Juxtaposing Character's Plights

In life, it is often said that "we play the cards we're dealt". In our three summer reading books this summer, we read about a wide range of characters, all of whom were dealt a different hand in life. Dick Diver of F Scott Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night was a brilliant and renowned psychologist who married one of his young, beautiful patients, who had a very wealthy family. Fast forward a few years and Dick is in a poor state. He lives a purposeless existence. His wife no longer depends on him for care of her mental health, as a matter of fact the practice-less "doctor" depends on his wife for money. Dick Diver is a great example of a character who is dealt a great hand: successful, married to a beautiful woman, blessed with charisma and looks and brains. He doesn't play all the cards he is dealt however, and the majority of the blame for his decline can be placed on him. Less analyzable are the characters of Dead Wake, who are passengers of the famous ship The Lusitania, which was sunk by a German U-Boat during World War I. Obviously they were put in much more dire circumstances than Dick Diver, but unlike Dick most of them most of them made the most of their hand, doing their best to survive and escape along with their loved ones in the face of difficult odds.

The final character is Sylvia Plath's fictionally biographical portrayal of herself: Esther Greenwood. Esther's lot in life is more interesting to analyze because to an outer perspective, much of her life seems pretty good. He father died when she was young, an obvious and difficult hardship to endure, but her mother was successful and independent and seemed to care for her children. Esther had a scholarship to an all women's college, where she made friends, went on dates with boys, and excelled. She lands an internship at a magazine in New York. These circumstances lead to a variety of situations taking place in Esther's mind, from poor self confidence to trust issues all the way to suicidal tendencies.

So why do all these characters' situations seem so bleak? This is because of the perspectivism that was part of modernist literature such as two of these texts (the other being a nonfictional representation of the time). Different peoples' perspectives skew their problems to seem larger than they are or somebody else's fault (such as in the case of Dick) or they make their problems seem smaller than they are or speak of them very casually and without a hint of real concern (such as in the case of Esther).