whom the novel is dedicated. The scenario is that of the "Riviera", a paradise between Tarmes, Cannes and Montecarlo, frequented by the writer and his wife, which, however, is above all an ideal place. "Tender is the night" also tells the life of American expatriates in Europe, rich people whom the author mistreats and makes us cry, whose "tears do not bring consolation or sense of justice", who do not appreciate Europe's cultural depth and its ancient history, but they are driven by a more superficial desire for novelty and fun, to escape boredom and, finally, to wear out. Wealth offers this possibility, but at the same time it, or the desire for it, leads to ruin. This is contrasted by the "bourgeois virtues", mainly constancy, which also appear "boring", so that the bourgeois desires that world, despite the suspicion that money does not bring happiness, on the contrary, it amplifies human defects. Yet, Fitzgerald cannot stop yearning and fascinated by it, sublimating the torment of such dualism in literature.