《夜色温柔》中迪克·戴弗的道德堕落 - 羞耻模型视角下的新思考-阙怡慧

分类号： H31 单位代码： 10335
密级：公开学号： 21805004
硕士学位论文
中文论文题目：《夜色温柔》中迪克·戴弗的道德
堕落——羞耻模型视角下的新思考
外文论文题目： Dick Diver’s Moral Decline in Tender Is
the Night: Rethinking from the Perspective of Shame Model
申请人姓名：阙怡慧
指导教师：何辉斌
专业名称：英语语言文学
研究方向：认知文学
所在学院：外国语言文化与国际交流学院
论文提交日期 2021/6/30
《夜色温柔》中迪克·戴弗的道德堕落—羞耻模型视
角下的新思考
论文作者签名:
指导教师签名:
论文评阅人 1：
评阅人 2：
评阅人 3：
评阅人 4：
评阅人 5：
答辩委员会主席：陈礼珍/教授/杭州师范大学
委员 1：隋红升/教授/浙江大学
委员 2：高奋/教授/浙江大学
委员 3：
委员 4：
委员 5：
答辩日期： 2021/5/21
Dick Diver’s Moral Decline in Tender Is the Night: Rethinking
from the Perspective of Shame Model
Author’s signature:
Supervisor’s signature:
Thesis reviewer 1：
Chair：Chen Lizhen/Professor/Hangzhou Normal University

(Committee of oral defence)
Committeeman 1：Sui Hongshen/Professor/Zhejiang University

Committeeman 2：Gao Fen/ Professor/Zhejiang University
Committeeman 3：
Committeeman 4：
Committeeman 5：
Date of oral defence： 2021/5/21

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浙江大学硕士学位论文 Acknowledgements
Acknowledgements
This thesis is a product of the affirmation and assistance of many people. I am

especially indebted to my mentor for his expert advice and patient editing. Thanks also
to other professors, who have advised me throughout the graduate program and helped
me to refine my research proposal.
I would also like to thank my cohort of roommates, who were essential to my
writing and research process; they continually inspired and supported me in every
setting from the classroom to my dormitory. I must also express my sincerest gratitude
to friends, whose constant assurances enabled me to pursue a graduate degree and
develop an expertise in my favorite area of study. Besides, I owe a lot to my family
because I felt depressed before the paper came out. At one point I wanted to give up my
research on literature. However, it’s my parents’ patience and trust that infused light
into my life and I began to know my value as independent scholar.
Finally, thanks most of all to my friend who I met in Shanghai during my internship.
His company tided me over until I finished the first draft. I am greatly appreciated our
fortuitous encounter. He motivated me constantly and reminded me not to be frightened
by occasional depression. I now believe motivation comes from kindness and purpose.
I
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Abstract
Abstract
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Tender Is the Night is one of the literary works of the 1920s
that depict the moral decline of America. It artistically presents the complex and special
psychological changes of the author. Therefore, it is necessary to study the text from
the perspective of psychology. Most scholars use psychoanalysis to interpret the hero
in the novel by introducing the concept of unconscious motive. This dissertation focuses
on attribution problem and personality development, and with the aid of Shame Model
in the theory of social psychology, explains the hero’s moral decline. In addition,
projective method is used to study the author and his works, which not only reflects his
attitudes but also enhances understanding of the complexity of human psychology and
behavior.
Shame Model presents inter-relations between measures of appraisal, feeling and
motivation, reflecting the latent structure of people’s experience of moral failure.
Shame can be subdivided into rejection, inferiority, and guilt according to different
appraisals. While the first two typically stimulate self-defensive motivation, the latter
is associated with self-improvement motivation. When moral failure is perceived as
other-condemnation, avoiding further damage to the social image becomes the primary
goal; when it is perceived as a self-defect, improving the self-image is the focus. Shame
Model explains why the experience of moral failures lead to different motivations.
The novel follows the emotional entanglement of Rosemary, Dick and Nicole
where the hero Dick Diver goes through three moral crises. He marries the rich
psychotic Nicole at the expense of his ideal. He has an affair with Hollywood girl
Rosemary regardless of his ethics. He indulges himself for years with his profession
unfulfilled. Diver goes from original rejection to being guilty and then to being inferior.
He can’t get rid of the awkward social image that he is “bought” by the Warren family,
and that he is hardly “made” into an ideal aristocrat. Global attribution increases his
self-defensive motivation, thus he resorts to evasion. Later, his self-image is ruined by
II
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Abstract
infidelity and alcoholism, but external attribution decreases his motivation for self-
improvement. Therefore, it’s responsibility avoidance caused by dysfunctional
personality rather than environmental corrosion that should be responsible for Diver’s
moral debacle. Moreover, Fitzgerald’s ambivalence is embodied in his character. He
yearns for the upper class but satirizes the rich. He sees through the emptiness behind
the vanity while enjoying the current extravagant life. Diver’s final retreat to a small
town is the awakening after disillusionment of the American dream. The ethical
dimension of exploring a new moral system and solution endows the novel with
brilliance of rational thinking in today’s cultural context.
Key words: moral decline; Shame Model; dysfunctional personality; Fitzgerald
III
浙江大学硕士学位论文摘要
摘要
弗朗西斯·斯科特·菲茨杰拉德的《夜色温柔》是描述 20 世纪 20 年代美国
道德衰败的文学作品之一。作者将其复杂特殊的心理变化进行艺术构思，最终呈
现于作品中，因此从心理学角度对文本进行研究分析非常必要。多数学者采用精
神分析法诠释主人公行为，以无意识动机为枢纽，把作品与人结合起来研究。本
文借助社会心理学理论中的羞耻模型，着眼于归因问题及人格发展，解释主人公
道德堕落的原因，并运用投射法将作家和作品联系起来研究，充分反映作者的思
维和态度，增进对人类心理和行为复杂性的理解。
羞耻模型通过呈现评价方式、情绪和动机等因素之间的相互关系，反映出人
们道德失败经历的潜在结构。根据评价方式不同，羞耻情绪可以被细分为抗拒、
自卑和内疚，前两者通常激发自我防御动机，后者则与自我完善动机相关联。当
道德失败行为被认为是外部谴责，避免社会形象受损就成为首要目标；当被认为
是自身缺陷，则重点考虑改善自我形象。羞耻模型解释了为什么道德失败的经历
会导致自我防御和自我完善的不同动机。
该小说以萝丝玛丽—迪克—尼科尔三人之间的感情纠葛为线索，串联起迪
克·戴弗的三次道德危机。戴弗与患有精神病的富家女尼科尔结合，放弃理想追
求；与好莱坞女孩萝丝玛丽产生婚外情，失去自我约束；最终事业荒疏，沾染恶
习，积重难返。戴弗经历了从抗拒到内疚再到自卑的心理变化。从被“收买”到
不堪“造就”，他的社会形象一直处于尴尬境地，整体归因强化了自我防御意图，
逃避是他的策略。后期他不顾自我形象，出轨、酗酒，外部归因削弱了自我完善
动机。环境腐蚀不是主导因素，人格失调导向的责任规避或许是戴弗道德溃败的
真正原因。此外，菲茨杰拉德的矛盾心理在戴弗身上得到了深刻体现。他渴望跻
身上流社会却又极尽讽刺富人群体，他过着放浪形骸的生活却也看透浮华背后的
空虚。戴弗最后的隐退正是“美国梦”幻灭后的清醒。通过反观人物命运探索新
的道德体系和精神出路，《夜色温柔》中体现出的伦理维度使其在当今的文化语
境下依然闪耀着理性思考的光辉。
【关键词】道德堕落；羞耻模型；人格失调；菲茨杰拉德
IV
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Contents
Contents
Acknowledgements………..………………………………………………………….Ⅰ
Abstract…...………………….………………………………………………………Ⅱ
摘要（Abstract in Chinese）…………………………………………………………Ⅳ
Introduction……..……………………………………………………………………1
Chapter Ⅰ Theoretic Exploration of Shame Model………………………………….8
1.1 Appraisals Based on Image Concerns…………………………………………8
1.2 Opposite Motivations Induced by Feelings of Shame…...…………………….9
1.3 Combinations in the Management of Moral Failures………………………...10
Chapter Ⅱ Shame Characteristics in Diver’s Moral Decline…..……...…………..13
2.1 Shame Featured with Rejection in Identity Loss…………………………….13
2.2 Shame Featured with Guilt in Fidelity Loss………………………………….16
2.3 Shame Featured with Inferiority in Capability Loss………………………….21
Chapter Ⅲ Social Psychological Analysis of Diver’s Moral Failures…………….24
3.1 Unalterable Damaged Social Image and Self-image…………………………24
3.2 Self-improvement Motivation Decreased by External Attribution…………..27
3.3 Self-defense Motivation Increased by Global Attribution……………………31
Chapter Ⅳ Moral Interaction between Diver and Fitzgerald….……..…………34
4.1 Dysfunctional Personality of the Character………….………...……………..34
4.2 Affective Ambivalence of the Author…………………………………….......37
4.3 Internalized Moralism against the Alienated World…………………………41
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………...46
References…………………………………………………………………………...48
V
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Introduction
Introduction
Fitzgerald will be read when many of his well-known contemporaries are forgotten.
—— Stein Gertrude (1933, p.218)
During F. Scott Fitzgerald’s lifetime, many critics took him as the representation
of lost generation who was disillusioned with American society. Fitzgerald was a
popular figure, but he was never really a popular writer in his lifetime. He got
disappointment after the publication of his fourth novel Tender Is the Night, which was
even bleaker than that experience of The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald was not satisfied
with the criticism which he thought distorted its meaning. The novel depicts a
disillusioned American psychiatrist Dick Diver and his wife Nicole Warren who suffers
from mental illness. Their marriage is based on the pathology and later their relationship
gets increasingly deviant until breaks. The book contains three parts and is narrated in
an unorthodoxly structure from three different perspectives. It begins on a sunshine
beach in the French Riviera and ends with the protagonist’s retreat into a town.
Tender Is the Night is the most autobiographical of his novels and it is based on the
experience of Fitzgerald’s wife Zelda’s struggle with schizophrenia. After the
publication of Tender Is the Night (1934), Rahv (1991) took the novel as courtship to
the capitalists: “The truth is that Nicole can be understood as a symbol of the whole
crazy social system, and Fitzgerald has been playing Dick Diver.” (p.19) Stavola (1979)
pointed out that both the author and the character have a sense of inferiority and the
ambivalence about identity, because they are both experiencing an American identity
crisis. (p.166) Fortunately, his later works stand the test and gain increasing attention
over time.
The study of Fitzgerald by western critics can be roughly divided into three stages:
the living period (1920-40), the recovery and prosperity period (1940-80), and the
stable period (1980-) 1 . Domestic scholar Wu Jianguo gives an overall introduction
1
何宁：
《菲茨杰拉德研究与中国》，《外语研究》，01 (2008)：98-102。
1
review of the life and creation of Fitzgerald as well as the summary of translation and
research of Chinese scholars in his treatise Fitzgerald Studies (2002)2: “Fitzgerald's
works have integrated the spirit of his time, the air of life, the commercial consciousness,
the lifestyle and the ethics in the reform. Most importantly, these works incorporate his
profound understanding of history and reality, his consciousness of morality and
tragedy, and prospective thinking on the future.” (p.385)
Tender Is the Night is indeed an excellent work with profound social and aesthetic
significance. Domestic and foreign researchers have been adopting every characteristic
perspective to study the book, such as feminism, cultural studies, psychoanalysis,
narrative theory, moreover, multiple critical perspectives have been emerging, like,
comparative studies of Fitzgerald and other writers and parallel interpretations of his
works. Ioana (2010) analyzes identity construction strategies in an attempt to show that
the two main characters, Dick Diver and Nicole Warren, use a process of othering in
order to achieve a “complete self” (p.63). Despite its being placed in a pathological
context in some psychoanalysis studies, there are opinions that the relationship between
Dick Diver and Nicole Warren is a love story in its nature. Based on Lawrence’s
philosophy of interpersonal relationships, Heather Brown (2013) proposes the view that
the Divers’ failed relationship is because “Diver has no interest in reaching a true
equilibrium with Nicole” (p.108). Li Dong (1995) analyzes the image of the hero Diver
and the cause of his tragedy. Zhang Qin (2001) interprets the novel from a feminist
perspective and finds that the text has become a typical metaphor for the fading of
patriarchy and rising of feminist culture. Jiang Lifu and Shi Yunlong (2006) use spatial
form theory to re-examine the novel, finding that the unique narrative structure,
perspective and skills show the new paradigm of modernist novels which emphasize
multi-dimensional thinking rather than plots. Above all, these criticisms from home and
abroad provide solid support for the research of the novel.
In search for new ways to understand the novel, there are four emerging research
trends can be summed: (1) a revisionist assessment of Tender Is the Night as Fitzgerald’s
2
吴建国：
《菲茨杰拉德研究》
。上海：外语教育出版社，2002。
2
most experimental novel; (2) an emphasis on how cultural studies—such as print media,
the history and reception of psychoanalysis, and Swiss and expatriate cultures—
influence it ; (3) a continued appreciation for the intertextual dialogues that inform the
novel; and (4) a welcome positioning of race, ethnicity, and gender as central to Tender
Is the Night and to Fitzgerald studies in general3. The emerging criticism theories also
accelerate the study of the novel. Zhang Xiaoli (2006) absorbs the concept of “identity
theory” in social psychology and applies it into analyzing the hero of the novel. She
concludes that the irreconcilability between Diver’s inner world and the outer world is
the main cause of his identity conflict. Diver cannot agree with the post-war society
which goes to the extreme to worship money instead of morality. In addition, he cannot
solve his own identity problem so as to give up the inner criterion. “It’s the combined
force of social denial, others’ denial and self-denial that pushes Diver into the abyss of
tragedy” (p.3). Wang YiJiao (2011) sees the disillusionment from the view of moral
emotion. He thinks that the cruelty of reality and initial dream exhaust Diver who can
no longer adhere to his ethical standards. Diver feels left out by the society because of
“mental exhaustion” and “moral disintegration” (p.41). A relatively new perspective is
provided by Junko (2012) who claims that the protagonist’s downfall is ascribed to a
“traumatic experience” (p.59), which can neither be referred to nor recognized by the
protagonist or the author. These untold memories motivated the novelist to create the
text and determined the course of the narrative. All the relevant research has been
greatly enriched through its archival, theoretical, and cultural explorations, and they are
essential for us to seek a profound understanding of the novel.
When it comes to the thematic research of the novel, the following themes such as
lost and confusion, disillusionment of American dream, self-exile, spiritual crisis are
most discussed. Wang Ning (1986) thinks that the essence of Fitzgerald’s novel is
disillusionment of American dream which reveals the spiritual crisis of the postwar
western youth. Liu Xianzhen (1996) extends the theme of disillusionment of American
dream to the realistic critical significance. He believes the novel represents corruption
3
Blazek, William & Laura Rattray. Twenty-First Century Readings of 'Tender is the Night'. Oxford
University Press, 2007.
3
and degeneration of the upper class in the western world. By tracking the creative
process of the novel and the author’s creation intention as well as his arrangements of
the ending, Qin Suyu and Cheng Xilin (2011) point out that the tragic protagonists in
Fitzgerald’s novels all show a certain heroic temperament in their disillusionments,
which deepens the effect. The numerous accounts of Diver’s tragic flaw have varied
widely, but they have nearly always converged in one overriding assumption: that the
narrative sequence of Tender Is the Night is directed toward a sovereign and ineluctable
end, which is the author’s ultimate annihilation of his American protagonist. However,
to grasp the essence of the novel, we should never ignore the author’s original meaning.
In his “General Plan” for Tender Is the Night in 1932, Fitzgerald elaborated the intention:
“Show a man who is a natural idealist, a spoiled priest, giving in for various causes to
the ideas of the haute Bourgeoise, and in his rise to the top of the social world losing
his idealism, his talent and turning to drink and dissipation.” (Bruccoli, 1963, p.76)
Given the authorial emphasis on the hero’s moral degradation, many critics have
focused on the reasons contributing to Diver’s decline. Fitzgerald ornately defines his
approach towards the protagonist of the novel who was unbreakable with “the
heightened promises of life” and was to be broken by means of his own idealism and
the deceptive, illusory world surrounding him which had aimed at his destruction. (Tate,
2007, p.107) Bruccoli thinks Diver is destroyed by “romantic concept” in the character
which might have made him a great figure. (2002, p.358) While most scholar believe
it’s the Warren’s wealth that destructs the promising psychiatrist, a more creative
opinion is that Diver’s failure is because of his unproper treat to Nicole, “greedily
accepting the reciprocal devotion of his patient” rather than helping her “translate” her
transference love “into self-knowledge”. (Boker, 1992, p.312) E.W. Pitcher (2015) puts
forward his idea that Diver’s problem is his unwillingness to acknowledge the inherent
darkness of human nature, an evasion of truth that compels him “lie to Nicole and to
himself” (p.85). The discrepancy explains the complexity and discoverability of Diver,
but they can’t sufficiently support Diver’s moral decline.
Ever since 1934, studies of Tender Is the Night have had difficulty in perceiving a
cause adequate to its hero’s catastrophe. It is not, as Henry Seidel Canby (1934)
4
remarked when he reviewed the book, that there are no reasons provided for Dick
Diver’s fate, but rather that “there are too many reasons, no one of which is dominant”
(p.316). George Steiner (1996) argues that “the essence of tragedy is that it be
irreparable from the point of view of both the protagonist and objective reality” (p.91).
Whether there should be one dominant reason is an arguable point; but, alternatively,
Fitzgerald does not suggest any clear combination of causes which can be seen to
account synergistically, as it were, for the velocity and extent of Diver’s decline. Over
the years, however, scholars have seen that the many more or less discrete reasons for
Diver’s collapse can be arranged under two broad categories. The first is socioeconomic:
An idealistic, middle class hero is used and discarded by a rich and careless leisure class.
The second, psychological category of motivation by ascribing to Diver some flaw of
character which made him extraordinarily susceptible to the fate which overtook him.
Therefore, in-depth exploration of the hero’s psychological change is indispensable.
Why rethink the universally discussed moral decline of Diver by introducing the
theory of Shame Model? On one hand, Shame Model deals with the experience of moral
failure by refining the concept of shame in the way of elemental analysis. Two
appraisals, three feelings and corresponding motivations are considered to form specific
appraisal-feeling-motivation combinations. Each combination represents an experience
of moral failure which is directed by concern for self-image or social image. In the
model, shame is dissected into rejection, guilt and inferiority. While the first is tied to
the other-condemnation appraisal that indicates the concern for social image, the last
two are respectively linked to the appraisals of specific self-defect and global self-
defect, which both implicate the concern for self-image. Shame Model successfully
explain why the experience of moral failures lead to distinct motivations for self-
defense and self-improvement. On the other hand, Fitzgerald’s tale of a psychiatrist’s
gradual disillusionment and decline offers description of one’s broken image and
insight into his psychology. As Stevens (1961) points out, the hero “is the loser in the
arena of morality. Ideas and morality, like truth and goodness, do not always become
one” (p.97), and “his failure brings to focus the fact that the division of idea and
morality can lead only to defeat” (p.104). If we apply the latest social psychological
5
model to the literary analysis, we will find the story of Dick Diver’s “dying fall”
obviously exceeds the authorized or official version of its meaning urged by Fitzgerald
himself. Diver fails to resolve his cognitive dissonance, succeeding neither in protecting
his self-image nor his social image in handling moral failures. His self-improvement
motivation is decreased by external attribution while his self-defensive tendency
increases due to global attribution, both indicating his downward spiral.
This dissertation comprises four chapters, taking Dick Diver’s moral decline as the
study object. The first chapter gives the comprehensive view of Shame Model in social
psychology. Three parts respectively explain what is Shame Model, why it can be
applied here and how to study the experience of the hero by virtue of the model. Chapter
Two focuses on the management paradigms of Diver’s moral failures. Three appraisal-
feeling-motivation combinations will be analyzed combining with the text. Diver goes
through three big moral failures: identity loss, fidelity loss and capability loss, which
respectively link to the feelings of rejection, guilt and inferiority. Accordingly, he takes
action of either self-defense or self-improvement. It is the one-after-another moral
failure that pushes him into the abyss of moral degeneration. Chapter Three summarizes
Diver’s unsuccessful management and incorrect attributions. His unalterable damaged
self-image and social image validate the tragedy, and his external and global attributions
are responsible for the result. The fourth Chapter explains the moral relevance between
the character and his author. Social ethics have influence on their moral choices and the
writer tries to regain moralism through reflection. Finally, the thesis draws to the
conclusion that the hero’s moral decline follows a certain psychological trajectory
dominated by a complex feeling known as shame. Responsibility avoidance caused by
dysfunctional personality should be responsible for Diver’s moral debacle. Fitzgerald
integrates his own social understanding into the novel, trying to explore a new moral
system and solution.
The interdisciplinary approach is not unprecedented. Many scholars have studied
the novel from the perspective of psychology. E.W.Pitcher (1981) thinks that the
“inhibitingly self-conscious egoism” of Diver reflects “the nations as much as
individuals suffer psychological breakdown” (p.72). Christian Messenger (2014)
6
analyzes the novel showcasing a “‘whole new world’ in which Dick and the twentieth
century would come to ‘believe,’ the world of institutional and therapeutic sympathy
represented by Freudian analysis” (p.22). All these attempts transcend the boundaries
of discipline and come out innovative findings. However, these psychological analyses
stay at macro level, which is too intuitive and qualitative lacking micro-level
consideration of the emotions and motives of the character. This dissertation resorts to
the factor analysis within Shame Model of social psychology, analyzing the
psychological process of the protagonist in a bid to explain his moral decline, and uses
projective method to study the author and his works, reflecting his attitudes as well as
enhancing understanding of the complexity of human psychology and behavior. Rather
than simply presenting experience patterns of the protagonist’s moral failure, the
dissertation aims to explore why and how Diver descends to the passive observer of his
fate from an ambitious talent as well as to offer referential significance on common
social psychological basis by elaborating his travelling down all these possible paths,
hoping the precise characterization and analysis help readers better understand the
round character and engage in their own life.
7
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Chapter Ⅰ Theoretic Exploration of Shame Model
Chapter Ⅰ Theoretic Exploration of Shame Model
1.1 Appraisals Based on Image Concerns
Although people like to boast themselves with good moral cultivation, we all make
mistakes. Sociologists hold that moral failure is a huge damage to our social image
because it affects others’ evaluations of us. Psychologists believe concern for one’s self-
image should be taken into consideration because self-evaluation is central to morality.
Socially or psychologically, these hypotheses give shame the core role in linking
appraisals and our concerns for image. However, social image and self-image are not
opposite, instead, they could be complementary or substitutable. If a person has a better
self-image, it will increase his need for a higher social image. In this case, they
complement each other; when a person has a low self-image, he may look to a better
social image and now the two are substitute for each other. In addition, one’s social
image is the overall impression of the public. Man is a social being and thus self-image
has social nature. From this perspective, to improve the self-image is to improve the
social image and social relations.
Shame was thought to be highly self-centered, but Lewis (1971) found that the
“other” is a prominent and powerful force in the experience of shame. (p.41) She
believed that for shame to occur there must be an emotional relationship between the
person and the “other” such that the person cares what the other thinks or feels about
the self. (p.42) Iyer and other people (2007) did an experiment on American and British
participants who were told their nations are corrupt and arrogant in the eyes of Iraqis4.
It’s actually an appraisal based on other’s condemnnation. The participants all
experienced the feeling of shame related with their damaged social images. It’s noticed
that self-image could also be affected at the same time, and the preferential concern for
self-image or social image is unclear. Therefore, Shame Model separates social image
4
Iyer, A., Schmader, T. & Lickel, B. “Why individuals protest the perceived transgressions of their
country: The role of anger, shame, and guilt”. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 33(2007):
572–587.
8
and self-image to discuss the connotation of shame under different circumstances.

Out of consideration of self-image, one tends to associate moral failure with self-
defect in terms of appraisal. He thinks the event is destructive to self-image and begins
to look for reasons in himself. Global self-defect or specific self-defect, which on earth
arouses the feeling of shame? Here two different opinions emerge: If one views himself
globally defective, he sees little chance to change his self-image, because he doesn’t
know where to begin from. At this moment, depression and pessimism take over the
emotion. When it comes to specific self-defect, one clearly knows what the problem is
and the possible remedial ways, then he may feel guilt due to the inner moral imperative,
which is embedded in the feeling of shame. When one cares his social image, afraid of
its destruction and ready to save it, he cares about his social bond. If one’s behavior is
deemed as moral failure by a group, he will possibly get social punishment. Under the
pressure of other-condemnation, it’s natural for one to feel rejection and isolation with
belief that he fails certain social standards.
1.2 Opposite Motivations Induced by Feelings of Shame
Having differentiated concerns for social image and self-image, it’s time to explain
various feelings related with shame and the following motivations induced by the
complicated emotion.
Moral Failure suggests the damage to one’s self-image, when one assumes that it is
caused by a global defect which is thought as unalterable, it’s natural for him to act
defensively. However, damage to social image may better explain self-defensive
motivation. When the feeling of shame debilitates to feeling of rejection, it makes sense
that self-defensive motivation is induced. Emotional experience of social devaluation
is easy to link with such feeling. Because the damage to one’s social image is done, one
can do nothing but adopt measures to avoid the further damage.
Shame Model helps to explain how the feelings of shame trigger distinct
motivations in the experience of moral failures. Here we consider two appraisals (other-
condemnation and self-defect) and three major shame feelings (rejection, guilt,
inferiority). When one focuses on his damaged social image, he is involved into the
9
other-condemnation appraisal and the core feeling of rejection will drive him to defend
himself. As his prioritized concern is self-image, two types of attribution may lead to
disparate results. Generally, internal, stable and specific attribution to one’s defect has
strong relation with the feeling of guilt, especially when he realizes he can save his self-
image as long as he conducted self-improvement action. While external, global self-
defect appraisal links little to shame but inferiority. Self-defensive motivation
thereupon rises, and one may hide, avoid or try to cover up for the sake of his social
image. By virtue of intermediate feelings, Shame Model identifies reasonable
motivations in different situations and examines moral choices.
In analyzing the multi-layered feelings of shame, we focus on how moral failure is
emotionally experienced. However, the conception of shame as describing emotion is
overly broad. In English the emotion words like “ashamed”, “disgraced”, and
“humiliated” are often used to express shame. As Ferguson (2005) argues, shame is a
feeling about who one is; it is about one’s identity. (p.377) However, too precise
emotion differentiation doesn’t help distinguish concern for self‐image from concern
for social image, because the two have internal connection as mentioned before.
1.3 Combinations in the Management of Moral Failures
Previously, shame is thought as an ambiguous conception, but in order to bridge the

different motivations and appraisals, the conception has to be redefined with more
measurable and differentiable feelings. Nicolay Gausel and Colin Wayne Leach (2011)
establish the basic framework of Shame Model 5 , as shown in Figure1. They divide
appraisals of moral failures into other-condemnation and self-defect. When it comes to
self-defect, two features need to be distinguished, one is global and the other is specific.
Since global self-defect is generally deemed as unalterable, it links to the motivation
for self-defense, whereas specific self-defect, which is alterable, points to the
motivation for self-improvement. We can easily find the appraisals concern two sides
we’ve discussed above. Other-condemnation appraisal shows the concern for social
5
Gausel, Nicolay & Colin Wayne Leach. "Concern for self‐image and social image in the management
of moral failure: Rethinking shame." European Journal of Social Psychology 41.4 (2011): 468-478.
10
image while self-defect appraisal focuses on self-image. In short, Shame Model

specifies the ways in which each concern guides the appraisal of, and feeling about,
moral failure.
In the first combination of appraised other-condemnation—> felt rejection—>
motivated self-defense, the concern lies in social image and the feeling based on such
concern is rejection related with shame. Social devaluation is indeed an unpleasant
experience and one who cares so about his social image will instinctively take action to
prevent it from further damaging through withdrawing himself from the circumstance
of failure. The damaged social image promotes the self-defensive motivation via the
intermediary feeling of rejection. Hiding and avoidance are the usual ways to turn to.
The second appraised global self-defect—> felt inferiority—> motivated self-defense
combination focuses on self-image. It becomes more complicated now because
different emphases lead to opposite motivations. In this pattern, one attributes moral
failure to global self-defect, instead generating the direct shame feeling, he is more
likely to be overwhelmed by inferiority which goes beyond pure remorse or guilt.
However, having anticipated the damage to self-image is preventable, he will still
choose a self-defensive way. The last type is appraised specific self-defect—> felt
guilt—> motivated self-improvement. This combination comes most natural to us
because when one realizes the heart of problem is resoluble, he focuses more on moral
reflection. Accordingly, he makes amends to protect his self-image motivated by the
willing of self-improvement. In a word, the model suggests that people choose the
suitable way on account of a particular pattern of appraisals and feelings about moral
failure.
11
Figure 1. Conceptual model of the experience of moral failure. Note: Top half of figure shows concern for social‐
image; shaded, bottom half of figure shows concern for self‐image
12
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Chapter Ⅱ Shame Characteristics in Diver’s Moral Decline
Chapter Ⅱ Shame Characteristics in Diver’s Moral

Decline
2.1 Shame Featured with Rejection in Identity Loss
Dick Diver, son of a poor minister, feels as much attraction to the temple’s money
changers, who can underwrite the romantic life, as he does to the pure altar of psychiatry.
His inability to resolve his own internal war leads his inevitably into an external conflict
triggered by his marriage to his social and philosophic opposite, Nicole Warren, a
wealthy girl from Chicago. Ill-prepared, Diver is thrust into a world which he does not
comprehend and into a struggle which he is fated to lose.
Fitzgerald describes Diver’s “illusions of eternal strength and health, and of the
essential goodness of people” (p.5). as his Achilles’ heel. He inherits the virtues from
his father and the two proud widows “who had raised him to believe that nothing could
be superior to ‘good instincts’, honor, courtesy, and courage” (p.22). He attempts to
maintain standards of self-reliance and personal responsibility by living a rather
ascetical life. He drinks the cheapest wine and takes third-class while travelling alone.
He would even penalize himself for any extravagances. However, Nicole who can buy
whatever she wants if needed stands in stark contrast against him. She induces all the
slackness in his nature by all means and Diver ends up in the overwhelm of material
stuff. Although he struggles “to keep alive the low painful fire of intelligence” (p.212),
all the efforts are doomed to failure because the very values he maintains are disdained
and rejected by the new world.
Diver has dedicated his full intelligence to science and his dream of being the best
psychologist who ever lived. He even likens himself to “the great Freud” who
successfully survive airplane bombs. He devotes to studying and writing, despite the
war and war-shortages which force him to burn his books for fuel, but not before he
commits to memory an abstract of the contents of each textbook, he experiences “the
fine quiet of the scholar which is nearest all things to heavenly peace” (p.4). Once he is
13
thrust outside the sanctuary, he begins to waver in both defense and dedication. In his
New Haven college days, through a process of self-deception, Diver has avoided
personal conflicts and consequently had earned the nickname “lucky Diver”. Once he
has completed his peaceful studies in Vienna, his vulnerability becomes immediately
apparent.
For a while he resists the attractions of Nicole and her world, but he vacillates and
his resistance is sporadic. Nicole observes that he is “all soft like a big cat” (p.10).
Diver’s feline softness reflects his inner vacillation. Fitzgerald makes it quite clear that
Diver literally holds the key to his own and Nicole’s future. Initially he accepts the
soundness of Franz’s and especially Dohmler’s admonitions that the relationship with
Nicole constitutes a professional situation and, mustering the necessary defenses,
adheres to their advice that the relationship must be immediately terminated before it
adversely affects Nicole’s ability to transfer her affection. But even as he performs the
external actions dictated by logic, Diver fails to check his deepening emotional response
to Nicole. He is drawn into an internal conflict between a resolute defense of his
profession and an irresolute, compromised one. As if to demonstrate his full awareness
of the dangers of his situation. Finally, Diver succumbs to his romantic inclinations,
experiencing “a sort of drunken flush pierced with voices, unimportant voices that did
not know how much he was loved” (p.42). Thus “lucky Diver” physically
acknowledges his love to Nicole on the horseshoe path, but his submission is
anticlimactic in light of his earlier decision to reject the dictates of logic. The train ride
back to the Zurich which follows his declaration of love is indeed, as Fitzgerald
carefully suggests, “a trail flight”, “a prefiguration of another journey” (p.50). Diver
and Nicole embark on a journey during the course of which “comes the afternoon with
the journey fading and dying but quickening again at the end” (p.50). Diver deposits
her “outside the sad door on the Zurishsee” asylum and walks away knowing “her
problem was one they had together for good now” (p.50).
On the French Riviera live a group of Americans whose life is described as reckless,
undirected and purposeless, like a chaotic carnival which presented in The Great Gatsby.
The hero changes but the emptiness after the vanity remains. Everyone wears a mask
14
and exhibits the attributes of that class. Nicole perceives that Diver is no longer
insulated from life. Diver once had contempt for scientists who cannot write and now
he excuses himself for not having enough time to write. She even observes that Diver
has begun to sign hotel registers as Mr. and Mrs. Diver rather Doctor and Mrs. Diver.
Throughout Nicole’s narrative, the gradual erosion of Diver’s original aspiration
becomes more and more obvious. The “Dicole” with which Diver and Nicole sign
communications indicates this loss of identity.
The change happens overtly on the night when he goes to dinner with Nicole and
Baby Warren, her sister. Diver did take the evasive action that he tried to keep Nicole
at a distance. He quitted the treatment plan in an effort to get that beautiful and innocent
girl out of his mind. However, fate tosses them together again. Nicole invites Diver to
the dinner which he could’ve turned down but accepted. Nicole seems more energetic
than before, she might be recovered. Without any exception, Diver has been convinced
by a yearn for another kind of possibility. During the dinner, Nicole leaves the crowd
and Diver follows out. All goes to the one scheme. As Nicole comes up close to Diver,
he can feel the “young lips, her body sighing in relief against the arm growing stronger
to hold her” (p.154). Diver gives in. The feeling is like “some indissoluble mixture,
with atoms joined and inseparable” (p.155) and Diver deeply knows that’s the
enchantment of Nicole. She has kind of values treasured by him who feels obligated to
protect them. Actually, Diver clearly knows about his situation that as long as he ties
the two together, it will be practically for him to get back to his own again, confirming
the description that “never again could they fit back into atomic scale” (p.155). His
marriage with Nicole, to some extent, is Diver’s contrived approach to his dreams of
love and professional success. Baby hit the nature of their relationship, she describes it
as “funny and lonely…no place to go except close”, questioning whether they should
“just love and love” and claiming that Nicole loves “the most” (p.159), which is exactly
what assures Diver’s personal value.
2.2 Shame Featured with Guilt in Fidelity Loss
From the perspective of Rosemary, the Divers’ marriage appears to her as the
15
perfect marriage: the most fascinating man she had ever met, married to the most
attractive woman she had ever seen, and living a life of refinement, expensive simplicity
and romantic love in the most elegant places in the world. This is what Rosemary is
fascinated by and wants a share of. In the beginning, Rosemary is appealed to Diver.
She tells her mother that she falls in love with a man on the beach. The fact is “when
he looks at her and for a moment she lives in the bright blue worlds of his eyes, eagerly
and confidently”. but then Rosemary only uses an indifferent tone “He’s married
though—it’s usually the way” (p.12). Her obsession with Diver increases, however,
until she confesses love to him: “I’m in love with you and Nicole. Actually that’s my
secret—I can’t even talk about you to anybody because I don’t want any more people
to know how wonderful you are. Honestly—I love you and Nicole—I do.” (p.94)
Rosemary is like Alice entering the wonderland which is totally different from
Hollywood she previously knows. It’s “a purpose, a working over something, an act of
creation from any she had known” (p.18). She looks into this new world with innocent
eyes. Little caring the complex circumstance and strange relations between people,
Rosemary has buried herself in a fantasy dream that her love is right there. And her
dreaming is supported by her mother’s encouragement. Mrs. Speers feels that her
daughter needs the chance to be spiritually weaned and grow mature. To Rosemary the
encounter with Diver is just an adventure for her to grow mature and her first step into
a mature world. She is called “Daddy’s girl” wherever she goes for her playing role in
that movie, but in reality she is only a mother’ daughter who listens to mother’s advice:
“Wound yourself or him—what happens it can’t spoil you because you’re not a girl.”
(p.34) Rosemary begins to approach Diver although he is an ambiguous definition to
her. She shows great interest in exploring the novelty. As she makes it to be closer to
Diver, Rosemary becomes more confident about her mother’s indoctrination. This kind
of fantasy doesn’t end until their final consummation in the affair. Rosemary is the one
who becomes sober first, obsession with Diver is no longer the meaning but only the
method. So far, the role of Rosemary as a catalyst in Diver’s decline has ended, but the
journey of Diver heading to failures will never stop.
Diver’s dedication of his life and talent to Nicole’s recovery and to protecting her
16
from responsibility is shattered when a murder happened. The body of a Negro, an

acquaintance of Abe North, is found stabbed to death on Rosemary’s bed. In an effort
to spare Rosemary embarrassment and unwarranted publicity, he quickly takes clean
sheets from his room to put on her bed. In his excitement and concern for Rosemary’s
well-being, he thrusts into Nicole’s hands the bloody sheet which cause her to suffer a
mental collapse. Having failed Nicole as a husband through his extramarital advances
toward Rosemary, he now fails her even as a psychiatrist. The blood-stained sheets
which Diver thrusts into her hands evidently remind Nicole of the loss of her virginity
to her father. Following Nicole’s breakdown in Paris, the Divers return to the villa Diana,
but Diver becomes increasingly dissatisfied with his existence. Retreat into his
workroom brings the realization “that his little collection of pamphlets…contained the
germ of all he would ever think or know” (p.177). He resents the year wasted at New
Haven and yearns for the original academic enthusiasm. It is him who had spent years
on the study of armadillo’s brain, monotonously but persistently. Diver now discovers
that life with Nicole has suddenly become a nightmare “hour upon the stage” where he
must cloak his emotions and stage his actions carefully. His original “self-protective
professional detachment” from Nicole now meshes with “some new coldness in his
heart” (p.180). He learns to be indifferent to her, deliberately ignoring Nicole’s
emotional demand in case of giving away his own will. He does empty the girl only as
his treated patient rather than his wife. Diver’s loss is irreparable, his defeat irreversible.
Broken in spirit and morale by harsh realization that his qualified financial
independence is at best a charade, that his pretense of rigid domesticity is becoming
unbearably arduous “in this effortless immobillity”, that “he was inevitably subjected
to microscopic examination” and “that life was refined down to a point” (p.183). Diver
confines himself to one room in the house, like a prisoner, listens to time.
Nicole because of her mental sickness loses her equal position in the marriage. Her
husband is also her doctor and watcher. In most cases, she can’t lose temper or it will
be deemed “relapse”. She is haunted by self-doubt and insecurity which her husband
brings to her. In Diver’s stand, he is also consumed by the patient and wife. He often
confuses his multiple duties that he fails to be a good husband and good doctor at the
17
same time. Nicole wants equality, but Diver wouldn’t let that chance happen. Finally,
he chooses to keep Nicole at a distance at his own risk. It seems the marriage is going
to the end because both of them are reluctant to deep communications. Nicole
doubtlessly holds the balance in Diver’s career and life. But her role can only end in
failure because marriage is never ever a solo playing. Her tragedy begins from
childhood when incest caused her mental disease. But on the other side of her disease,
she presents charming appearance and quiet personality as well as great intelligence
which are all attracted desperately to Diver who becomes the empathy object of the
poor girl. “She led a lonely life owning Diver who did not want to be owned” (p.160).
Fitzgerald sensitively captured the feeling.
Nicole’s love gives Diver a sense of strife which pushes him to find a vent. He is
fed up with “Nicole sick and Nicole well” (p.168) and he knows he will never go back
to the original self if it continues. Rosemary is a well-time excuse to escapes, afterwards
Diver clearly admits that “time with Rosemary was self-indulgence” (p.213). The root
of their troubled marriage is their unhealthy relationship. He knows he loves Nicole
especially after the affair with Rosemary. Taking his previous infidelity as a try of
avoidance, now he reexamines his heavy responsibility and revives his feeling to his
wife, “thoughts about her, that she should die, sink into darkness, love another man,
make him physically sick” (p.217). At that moment he must have pulled himself from
apathy to guilt. He is in need to change the situation. Things don’t turn good easily,
though. Nicole has another psychotic symptom in the bathroom, crying out “I never
expected you to love me—it was too late” (p.112). She begs anyone for not entering the
bathroom because she feels that her only privacy has been deprived. The blood indeed
stimulates her memory of incest scene, she helplessly askes how “to fix them” (p.112).
Huge real pressure again weighs on Diver which reminds him of his duty and his fault,
especially his helplessness.
Diver goes back to family as expected and tries his best to fulfill his responsibility
and commitment. They fly to Riviera where Diver attempts to relive the old days. But
nothing can go back to the past. Diver has no longer been the promising doctor who
aspired to write a medical treatise. Alcoholism and extravagance overshadow the
18
frustrated man. Nicole notices Diver’s changing all the long run. She reaches the
decision: “We can’t go on like this.” Then she further asks: “Or can we? What do you
think?” (p.267) Diver’s response is perfunctory, which ignites Nicole’s real thoughts:
“I’ve ruined you… you used to want to create things—now you seem to want to smash
them up.” (p.267) Nicole sees everything but she keeps silent in their marriage partly
for her worrying that Diver would leave her. But she in any case doesn’t want to see a
ruined man. Until then both of them come to face the destruction. Neither has Diver
achieved his original dream nor did he own a brilliant career with the loved on by his
side. Their relationships run on rocks so does his life. Diver breaks Nicole’s last
affection for him negligently or deliberately, creating the condition of pushing Nicole
to Tommy Barban’s arm. In a way, Diver lets it go without making any remedy. He
yields control in the relationship but he can never regain control of his own life. On the
afternoon of that eventful evening, momentarily reunited by the menace of their
drunken cook, Diver and Nicole miss their final chance for reconciliation.
“We can’t go on like this?” Nicole suggested. “Or can we? What do you think?”
Startled that for the moment Diver did not deny it, she continued, “Some of the
time I think it’s my fault? I’ve ruined you.”
“So I’m ruined, am I?” he inquired pleasantly.
“I didn’t mean that. But you used to want to create things? Now you seem to want
to smash them up.” (p. 286)
Still anxious to preserve an increasingly imperfect world but the only one she
knows, Nicole tries another tack: “After all, what do you get out of this?” (p. 286) His
cool, clinical answer “Knowing you’re stronger every day. Knowing that your illness
follows the law of diminishing returns” frightens Nicole and she “thrust her hand
forward to his across the table” (p. 286). Diver’s reaction is direct resistance, and to that
point, their marriage has been thrown into abyss by Diver, the controller of the marriage.
The first stage of Nicole’s recovery was brought about by a “transference” of her
love for her father onto Diver. He then was a promising doctor and handsome lover who
19
could offer her considerable curing and understanding. But he could not give her the
basic understanding of life that she would need to become completely well. What Diver
generally helped her to do was cover up the problem, not get to the core of it. Even if it
is Nicole who eventually goes off, it is she who, at the beginning of their relationship
and for the greatest part of it, is the most in love.
Isn’t it funny and lonely being together, Diver? No place to go except close. Shall
we just love and love? Ah, but I love the most, and I can tell when you are away
from me, even a little. I think it’s wonderful to be just like everybody else, to reach
out and find you all warm beside me in the bed. (p.159)
She is proud of Diver and of his achievement and, despite many critical opinions
to the contrary, she never attempts to bribe him with her money or to prevent him from
working; neither does she encourage his drinking, his showing off, their partying and,
later, his quarrelsomeness. In fact, she needs him to be successful and stable, for only
such a man can provide emotional stability for her. Her admiration for Diver is clearly
revealed at the beginning of her monologue, or flashback, when she sounds like any
woman proud of her husband. She is delighted to mention Diver’s pamphlet being
selling everywhere and emphasizes it will be published in six languages. It is also
obvious that she reacts strongly against his abandoning his title. The beginning of
Diver’s loss of self-respect is indicated here, and so is Nicole’s awareness of it. The fact
that she will not stay with a husband whom she can no longer respect and who does not
abide by his own principles is also clearly foreshadowed. From admiration and respect
for Diver, Nicole evolves toward contempt and pity, which spells the death of her love
for him. That Diver’s degeneration brings about Nicole’s final recovery is in a sense
true, but not in the way that it is usually seen. He does not sacrifice himself so that she
may recover. He degenerates because of his own deep-seated psychological problems,
and she is left with nothing to hold on to. She is then faced with two alternatives: either
go down with him or survive him, and she finds a way to survive, after a short moment
when she is tempted to “drown” with him literally and symbolically. (p.274)
20
One cannot help but question the value of what Diver could have offered to Nicole,
for as Robert Sklar very aptly put it:
the source of her disintegration lies in the same dissimulation which his social role
was made to bolster. But where her disintegration arose from one ugly incident, his
disintegration stems from the very core of his personal identity. The true neurotic
in Tender is the Night is not Nicole Diver, but her husband. (1967, p.285)
Fitzgerald makes the comment on Diver’s behavior as Diver is waiting for

Rosemary outside the “Films par Excellence Studio”: Diver’s necessity of behaving as
he did was a projection of some submerged reality…Diver was paying some tribute to
things unforgotten, unshriven, unexpurgated. (p.91) It has wider implications and gives
a clue to Diver’s behavior throughout his life. Confronted with reminders of “the
maturity of and older America”, of “old loyalties and devotions”, Diver becomes
increasingly aware of, and concurrently ashamed of, his financial dependence upon
Nicole, his emotional entanglement with Rosemary, and his relinquishment of the past.
2.3 Shame Featured with Inferiority in Capability Loss
Diver finally realizes that his intelligence and integrity have been controlled and
prostituted by money, specifically the Warren money, that America already regards him
as a “capital investment”, but he cannot understand why or how that fact has come
about. Yet despite his wasted nine year spent “teaching the rich the ABC’s of human
decency” (p.219). When he hears the news of his father’s death, the son “is compelled
to judge himself by the standards his father taught him, and by these standards Diver
recognizes his corruption.” (Bruccoli, 2002, p.123) Kneeling beside his father’s grave,
Diver bids a real and symbolic farewell to the past and all its values. He has no more
ties now and he cannot come back, either. All the values he inherits from the old world
are buried at the same time. “Good-bye, my father—good-bye, all my fathers.” (p.222)
Diver’s lament is not only for his loved ones but also an elegy for the era which cannot
be revisited. He deliberately goes out of his way to renew his relationship with
Rosemary Hoyt. Rosemary exercises complete control over Diver, and, despite the
21
mutual recognition that neither is in love with the other, they surrender to their passions.
Diver’s rapid, drunken disintegration which follows that surrender abruptly in his petty
quarrel with the cab drivers and his subsequent beating and imprisonment. He
experiences feelings of “vast criminal irresponsibility” and hopelessness. Imprisoned,
he is forced to undergo the ultimate humiliation of asking Baby Warren’s aid to free
him. Diver’s degeneration is also reflected in a scene during his release when angry
crowd mistakes him for a child rapist and murder. Diver’s dependence upon Baby
Warren’s influence and money constitutes a total, unconditional surrender of body and
spirit to an unprincipled representative of post-war world. Baby, on the other hand, has
“the satisfaction of feeling that, whatever Diver’s previous record was, they now
possessed a moral superiority over him for as long as proved of any use” (p.253).
As foreshadowed by his humiliating debacle in Rome, Diver ceases to exert any
real influence or control over his existence. He manages for a short time to fulfill his
role at the clinic, but his performance is perfunctory and degenerates as the habit of
personal responsibility and discretion fades. In addition, Diver expresses impatience at
his psychiatric chores at the clinic and feels a growing aversion to the clinic’s wealthy
clientele as well. They remind him of old things which he rebels at. In the broken post-
war world, all the remainder of his life are no longer as complete as they were. All the
characters who have surrounded Diver throughout the novel have been incomplete and
have dissipate through contact with the world of money and leisure. Diver readily
accepts the chaos and dissolved partnership because “he had long felt the ethics of his
profession dissolving into a lifeless mass” (p.274). Another example of Diver’s
helplessness is his inability to control even his domestic existence; a drunk cook forces
him to withdraw before her violent advance and to resort to bribery to remove her from
the premises. In another episode, Diver tries to water ski with another man on his
shoulders, but his physical strength has so declined in the two years since he last
performed the trick that he is incapable of getting to his feet repeated attempts. His
inability to stand with other man on his shoulders not only dramatizes the debilitating
effects of his recent existences but more significantly also symbolizes his diminished
capacity for shouldering other people’s burden. In the motorboat, Nicole misses
22
“Diver’s easy talent of taking control of situations and making them all right” (p.301).
Afterwards Nicole’s uneasiness changes to contempt. When she is finally released from
dependency upon Diver, Nicole thinks to herself, “I’m practically standing alone,
without him” (p.307).
The pessimism becomes stronger and stronger as Diver fades out of the novel. No
possibility of reconciliation with Nicole exists; she has “cut the cord forever” and is
under the protectorship of her new husband, Tommy Barban. With that avenue
effectively closed, Diver begins a progressive decline through a series of New York
towns. Diver feels knackered. There is hardly any pride and dignity left for he has sold
them out to the Warren millions. He cannot fulfill any responsibility or ideal. He’s never
a man of word. It never rains but it pours. Problematic marriage, deceased father and
friend may all be the final straw that broke the camel’s back. Finally, the day comes
when he receives the urgent mission to rescue his old friend in the middle of night.
He got up and, as he absorbed the situation, his self-knowledge assured him that he
would undertake to deal with it— the old fatal pleasingness, the old forceful charm,
swept back with its cry of “Use me!” He would have to go fix this thing that he
didn't care a damn about, because it had early become a habit to be loved, perhaps
from the moment when he had realized that he was the last hope of a decaying
clan.(p.331)
In general, Diver made three big choices in his life. The inconsistency of his
original motivations and behaviors leads to the moral degeneration. The final
incompetence overwhelmed by disillusionment drives him away from everything
which he was imposed on. He could do nothing but accept the arrangement of the fate.
23
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Chapter Ⅲ Social Psychological Analysis of Diver’s Moral Failures
Chapter Ⅲ Social Psychological Analysis of Diver’s

Moral Failures
3.1 Unalterable Damaged Social Image and Self-image
Tender Is the Night is the portrayal of Dick Diver going through broken career and
marriage. His life is an everlasting exhausting: from original “all completeness” to the
one who “still had pieces of his own most personal self for everyone”(p.139) and at last
to a total defeated man who is incapable of achieving any of initial dreams. As a man
endowed and cultivated with morality, he is least willing to give up his own moral
adherence. However, in the Italian taxi-driver episode. Diver has descended to be a man
who acts based on emotion for the sake of emotion. He no longer controls violence,
instead, he provokes aggressive action, letting all the rationality at loose ends. “Dr.
Diver’s profession of sorting the broken shells of a sort of egg had given him a dread
of breakage.” (p.195)
The gradual dissolution of Abe North is significant because it functions as an
ominous foreshadowing of the fate of Dick Diver. The party proves the final blow to an
already weakened Abe North. Still drunk the next day as he departs from the Gare Saint-
Lazare, Abe, desperately craving and hopelessly dependent upon alcohol, speaks out
the dilemma facing people of his kind. If they are sober, they don’t want to
communicate with people in the corrupt world, but as they paralyze themselves with
alcohol, other people resist the company. Abe and Diver expose themselves and their
talents to the potentially corrupting influences of leisure and money. Diver feels that he
has been no less than an animal endlessly driven by external glories. He doubts the
meaning of dignity and regrettably realizes it “could come only with an over-throwing
of his past, of the effort of the last six years” (p.152). Diver has finally fallen casualty
to his own internal dissension and no longer can he mask or elude, with fine clothes and
endless parties, the turmoil and guilt inherent in his failure to adequately defend or
pursue his true talent.
24
The novel begins with Dick Diver an outgoing image who seems to be passionate
about all the things around. He’s always energetic and controllable over the things,
which makes him stand out in the crowd. Diver is high on being the center of the public
with attention of his company. During a dinner with Rosemary, the Norths and the two
French musicians, Diver boasts that “no American man had any repose” except himself.
He tries to get the others to find someone in the restaurant to prove his assertion and
the result flatters him. All the men coming into the restaurant fail in keeping composed.
As Diver says, “I’m the only one” (p.111), his pride and confidence show between the
lines. From the perspective of Rosemary, Diver has doubtlessly become the center of
her fantasy world, a charming character, an “all complete” figure.
Diver’s self-image is crucial to him, and it involves being brave and wise and kind,
the very qualities his father had taught him to believe in; but above all, he wants to be
loved—not to love, which involves being the subject, but to be loved. Diver has
“extraordinary virtuosity with people” (p.27). He himself is often baffled by the
spectacular success of his New World hospitality, a hospitality that brooks no invidious
distinction among his varied guests but rather encourages them all to be their “best
selves” (p.32). A well-known passage describing the Divers’ dinner party at the Villa
Diana may serve to illustrate his social image:
The table seemed to have risen a little toward the sky like a mechanical dancing
platform, giving the people around it a sense of being alone with each other in the
dark universe, nourished by its only food, warmed by its only lights. And, as if a
curious hushed laugh from Mrs. McKisco were a signal that such a detachment
from the world had been achieved, the two Divers began suddenly to warm and
glow and expand, as if to make up to their guests, already so subtly assured of their
importance, so flattered with politeness, for anything they might still miss from
that country well left behind. Just for a moment they seemed to speak to everyone
at the table, singly and together, assuring them of their friendliness, their affection.
(p.34)
25
His characteristics become startlingly clear when he begins to break down and loses
his composure. “He was in love with every pretty woman he saw now, their forms at a
distance, their shadows on a wall” (p.201), and he indulges in casual affairs which bring
him nothing but further trouble. At the same time, his repressed hostility comes to the
fore, and he continuously antagonizes and offends people for no reason. Nicole was
affirming his talent but now detests his abandonment. Diver’s apparent self-denial and
concern for others is basically a way to satisfy his own love lust and, through it, to gain
power over others. As he himself acknowledges, it is a “trick of the heart” (p.164). Since
the ultimate aim of this love lust is the domination of others, it can never be satisfied
and, because it is impersonal, other-directed, and neurotic, it can only lead to Diver’s
own destruction. On the boats of Rosemary’s friend scene, Diver tries desperately to
retain the energy and ability of the old days. He plans to perform an old trick which is
about lifting a man on his shoulders while boarding behind the boat. Failed two times,
Diver gives his last try. As Diver feels the full weight of his partner on the shoulders,
he is almost immovable. Still, he doesn’t give up the attempt to lift the burden until he
collapses “back down on his knees with a smack” (p.284). He ends up looking
humiliated in the water. Later he confesses to Rosemary that he has “gone into a process
of deterioration” (p.285).
However, it’s totally wrong to see Diver as a passive character in the book. His
antisocial action suggesting his moral decline in the later period have inevitable internal
and external causes. He suffers belief crisis from father’s death and the defection of
Nicole contributes further to the collapse of his ideals. In the face of Nicole’s appraisal
that he is a “coward” and a “failure” (p.301), Diver chooses the most useless behavior
and the worst attitude to prove it, which fails the loyalty of people around him. It seems
that he deliberately negates the decency and elegance in the past which makes him the
“center of light, life, hope, and excitement” (p.287). It’s him who break down the
marriage, career and even his life. Although in the last part of the book, Diver is caught
in a deep sense of disillusionment, forcing him to negate and resist the formal ideals
and pursuits. Only at the bottom of his heart, nostalgia is breeding: a remembrance that
at the end of the novel takes the form of an elaborate repetition and retracing of his
26
American past. In this repressed context, Diver’s offstage decision to reject his postwar
life in Europe is motivated not only by despair and disillusion but, as the following
passage may suggest, by a renewed allegiance to an earlier and more solitary sense of
self—a self all but consumed by the various social roles it has come to play in the
decadent lives of others.
His love for Nicole and Rosemary, his friendship with Abe North, with Tommy
Barban in the broken universe of the war’s ending—in such contacts the
personalities had seemed to press up so close to him that he became the personality
itself—there seemed some necessity of taking all or nothing; it was as if for the
remainder of his life he was condemned to carry with him the egos of certain people,
early met and early loved, and to be only as complete as they were complete
themselves. (p.245)
Diver from the very beginning holds the belief that he must be less intact, even
faintly destroyed. He is ready to establish a new structure which is bound to be better
than the original one. It seems like the life course of Diver who’s gradually falling into
decadence. Maybe we can try to understand Diver’s behavior change from a different
angle that his corruption is the way of self-defense to save himself from the social
repression. Diver reflects the eroding self and attempts to break out. He deliberately
takes the negative approach with the motivation for self-defense. Perhaps he is not
really giving up on himself but to retrieve the “intricate destiny”.
3.2 External Attribution Decreasing Self-improvement Motivation
Diver not only makes wrong choices but attributes in a wrong way. It’s not until
Nicole’s awakening that Diver’s self-moved sacrifice is proved not what he himself
thought. Diver’s falling in love with Nicole is definitive. Nicole stands for everything
that could attract him in a woman: she is young, beautiful, sick and therefore dependent,
rich and therefore fascinating, glamorous and able to offer him the graceful way of life
he yearns for. Most importantly, she adores him and needs him. He is, therefore,
fascinated by the idea of devoting his life to her and thus making actual his self-image,
27
becoming worthy of Nicole’s love and earning the gratitude of the rich typified by Baby
Warren. That he had considered himself as an object in the hands of the Warrens is
clearly shown by his interior comment when Nicole finally asserts herself: “The case
was finished. Doctor Diver was at liberty.” (p.302) Clearly, also, and however harsh it
may sound, Baby Warren sizes him up accurately when she decides that “he put himself
out too much to be the correct stuff” (p.157). She encourages Nicole to break up with
Diver who is ineducable to her class. Although Nicole feels a bit hesitant, she has got
clear self-judgment:
She had somehow given over the thinking to him, and in his absences her every
action seemed automatically governed by what he would like, so that now she felt
inadequate to match her intentions against his. Yet think she must; she knew at last
the number on the dreadful door of fantasy, the threshold to the escape that was no
escape; she knew that for her the greatest sin now and in the future was to delude
herself. It had been a long lesson but she had learned it. Either you think—or else
others have to think for you and take power from you, pervert and discipline your
natural tastes, civilize and sterilize you. (p.290)
There are three obvious psychotic relapse of Nicole which, as a matter of fact, can’t
pin on her. The first happens in the bathroom and is observed by Mrs. McKisco who is
later threatened by Tommy Barban not to inform anyone. It even triggers a duel.
Everyone tries to cover up some stuff about the Diver. The relapse can be seen as the
response and vent of Nicole to the unsatisfied party or unsatisfied authority of Diver
who insists on the “really bad party” (p.27). The next relapse occurs in Paris. It starts
with a negro dying in Rosemary's room. What Diver does is shoving Nicole the bloody
sheets which possibly cause her panic and terrible memories that she was sexually
assaulted by her father. Not long before the incident, one of Diver’s friend Maria Wallis
kills a man in an accident and turns to Diver for help. At that point, Nicole thinks
rationally that they should phone Maria’s sister whose husband is a Frenchman, and she
definitely “can do more than we can” (p.84) rather than Diver’s idea of solving the
28
problem on his own. This time Nicole’s reaction is the most violent, however, Diver is
disappointed even annoyed with her. He expects Nicole to be self-restraint and her
symptoms are accused of inappropriateness. It’s quite unfair to the reader, though. The
last collapse is after the severe quarrel between Nicole and Diver on his scandal. Nicole
drives the car heading down to the hill with the determination to destroy both of them.
It’s even not an irrational impulse but her final decision after she has realized her
husband’s desertion of her. She can neither get Diver back nor his good nature, so she
adopts the most resolute way to express her most real disappointment.
Objectively, they share the responsibility of the failure of the relationship and their
destruction. Their relationship is destructed by themselves because actions and
intentions run counter to each other. They can never get a balance in the marriage which
focus much on equality. The ‘mingling and merging’ nature of the relationship between
Diver and Nicole is superbly symbolized by the epithet “Dicole”. The fusion of the
names here emphasizes the fact that both parties lose their separate identities in this
relationship. Neither Diver nor Nicole is to blame individually, as both of them play a
part in the failure of the relationship. In fact, if we must accuse one partner more than
the other, we would find fault in Diver over Nicole because he refuses to take part in a
love battle with her, but he once again places the blame on Nicole, claiming that this
avoidance occurs at the end of the novel because Nicole “no longer needs him”(p.14).
There is little evidence in Fitzgerald’s novel that Diver is ever willing to engage in a
love battle, and at the end of their marriage, Nicole has had little interest in balancing
the position with Diver and she chooses to quit.
The most memorable fight the couple has results in violence and is driven by
jealousy rather than a desire to work toward an understanding of one another. When
Nicole receives a letter that accuses Diver of seducing a patient’s young daughter, she
confronts her husband; but rather than seeing the argument as a personal matter, Diver
can only think of Nicole as a patient. Diver is aware of this problem, admitting the
“dualism in his views of her—that of the husband, that of the psychiatrist—was
increasingly paralyzing his faculties” (p.210), but he is still unwilling to battle with
Nicole. Instead, he tries to brush off the issue as quickly as possible and act as if it never
29
happened. It is clear by Nicole’s silence that she is unhappy with this resolution, but
Diver can only interpret this behavior as something akin to a patient’s irrational mood
swing. Diver excuses himself by shifting the blame to the girl, asserting the letter is
written by a lunatic. Nicole doesn’t buy his argument as her self-consciousness has
recovered. She is undoubtedly questioning Diver’s infidelity. Diver again tries to
distract her: “Suppose we don’t have any nonsense, Nicole.” (p.209) It’s obvious that
his response is designed to diffuse the situation and avoid any kind of productive
discussion. Nicole attempts to get a response from Diver by openly accusing him of his
moral problem: “Don’t you think I saw that girl look at you?” The rhetorical question
pushes Diver to face the confrontation and his final explain that her view of things is
simply a delusion entirely irritates her: “It’s always a delusion when I see what you
don’t want me to see.” (p.212) Nicole is right, and Diver knows it, as her words produce
in him a “sense of guilt as in one of those nightmares where we are accused of a crime
which we recognize as something undeniably experienced” (p.212).
However, Diver still rejects Nicole’s perspective, and the matter is dropped once
again. Nicole becomes violent, deliberately causing the car to crash on the family’s
drive home. Nicole tries to destroy everything in an attempt to get some reaction from
Diver. After the accident she screams in delight, “You were scared, weren’t you? ...You
wanted to live!” (p.215) While Nicole gets the response she was looking for, it does not
lead to anything productive. In fact, this episode only pushes Diver further away, as he
goes on a trip in order to continue avoiding confrontation with Nicole, a point he makes
perfectly clear when he says: “I don’t want to go away with Nicole. I want to go away
alone.” (p.216) When he not only refuses to be patronized but also to be polite, Nicole
exclaims: “You’re a coward. You’ve made a failure of your life, and you want to blame
it on me.” (p.319) The pity and shame of it is that she is right. Diver has caused his own
failure in life but he is always looking for external attribution. Although extremely
reluctant to recognize, he still has to face the reality that he is depend on the Warren’s
money to accomplish the present achievements. As a matter of fact, Nicole never pushes
him to the bottomless abyss of desire. He himself goes over to the doom step by step in
the face of temptation. He should also come to realize that Nicole’s mental disease is
30
not the real problem which impedes him becoming a brilliant psychiatrist. Rather, he
takes it as excuse to evade too many responsibilities that he should have burdened.
3.3 Global Attribution Increasing Self-defense Motivation
People sympathize with Diver as an outcast by the upper class who should have
been a promising doctor. However, if he still lingers on that world, wearing his
hypocritical mask, is it meaning that he will get rid of the ending of failure? The answer
is no. The novel describes a tragedy, but the reason of Diver’s demise is not being
outcast at all, Diver should be responsible for his own limitation and dissention. A series
of negative feedback strengthens his sense of incapability, suggesting that all failures
are irretrievable. Diver has no faith to rely on but accepts the rest arrangement with
cowardice and uncertainty. To be fair, the degradation of circumstance is only the
external cause of Diver’s tragedy while the internal cause is his psychological conflict.
The psychological conflict between morality and desire destroys his will, he can neither
resolve internal conflict nor change the external world. Under multiple forces, he is
pushed to the doom.
Nicole plays vital role in Diver’s course of life. Diver was in belief that his marriage
with Nicole can complete himself. He is always conscious of his existence. When in
college he was called “lucky Diver” from which he begins to explore the inner pursuit:
He must be less intact, even faintly destroyed. (p.4) Diver realizes his future will not be
as smooth as previous years. His simple morality will be challenged, and his integrity
will be lost for the sake of others. All the forthcoming choice facing him is exciting but
somehow worrying. The principle of self-reliance which he sticks to may change as
time goes by, and he knows he could do nothing but accept it. Milton Stern (2003)
points out the symbolism of Diver the name: On one side, he deeply dives into learning,
discipline, creativity, and the moral identity learned from his father and ancestors. One
the other hand, it implies a dying fall, which means his diving into disintegration and
oblivion. (p.101)
The disparity in economic and social status must have caused Diver who has high
self-esteem a great deal of psychological pressure. Although he tries to remain
31
financially independent in his marriage life with Nicole, Nicole’s lavish lifestyle forces
him to envisage the Warren’s wealth and its great temptation. What’s worse, as Nicole’s
money accumulates, all these material stuff which can hardly be spilt in cohabitation
affects unconsciously Diver’s original virtues as thrift, honesty and self-control. Under
the influence of Nicole’s extravagant consumption behavior, Diver, who was born
industrious and thrifty, begins to indulge himself. His well of composedness has a
breach and his self-control is overtaken by earthly desires. He jumps into the Warren’s
wealth. It is worth mentioning that Nicole’s sister Baby also influences Diver’s view
towards his wife. Before their marriage, Diver has already seen through Baby’s plan to
buy her sister a doctor and husband with money, and from then on, Diver knows his
position in the eyes of the upper class. Although he and Nicole are husband and wife,
their relationship is more like the exploiter and the exploited. This kind of marriage
established on the employment system must be a great psychological blow to Diver,
who begins to doubt his own identity. In their marriage life, it’s Nicole who guide the
marital status which in nature is decided by the financial status, and such hierarchy
creates a sense of alienation in Diver’s mind. For the most part, the main fabric
supporting their marriage is Diver’s morality, not his lust. The marriage of Diver and
Nicole is more like a kind of accidental coincidence of morality and desire. On one
hand, Diver sticks to traditional moral standards who thinks, with compassion and
humanitarianism, that marrying Nicole can help her with mental illness. It can be
interpreted as sacrifice. On the other hand, Diver is attracted by Nicole’s beauty and
wealth. The reaction of lust and compassion eventually leads his proposing to Nicole,
and now he is more like an egoist than an altruist.
Diver is as lost in the crowd as his contemporary named Lost Generation who are
unsatisfied with the post-war world but can’t find the new principles for life, only
rebelling against previous ideals and values. Nicole falls into the embrace of Tommy
Barban and keeps in touch with Diver via letters and the education expenses of their
children. She is almost sure Diver is going to live his rest life “without success”,
because his treatise is always “in the process of completion” (p.314). It’s said that Diver
is “entangled with a girl, …involved in a lawsuit about some medical question” (p.334).
32
The last clue is a post mark from Hornell, New York, hardly positioned on the map. But
anyhow, he lives in the country, in one town or another. Such ending seems scratchy,
but it’s the careful arrangement of the author. Diver is physically out of sight, hardly
being located precisely. However, the town he retreats may be a hint: it’s the origin of
everything and the burgeon of rebirth. Chance is he is in attempts to find his initial
aspiration and moral purity, retrieving archetypal image and energy.
In fact, to a large extent, it’s reasonable for Nicole’s turning down Diver in the end
for we can clearly see the declining of him, whether in physical or psychological
position. Diver himself also confesses his diminished self-esteem to Rosemary that he
has “gone into a process of deterioration” (p.285). While several years ago, Diver had
presented incomparable confidence and absolute authority, now eclipsing the
appearance of a “deposed ruler” (p.280) who bleakly accepts his destruction.
33
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Chapter Ⅳ Moral Interaction between Diver and Fitzgerald
Chapter Ⅳ Moral Interaction between Diver and

Fitzgerald
4.1 Dysfunctional Personality of the Character
Like his wife, Diver is a schizophrenic personality; but where her disease is mental,
his is spiritual. His loyalties are divided between the “good instincts” in which he has
been bred and the gross, wasteful but leisurely world of wealth into which he has
married. Diver makes his debut from Rosemary’s perspective. In the eyes of the
unsophisticated girl, he is handsome, intelligent and powerful. To her, Diver’s “voice
promised that he would take care of her, and that a little later he would open up whole
new worlds for her, unroll an endless succession of magnificent possibilities”. (p.39)
Diver is ambitious who determines to be “the best psychiatrist”. He has strong
personality factors such as diligence, firmness, and perseverance, which help him
overcome difficulties in achieving his moral ideals and career goals. During first world
war, Diver risks his life to Europe in order to develop his academic and scientific
research. In Vienna where the shadow of war casts, he concentrates on his book
regardless of hard condition. He is so diligent and creative that his academic writing is
thought “from an Englisnman, they could not believe that a book with such a dense
description could have been written by an American.”(p.110) The man is empathetic,
“As seeing a beautiful shell, he feels sorry for the diminishing life in the shell. ” (p.103)
Therefore, he feels sympathy for Nicole, who is mentally deranged after incest with her
father. Diver generously offer help to her and all the people around him. He takes
extraordinary courage to accept the love of a mental patient, to marry her, and to bear
the heavy mental burden with her. He is gentle, amiable, charming, and more graceful
than any man in that upper class. He seems to have marvellous passion but behaves in
the social scenes as composed as a priest. “There’s a toughness in him, the temperament
of self-control and self-discipline”. (p.125) He is quite good at controlling emotions,
believing indulgence is disgraceful.
34
He is well aware of Nicole’s mental problem and the stress it causes. He decides to
marry her because he wants to take responsibility for her situation. He is eager to create
a satisfactory world to fill the moral void. He chooses the “sweet poison” and, with kind
intention, does his best to rebuild the values of the upper class while healing and caring
for Nicole. But his interventions against the rich fails because there is a fundamental
conflict between the two values. Diver feels disgusted the first time Nicole’s sister, Baby,
suggests “buying” a doctor and husband for Nicole. He avoids them and nearly gives
up his love. Finally his idealism makes him yield to the upper class. Before his marriage
to Nicole, Baby still holds the idea that the doctor will never be an aristocrat according
to their standards. Although Diver is often the center character in the social circle but
he is detached from it at heart. Diver, as an ambitious psychiatrist, wants to cultivate
the people around him while keep his own independence and purity. The rich class
wants to control a man who doesn’t want to be controlled. However, He lives under
great financial and psychological pressure. Baby thinks it is only a matter of time before
they possess him and that sooner or later he would admit pretending independent is
ridiculous. Choosing Nicole means choosing responsibility and it also means losing his
own independence, which is even realized by Nicole. He combines love with ambition,
but the beautiful vision is distorted by wealth. When he put his ideal as a bet on marriage,
he has been deviated from the track of work, and given up his own identity. He realizes
that it is the wealth of the Warrens rather than his own business prestige that offers him
clinic to work, and for this arrangement, he could do nothing but accept.
In a sense, Diver is not only the victim of the external conditions, but also the victim
of his own personality defect, which is, he cannot judge things according to his own
interests but surrender prematurely. Diver has always been dominated by the “ideal
self”, he struggles with the temptation of lust, material enjoyment and social alienation.
The ideal side wins when he shows his perfect personality. As the novel proceeds to the
third part, Diver’s good side has been radically changed. When he meets Rosemary
again, he can’t wait to have sex with her, even though he has realized that it is not about
love. In the clinic he flirts with a female patient with severe neurotic eczema, and
casually kisses the patient’s daughter who is under fifteen. He is habitually
35
uncontrollable like a “merrymaking, absurd, and opportunistic schemer”, always

having lusts for women in social situations. Emotionally, Diver has lost his self-control
and reason. The aspiring psychiatrist gradually abandons his academic research and
buries himself in the material comfort. He indulges in alcohol, even taking a sip at work.
Having gone through his father’s death, he is extremely depressed like suffering the
plague and no longer able to bring happiness to others. A series of bad things happen,
fighting with a taxi driver, attacking a police officer, being wounded and imprisoned.
In social circles, he is no more amiable and agreeable and his meanness surprises
Rosemary, who has taken him as a generous and sympathetic man. He often gets drunk
and offends people, and his speeches become boring and sarcastic.
In past analyses, Diver is often placed in the position of the weak who naturally
gains the sympathy. If we take him as an activist, his every choice should be considered
carefully. At the start of his career, he meets a special patient: a beautiful, well-off
Nicole. What treatment he offers to her? Using normal therapy or empathy treatment
which may lead to unmanageable consequences? When Nicole makes confession to
him, does he reject sanely or indulgently accept? As he decides to stay away from the
Warren sisters, is he consistent or shaky with the original ideal? Marital life unsatisfying,
Diver turns to another girl rather than settling problems with his wife. Feeling dignity
lost, he accepts the Warren’s arrangement and self-justification. It’s not until Nicole
tears up the veil of the failed marriage that the idea of leaving comes into his mind. All
in all, Diver’s responsibility for these choices cannot be shirked. Provided that he
climbs to the upper class through marriage is partly for self-improvement, all his later
choices are performed with a strong sense of self. In the first part of the novel, Diver
says to Nicole: “I want to give a really bad party. I mean it. I want to give a party where
there’s a brawl and seductions and people going home with their feelings hurt and
women passed out in the cabinet de toilette. You wait and see.” (p.41) Then, as in all
public places, the Divers put on their new masks: suave, dignified, eloquent, and
become the focus of Rosemary and others alike. Diver at that time is more like a psycho
than a doctor who poses himself as a member of the upper class and takes pleasure in
playing other people.
36
Although rationality takes the leading role of Diver’s personality, he still has a
romantic fantasy featured with “transcendental idealism”. He lacks correct judgment
and understanding of himself and others. Post-war America provides young people with
the conditions for money and pleasure, and people try to seek a new way of life in the
heavy boredom. Diver sinks in the environment. Poor but intelligent, he naively thinks
that one can change his life by individual struggle regardless of the surrounding
environment. The vanity of the age, the trauma of the war, the collapse of traditional
moralism conspire to his agreeing with the success criteria: money and status can be
achieved at the same time. Therefore, he thinks that he has found the shortcut for
success by combining such marriage with his status dreams.
In fact, many details in the book indicate that Diver’s image is incongruent with
the existing social standards. His smart intelligence, extraordinary charm, good
cultivation can’t prove he is a man of perfect. He is actually more like a complex in
whom inferiority and arrogance coexist, and cowering and rash intergrow. Fighting
against an inharmonious new world, he, anyway, is hopelessly defeated in trying to
practice his lofty ideal and morality. By psychological analysis, we have a glimpse of
Diver’s oscillation between complicated feelings, trying to stay aloft but end in the mire.
His potential character defects and emerging self-indulgence finally eclipse his earlier
reputation for restrained and responsible behavior. In the end, he descends to the image
of ill temper and alcoholism with waning self-confidence and divided identity.
4.2 Affective Ambivalence of the Author
Tender Is the Night is to a large extent an autobiography elevated by Fitzgerald,

which mirrors his life and emotional experience. The novel was written at a time when
Fitzgerald was in crisis both physically and spiritually. In May,1924, the Fitzgerald
family arrived in France and lived in Europe. Until 1931, they returned America and
settled down. During this time, Fitzgerald completed most of the manuscripts for The
Great Gatsby and Tender Is the Night. It was also during this period that American
society went through social changes from the boom to the Great Depression. Although
Fitzgerald was not affected directly, his literary creation and personal life both hit the
37
low point. His chronic alcoholism and irregular lifestyle, as well as his career anxiety,
took a toll on his physical and mental health. Besides, his marriage was on the rocks
when hysterical symptom often occurs to his wife Zelda. In April,1930, Zelda was
hospitalized for mental collapse for the first time which also gave a blow to Fitzgerald’s
spirit. He was poor and miserable and could only write movie script for Hollywood to
get out of trouble, which, in the end, only deepened his misery. The cruel reality forced
him to the edge of collapse. The past carnival, dignity and pride evaporated, instead
coldness and sadness fell. As he described it in his late autobiographical essay “The
Crack-Up”: “I am in the night of the soul, day after day, it is always at three o’clock.”
(p.305) Meanwhile, the spreading spiritual crisis in American society and the
foreseeable economic crisis touched him a lot; he saw the essence of capitalism and the
inevitable moral collapse behind the flashy dazzle. “The whole system staggered and
rumbled forward.” (p.311) It is in the context of social background, creation mood and
life understanding that Fitzgerald decided to write a novel about decline.
A series of personal misfortunes brought moral issues to the center of his thought
and made it necessary for him to develop ways of dealing with them. His misfortunes
have been frequently related: his wife was mentally ill and was at length confined
permanently to a sanitarium. He himself was plagued with alcoholism—the party was
over but the hangover seemed permanent. He was disappointed with his writing. None
of it had brought him the financial rewards he had anticipated and he was constantly in
debt. He seemed in the thirties to be suffering the consequences of a mis spent youth,
and he experienced a growing sense of guilt and a need to pass some sort of moral
judgment upon himself and the decade that had come to such an abrupt climax in 1929.
He completely replotted his story, building it around the moral and emotional
disintegration of a young American expatriate, very much like himself, married to a
lovely young schizophrene resembling Zelda. Fitzgerald was tortured by the abnormal
marriage and became addicted to alcohol. These pains were embodied in Tender Is the
Night, and he tried to find a way out for himself by exploring the ending of the character
in his novel. In the nine years of the composition, Fitzgerald forged his keen insight and
objective judgment, able to reflect his love and marriage life with Zelda in the form of
38
novel. He tried to analyze the causes of Zelda’s illness, the negative impact of her
mental illness on his personal life and literary career, and his responsibility for the tragic
marriage in this profound novel. “We are in the process of destroying our own future. I
have never really thought about it before. We are trampling on each other. I destroy you,
and you destroy me.” He wrote to Zelda in a letter. Fitzgerald artfully combines his
psychological conflicts and strong feelings into this work with his subtle writing,
mature thinking and superb narrative skills, which makes it extraordinarily touching
and the character image of Diver more authentic, tragic and moving.
With the publication This Side of Paradise in 1846, Fitzgerald rose to fame
overnight. He regained the heart of Zelda who was from a rich family and rushed to
marry her. After marriage the couple lived in luxury and enjoyed being ostentatious. It
was the most glorious and extravagant period of Fitzgerald’s life. His good looks,
decent grooming and fashion-seeking lifestyle are typical in his novels. A concern with
money is obviously seen in Fitzgerald; he took it as a way to be perfect, although
intellectual honesty forced him to recognize its limitations. In many of his novels, he
tartly pointed out the destructive power of money and its alienation of human nature.
Fitzgerald attempted to find certainty in a moneyed aristocracy, and Tender Is the Night
is, to some extent, an analysis of the uncertainty and instability of the American rich, to
whom he attributed the virtues he admired. His attitude towards aristocracy continues
to be modifying under the corrupting influence of money until it became a moral rather
than a material state. His view on wealth was ambiguous. On one hand, he saw in their
lives the possibilities of grandeur and personal freedom. On the other hand, he was
deeply aware of the confining and isolating power of money.
In the novel, his feelings of both guilt and failure become abundantly clear. The
author himself was attempting to get rid of a number of things and was having little
success in doing so. Faced with the personal consequences of the twenties, he seemed
unable to throw them off. He was still an alcoholic, still dissatisfied with his writing,
still in debt. Most important, in terms of the story, he still had within him the image of
his wife Zelda as she had been in the first years he knew her. He felt he had to extirpate
this image and accept the fact that she would not recover from her illness. The sense of
39
failure is overwhelming. We learn only that a promising and talented man has wasted
years of his life. In Fitzgerald’s opinion, man cannot be isolated from society. To be
more specific, he believed that life should be dominated and that society’s rules
shouldn’t bind the individual. To him, he cared about personal dignity and loss must be
suffered with dignity. Thus, he sympathized with social climbers who possessed
intelligence and charm because he saw natural instincts in their struggle. However, he
insisted on individuality on one side, he longed for a standard to define himself on the
other side. He always tried to find certainty, and he even attributed all the virtues he
admired to the wealthy, but these rich people didn’t live up to his expectation. He
elucidated the case in The Rich Boy (1951):
Let me tell you about the rich. They are different from you and me. They possess
and enjoy early, and it does something to them, and makes them soft where we are
hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you are born rich, it
is very difficult to understand. They think, deep in their hearts, that they are better
than we are because we had to discover the compensations and refuges of life for
ourselves. Even when they enter deep into our world or sink below us, they still
think that they are better than we are. They are different. (p.177)
The origin of literature serves for ethical and moral purpose. As representative
writer of the “lost generation”, Fitzgerald is spiritually detached from material
civilization while enjoying the life of the most prosperous 1920s after the First World
War. As foreseeing the tragic ending of the “American dream”, what kind of moral
concern does he have? Published in 1934, the novel is widely criticized for its wealth-
relevant theme, which is at odds with the Great Depression. It is not until the “Fitzgerald
Revival” in the 1940s and 1950s that the critics realize the writer’s humanistic concern
from the perspective new criticism by close reading the text. Diver’s uncertainty is
rooted in is absence of faith. “Farewell” means he has become a man without past when
he didn’t find out his own position, nor did he carry out his medical research to the end,
but put his hope and the meaning of life in the vision of the “upper society”. Now,
40
dreams come to be disillusioned ideals turn into dust and ashes. The past was nothing
but shame; The future was bleak, without any hope in the shadow of the tragedy. In this
way, he became rootless and spiritual void, no tradition and no future, which is
consistent with the American zeitgeist after the First World War: the old moral standards
decay, the new order is to establish, people are at the window period of spiritual demand.
The author portrays Diver’s moral tragedy, presenting a fact that one can’t get rid of the
“psychosis mechanism” of the American Dream in the harsh society. “Life is nothing
but a trick in which failure is the only end, and the compensation is not happiness and
joy, but the deeper satisfaction that comes from continuing to struggle.” (p.104)
And yet, for all the failure and futility that Fitzgerald found in the American
experience, his attitude remained one of acceptance, and not one of despair. After
exploring his materials to their limits Fitzgerald had discovered in an archetypal pattern
of desire and belief and behavior compounded the imaginative history of modern
civilization. A deep concern with money and the things a great deal of it can buy is
clearly evident in the lines. Yet there is another and more important implication in
them—the fear Fitzgerald had that he should seem to be moralizing. This was not the
only occasion on which he recognized such a tendency in himself. In a letter to his
daughter, he once confessed that he had turned away from a career as a writer of musical
comedy because, “I am too much of a moralist at heart, and really want to preach at
people in some acceptable form rather than to entertain them.” (p.98)
4.3 Internalized Moralism against the Alienated World
In this most autobiographical novel, the hero is descended from a Southern family.
His great grandfather had been governor of North Carolina, he numbers Mad Anthony
Wayne among his ancestors, and his father, who told him about Mosby, came North
immediately after the Civil War. From his father, who in turn inherited them from his
ancestors, Diver learns the manners and code of morality Fitzgerald always associated
with the pre-Civil War South:
Dick loved his father—again and again he referred judgements to what his father
41
would probably have thought or done…He told Dick all he knew about life, not
much but most of it true, simple things, matters of behavior that came within his
clergyman’s range… his father had been sure of what he was, with a deep pride of
the two proud widows who had raised him to believe that nothing could be superior
to “good instincts”: honor, courtesy and courage. (pp.220-221)
Diver always bears his father’s advice in mind, and he follows these lofty principles
by his words and deeds all the time. He believes that generosity and trust will win him
the love and respect of everyone. His friends all expect support from him, even for
Mary North who was unfriendly to him, Diver still goes and helps her when she is in
need. He is always the man on the beach who “was giving a quiet little performance for
this group; he moved gravely about with a rake, ostensibly removing gravel and
meanwhile developing some esoteric burlesque held in suspension by his grave face.”
(p.10) The image of Diver is indicative of the task he has undertaken over the years to
clean up the mess in the world. He in indeed tries to heal the disease of society with his
integrity, kindness and noble quality. he faces a crucial choice between adhering to the
“essential human value” he has learned from his father and accepting Nicole as well as
the class she belongs to. He made the choice. So, he takes care of Nicole as doctor and
husband. However, he, in the new world, has to meet the growing needs of the greedy
society and to appease those who come for help with his own energy. Eventually, the
constant giving exhausts him, and his human impulses in turn destroy his marriage.
When he is confronted with the fact that Nicole’s love for him is transference love, he
breaks the psychological bond and lets her walk away. Doctor Diver marries a mental
patient and now his work is done. However, he can only temporarily cure the illness of
his psychotic wife Nicole, but for the American society in a spiritual crisis, he can do
nothing but fall victim of the upper class. He gets lost in the process of realizing his
ideal, from ambitious doctor to employed husband and finally the castaway. Fitzgerald
reveals the harsh social reality in the novel: Diver is, from beginning to end, surrounded
by selfishness, hypocrisy, callousness and chaos. He can’t protect his identity as well
as his dream. Once disillusioned, he becomes lost and exiles himself hopelessly.
42
In his serious writings Fitzgerald is a stern and uncommon promising moralist. The
two earliest and probably the most important moral influences in his life were the
Roman Catholic Church and his father, Edward Fitzgerald. By the time he was twenty-
two, and had finished writing his first novel, This Side of Paradise, he had left the
Church; thereafter the Catholicism in his work became more and more diffuse. But his
father continued to be a sort of “moral touchstone” for him all his life. “Always deep in
my subconscious”, as he says in his hitherto unpublished fragment “The Death of My
Father”, “I have referred judgments back to him, to what he would have thought or
done.”
The 1920s is what Malcolm called a time of “cultural boiling." It is also an age of
consumptionism and hedonism when traditional American values of production are
gradually giving way to those of consumption, and Protestant ethic is being replaced by
a hedonistic lifestyle. Traditional morality collapses and people are reduced to the
pursuit and satisfaction of material desire, losing value judgments. Deeply impressed
by the extreme prevalence of materialistic values in American society in the 1920s,
Fitzgerald neither avoids the feature nor describes it directly. He reflects the society
through the protagonist's experience. He is regarded as the chronicler of the Jazz Age
with his poetic and passionate critique of the essence of the American Dream. He deeply
reveals the bankruptcy of morality and that of the “American dream”. We can see the
dream from two dimensions: spiritualism tendency and materialism pursuit. What
Fitzgerald criticizes is the later and its extreme manifestation in the new world. Seeing
the failure of spiritual seeker and moral saint in the era of hedonism and materialism,
he realizes the rustic American ideal has soured, and points out the harmfulness of
excessive material dream and the necessity of moral factors in the American spirit and
ideal. According to Fitzgerald, the pursuer of the “American Dream” eventually
becomes a loser. The reason lies in the change of traditional values which makes people
no longer worship heroes but pursue personal enjoyment and indulgence. Fitzgerald,
bathed in the traditional culture of collective unconsciousness and active in the era of
indulgence, deeply feels the change of times and the transformation of culture.
Although he can’t stay away from it. he keeps detached mind. He observes, reflects and
43
reexamines the society, and calls for the improvement of it. To present the social status
and people’s life as well as mental state is the basis of his creation, and his ultimate goal
is to appeal to the return of traditional values.
Fitzgerald’s literary stature derives from, to some extent, his moral critique of
American civilization. As this predominant motive took shape in his writing, he
approached and achieved an almost archetypal pattern that can be isolated and analyzed,
admired for its aesthetic complexity and interest and valued for its ethical and social
insight. We can see from his novels above all his understanding of the past and the
present—perhaps the future—of his America. Money worship is the familiar subject of
personal materialistic success. It seems that all the magic of the world can be had for
money. Holding the middle-class radicalism of the American progressive tradition,
Fitzgerald examines and condemns the plutocratic ambitions of American life and the
ruinous price exacted by this dream.
The America of the twentieth century presented a very different and a disturbing
scene to any person. Before the dawn of the twentieth century, progress happened at a
normal pace in all the professional fields. There was a shift from the days of the Wild
West—moving from the gunfighter, mining, homesteading and outlaw mentality into
becoming a fierce competitor to occupy the number one status in the world. Enormous
changes occurred in almost all the fields in America of the twentieth century. The
tremendous industrial growth, luxurious standard of living and the promise of American
life yielded temporal proliferation. In an effort to industrialize and civilize the nation,
America had to face challenges in dealing with the Child Labor Laws and Prohibition.
This led to the outlaw mentality spawning a new breed of people who resorted to
bootlegging. There was a huge leap in material sophistication that strengthened the
economic strata of a man’s life-but a price had to be paid for it. Though monstrous
strides were taken to facilitate materialistic growth, the moral face of man suffered a
huge dent. It resulted in impairment of virtues and moral principles. The American
society revealed that constructing a house was far easier than to build a home. The
moral decadence of the twentieth century is a picture of “white washed tombs” where
man seemingly appeared to be wealthy outside only to have a rotten, ruined, stinking
44
inside. This is the portrait of man in the fiction of Fitzgerald.

How we think of the values of his time is beyond the point, the character’s reation
and the receptive attitude of the author show their specific meanings. Fitzgerald tries to
deal with the social problem according to a new standard. Standing in an equivocal
position in American society, he was in an attempt to create his own “manners”. We see
his character transcends the society at the cost of partial integration. Tender Is the Night,
is the tragedy of both an individual and a society. It’s the tragedy of an individual by
virtue of its placing a basically good man in a situation where the flaw destroys him.
It’s the tragedy of a society and particularly of that society’s upper class, by virtue of
its showing us a group of people, sick because they have lost former traditions and
moralities, misuse and cast aside the doctor who has a cure—the older American values
of “honor, courtesy, and courage”.
45
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Conclusion
Conclusion
Overall, factor analysis as well as projective method within the framework of

Shame Model are applied into the study. By psychological trace of the protagonist and
autobiographical reference of the author, the reason for Diver’s moral decline is
rethought: Feelings of shame trigger appropriate motivations to remedy moral mistakes,
but Diver’s wrong attributions make the effect debilitating or even counterproductive.
His external attribution decreases the motivation for self-improvement while the global
attribution increases self-defensive motivation. He blames circumstances for the
dilemma and absolves himself of responsibility for his choices and actions. He doesn’t
agree with the Warren’s idea of “buying” a doctor, but he chooses compromise. He
detests infidelity which is against his inherited morality, but he indulges in carnal
pleasure. He aspires to be the best psychiatrist but deludes himself with sacrifice and
incompetence. He who takes himself as wholly defective gives in to alcoholism and
dissipation in the end. All the incongruous actions indicating his dysfunctional
personality result in Diver’s moral debacle. The dysfunctional personality costs him his
profession as well as his personal life. While Nicole, his psychologically disturbed wife,
becomes saner, Diver sinks deep into insanity because of his damaged image. In this
process, he tries to deny his true nature by catering to others and develops evasive
tendency. In Diver’s own words, when misfortune strikes, his mask is ripped open,
resulting in his fall from the heights of prosperity deep down to the depths of adversity.
As a man endowed and cultivated with morality, he is least willing to give up his
own moral adherence. But as he exposes himself and his talents to the potentially
corrupting influences of leisure and money, he doubts the meaning of morality. Diver’s
dysfunctional personality is developed to deal with his complicated social relations. He
can be a caring husband, a promising doctor, a cultivated teacher of the upper class, but
he can never be himself who prioritizes his ideals and firm belief in self-reliance. He
has been without doubt imprisoned in the “Warren safety-deposit vaults” where he
46
浙江大学硕士学位论文 Conclusion
could only “waste eight years teaching the rich the ABC’s of human decency”. Finally,
he falls casualty to his own internal dissension and no longer can he elude the shame
inherent in his failure to adequately defend or pursue his true talent.
The hero is unquestionably a pursuer of the American dream. His father plants the
seeds of good values in his young mind and he is committed to spiritual pursuit.
However, materialism overtakes moralism of the American dream in the 1920s and
moral decline becomes the norm in the society then. Fitzgerald tries to reflect on the
crisis of American culture by presenting individual’s experience of moral failures and
desperate struggle. He places his hope and sympathy on the hero, which not only affirms
the significance of his fight, but also expresses his own emotional attribution and value
orientation. It is through Diver’s degeneration that Fitzgerald represents the abnormal
scene of the age and gives the voice of civilization reflection. Tender Is the Night and
the new social psychological model explain the behavior choice of the protagonist in
the new context, not only giving another possible interpretation to the classic literature
but also instructive to the moral practice in the reality.
47
浙江大学硕士学位论文 References
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分类号： H31 单位代码： 10335

外文论文题目： Dick Diver’s Moral Decline in Tender Is

the Night: Rethinking from the Perspective of Shame Model

Chair：Chen Lizhen/Professor/Hangzhou Normal University

Committeeman 1：Sui Hongshen/Professor/Zhejiang University

Date of oral defence： 2021/5/21

表或撰写过的研究成果，也不包含为获得 浙江大学 或其他教育机构的学位或

学位论文作者签名： 签字日期： 2021 年 6 月 30 日

本学位论文作者完全了解 浙江大学 有权保留并向国家有关部门或机

签字日期: 2021 年 6 月 30 日 签字日期： 2021 年 6 月 30 日

This thesis is a product of the affirmation and assistance of many people. I am

—— Stein Gertrude (1933, p.218)

Chapter Ⅰ Theoretic Exploration of Shame Model

1.1 Appraisals Based on Image Concerns

and self-image to discuss the connotation of shame under different circumstances.

1.2 Opposite Motivations Induced by Feelings of Shame

1.3 Combinations in the Management of Moral Failures

Previously, shame is thought as an ambiguous conception, but in order to bridge the

image while self-defect appraisal focuses on self-image. In short, Shame Model

Chapter Ⅱ Shame Characteristics in Diver’s Moral

2.1 Shame Featured with Rejection in Identity Loss

2.2 Shame Featured with Guilt in Fidelity Loss

from responsibility is shattered when a murder happened. The body of a Negro, an

Fitzgerald makes the comment on Diver’s behavior as Diver is waiting for

2.3 Shame Featured with Inferiority in Capability Loss

Chapter Ⅲ Social Psychological Analysis of Diver’s

3.1 Unalterable Damaged Social Image and Self-image

3.2 External Attribution Decreasing Self-improvement Motivation

3.3 Global Attribution Increasing Self-defense Motivation

Chapter Ⅳ Moral Interaction between Diver and

4.1 Dysfunctional Personality of the Character

uncontrollable like a “merrymaking, absurd, and opportunistic schemer”, always

4.2 Affective Ambivalence of the Author

Tender Is the Night is to a large extent an autobiography elevated by Fitzgerald,

4.3 Internalized Moralism against the Alienated World

inside. This is the portrait of man in the fiction of Fitzgerald.

Overall, factor analysis as well as projective method within the framework of

Oxford University Press.

Fitzgerald’s Tender Is the Night.” Literature and Medicine 2: 294-314.

Tender Is the Night.” The F. Scott Fitzgerald Review 11(1): 99-115.

Scott Fitzgerald. Wm. S. Hein Publishing.

Edmund Wilson ed (1945). The Crack-Up. New York: New Directions.

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