RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE <i> by Zane Grey (Penguin: $7.95) </i>

F. Scott Fitzgerald dominates literature in the ‘20s in the popular imagination, but “Tender Is the Night” sold only 50,000 copies when it was first published; Zane Grey’s novels made the best-seller list nine times between 1914 and 1928. Even allowing for the fact that TV and movie Westerns have reduced his vision of the Old West to a threadbare cliche, it’s difficult for modern readers to understand why his work was so popular. “Riders of the Purple Sage” resembles a cross between a sentimental Victorian novel and “Deadwood Dick on Deck.” Grey’s prose seems not only hopelessly dated but amateurishly straightforward. There are no surprises or nuances of character: The bad guys are Bad, the good guys are Good and the outcome is predictable by the end of the first chapter. Jane Tompkins’ unintentionally hilarious introduction is worth skimming in a bookstore: Laden with references to Freud, Zeitgeist and Longinus(!), it reads like a parody of graduate student’s English paper.