Excess and Destruction

One overriding moral message in the novel is that living recklessly and excessively leads to personal decline and destruction. The consequences extend beyond the individual and affect others, as well, such as when Abe's excessive drinking causes the imprisonment of one innocent man and the death of another. Dick's excessive drinking also has dire consequences, such as alienating his friends, ruining his career, and getting him beaten and imprisoned. His obsessive interest in youth and beauty contributes to the destruction of his marriage, paints him as a sexual pervert, and eventually entangles him in a lawsuit.

Fitzgerald wrote this novel during an era that clearly indicated how living excessively and recklessly has serious and destructive consequences. The Jazz Age was, in essence, a period of excess. Following World War I, the social climate reached an energetic peak during the Roaring Twenties. With a new emphasis on individualism and the pursuit of pleasure and enjoyment, this period was filled with raucous gaiety that, in the end, had serious negative consequences. The excesses of drink and pleasure that cause the destruction of characters in Tender is the Night reflect Fitzgerald's sensitivity to the excesses of the Jazz Age prior to the Great Depression.

Tender is the Night
F. Scott Fitzgerald