The Love of the Last Tycoon: a Western (unfinished)

Not so much a complete novel, but rather two thirds of what would be the first draft: Fitzgerald’s last and unfinished work is set in the 1930s Hollywood and stars one Monroe Stahr, a prodigious but workaholic film executive (the film company itself based off of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer), and the story traces his mid-life’s adventures through love and work. Stahr is the company’s oracle, its kingmaker and its queenmaker, yet the early passing of his actress wife led to his workaholism as an escape – but this all changes when, during a fateful, moonlit night he met and instantly became infatuated with Kathleen, who was a stranger but bore his late wife’s same beautiful face. The novel only has 17 chapters out of a planned 30, but just as the case with Gatsby, the early character development already foretold of the tragic thunderclap that would have come later. I loved the usual beautiful, lyrical language, although the text had some long-winded spots that clearly shows its unfinished state. Nevertheless the novel had a few ethereal, unforgettable moments that made reading it an absolute joy.

In a novel the plot climax often gets the most attention: say, the moment of the fatal car crash in Gatsby or in this story, the (unwritten) part where Stahr and his partner-turned-enemy clash in the finale – they’re the most picturesque, but not the most tragic part of the tragedies. In Gatsby, the tragic climax happened when he finally reconnected with Daisy, his 5-year wish and ideal fulfilled: at this point, his “green light” metaphorical ideal disappeared and “his count of enchanted objects diminished by one”. In Last Tycoon, Stahr becomes enamored with Kathleen and they quickly become intimate – but one particular evening on a night drive, Kathleen reveals her impending engagement with another man whom she doesn’t love much. She silently offers Stahr a chance to take her away, to wrest her away from the other man and claim her as his own if he truly loved her. Stahr knows his heart’s want but hesitates because of his work, because of “balanced judgment” and not wanting to get carried away by his passions: he postpones his decision to the next day’s afternoon. The other man arrived the next morning, and by noon, Kathleen was married, and when Stahr finally received the fatal telegram, everything had been over. Stahr’s tragic hesitation turned a breathless, budding romance that could have reinvigorated him into a carnal, adulterous affair that persisted after Kathleen’s marriage. That hesitation made all the difference, as it said “I like you but I don’t love you”. It makes me believe that without a certain brave, unthinking leap during some most important moment, the thrill of infatuation dissolves into lukewarm liking, and sex turns from desire’s consummation to a blasé and even grotesque habit.