Tender is the Night - Book 1 - A novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Aug 25, 2026

Uploaded by Miles

Tender is the Night opens on the French Riviera in 1925, where a prominent hotel and its surrounding villas frame a summer of glamour and idle social rituals. Rosemary and her mother arrive by train with unsettled expectations, seeking distraction rather than purpose. The early scenes emphasize bright landscapes, overheated light, and beachside observers, while Rosemary’s vitality and sensitivity stand in contrast to the quiet, watchful routines of guests. The narrative establishes atmosphere, character contrast, and the tension between appearance and inner direction.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryStory & Novel

FormatPDF

Pages459

Reading Time11 h 47 min

AccessFree to download

Book 1

Setting on the French Riviera

Arrival of Rosemary and her mother

Life at the hotel and beach

Tender is the Night By F. Scott Fitzgerald (1933) Published by Planet eBook. Visit the site to download free eBooks of classic literature, books and novels. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons AttributionNoncommercial 3.0 United States License. Already with thee! tender is the night...... But here there is no light, Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways. —Ode to a Nightingale TO GERALD and SARA MANY FÊTES [Free eBooks at](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com)[ Planet eBook.com](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com) 3 Book 1 4 Tender is the Night I On the pleasant shore of the French Riviera, about halfway between Marseilles and the Italian border, stands a large, proud, rosecolored hotel. Deferential palms cool its flushed façade, and before it stretches a short dazzling beach. Lately it has become a summer resort of notable and fashionable people; a decade ago it was almost deserted after its English clientele went north in April. Now, many bungalows cluster near it, but when this story begins only the cupolas of a dozen old villas rotted like water lilies among the massed pines between Gausse’s Hôtel des Étrangers and Cannes, five miles away. The hotel and its bright tan prayer rug of a beach were one. In the early morning the distant image of Cannes, the pink and cream of old fortifications, the purple Alp that bounded Italy, were cast across the water and lay quavering in the ripples and rings sent up by sea-plants through the clear shallows. Before eight a man came down to the beach in a blue bathrobe and with much preliminary application to his person of the chilly water, and much grunting and loud breathing, floundered a minute in the sea. When he had gone, beach and bay were quiet for an hour. Merchantmen crawled westward on the horizon; bus boys shouted in the hotel court; the dew dried upon the pines. In another hour the horns of motors began to blow down from the [Free eBooks at](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com)[ Planet eBook.com](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com) 5 winding road along the low range of the Maures, which separates the littoral from true Provençal France. A mile from the sea, where pines give way to dusty poplars, is an isolated railroad stop, whence one June morning in 1925 a victoria brought a woman and her daughter down to Gausse’s Hotel. The mother’s face was of a fading prettiness that would soon be patted with broken veins; her expression was both tranquil and aware in a pleasant way. However, one’s eye moved on quickly to her daughter, who had magic in her pink palms and her cheeks lit to a lovely flame, like the thrilling flush of children after their cold baths in the evening. Her fine forehead sloped gently up to where her hair, bordering it like an armorial shield, burst into lovelocks and waves and curlicues of ash blonde and gold. Her eyes were bright, big, clear, wet, and shining, the color of her cheeks was real, breaking close to the surface from the strong young pump of her heart. Her body hovered delicately on the last edge of childhood—she was almost eighteen, nearly complete, but the dew was still on her. As sea and sky appeared below them in a thin, hot line the mother said: ‘Something tells me we’re not going to like this place.’‘I want to go home anyhow,’ the girl answered. They both spoke cheerfully but were obviously without direction and bored by the fact—moreover, just any direction would not do. They wanted high excitement, not from the necessity of stimulating jaded nerves but with the avidity of prize-winning schoolchildren who deserved their vacations. 6 Tender is the Night ‘We’ll stay three days and then go home. I’ll wire right away for steamer tickets.’ At the hotel the girl made the reservation in idiomatic but rather flat French, like something remembered. When they were installed on the ground floor she walked into the glare of the French windows and out a few

FAQs

Tender is the Night的故事开端发生在哪里？

故事开端在法国里维埃拉的一家大型酒店周边，靠近马赛与意大利边境之间的海岸地带。

Rosemary和她母亲为什么来到这家酒店？

她们在一个六月的清晨抵达，希望短暂停留并很快回家，但对这地方并没有明确期待，情绪上既有愉快的口吻，也带着无方向的无聊。

小说开场如何呈现氛围与人物对比？

叙述通过炫目的阳光、平静却忙碌的海滩活动与宾客社交来建立强烈的感官氛围；同时，Rosemary的活力与敏感被置于旁人的目光与刻板的度假节奏之下。

Aug 25, 2026

Uploaded by Miles