Episode 41: Feeling the Modern World Fracture in F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender Is the Night

Send us Fan MailF. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender Is the Night (1934) has always sparked great debate about whether it is a noble botch or a modernist classic because its non-chronological form, confounding character motivation, and intrusive narrative voice all seem so compellingly imperfect. In 1951 the literary critic Malcolm Cowley even published a "corrected" edition in which he reordered the novel so it unfolded in sequence---to no avail in critical estimantion. In this story of the talented psychologist Dr Dick Diver and his traumatized wife Nicole we find modernism writ large with events that symbolize the dissipation and diminution of talent and "repose," despite the Divers' surface glamour that makes Americans abroad flock to them in fashionable seasons. And can contemporary readers empathize with the fatal flaw of Dick, whose need for female approval leads him to pursue an adulterous flirtation with ingenue actress Rosemary Hoyt? Ultimately, Tender is a book about falling apart and recognizing that the pieces won't go back together again, not even if you're a rich expatriate living on the French Riviera in the mid-1920s.   All opinions are the hosts' own and do not reflect the points of view of their employers, publishers, relatives, pets, or accountants. All show music is by Lobo Loco.  The intro song is “Old Ralley”; the intermission is “The First Moment,” and the outro is “Inspector Invisible.”  For more information visit: https://locolobomusic.com/.