The Great Gatsby: Difference between revisions

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{{quote|''"Can't repeat the past?" [Gatsby] cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!"''}}

 

 

 

The novel opens as Nick Carraway, 'Middle Westerner' and self-professed honest man, feeling the need to make his mark on the world, moves to Long Island, New York to get into business. He takes a house just across the bay from the upper crust, including his flighty cousin Daisy and her new husband, ex-college jock Tom Buchanan. But Nick is a [[First-Person Peripheral Narrator]], which means he is only the narrator, not the protagonist.

The true hero of the piece, in more ways than one, is his new neighbor Jay Gatsby: an enigmatic man who makes sure to flaunt his wealth to everyone close by, building a lavish mansion near Nick's home and throwing completely over-the-top weekly parties to which everyone who's anyone is invited... but seeming, himself, mysteriously detached from it all. In a darkly comic parody of celebrity culture, speculation at these extravaganzas runs rampant as to who Gatsby is and where his money came from, with the rumors getting wilder and wilder ("I heard he ''killed'' a man once!") as the guests abuse his hospitality more and more freely.

 

 

The love of his life--as he assumed--then promptly, inevitably, left him to marry someone in her own class, namely Tom Buchanan. But Gatsby, the romantic idealist, couldn't or wouldn't accept that. He will do anything to win Daisy back-- ''anything''. If wealth and status is what Daisy wants, a wealthy, socially prominent man is what Gatsby will become, by any means necessary. The mansion, the expensive clothes and car, the parties-- all designed solely to attract the notice of Daisy, whose presence ''just'' across the bay is symbolized by the green light that burns at the end of her dock.

[[School Study Media|Required reading in high school for a lot of people.]]

 

 

 

 

Don't mix up this work with ''[[Gadsby|Gadsby: Champion Of Youth]]'', in which a dissimilar author drafts a book without using a particular symbol of our Latin syllabary. (It always sounds this awkward.) {{spoiler|He doesn't use the letter 'e.'}}

 

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{{tropelist}}

* [[Anti-Hero]]: {{spoiler|Gatsby}} is a crook, but he's more compassionate than most of the "law-abiding" characters.

* [[Ate His Gun]]: George Wilson in the movie.

* [[Big Brother Is Watching]]: Dr. T.J. Eckleburg.

* [[A Birthday, Not a Break]]: Nick's 30th right after Gatsby and Daisy's relationship goes to hell.

* [[Blood Is Squicker in Water]]: When {{spoiler|Gatsby dies in his swimming pool}}, "a thin red circle in the water" fans out.

* [[Bottle Fairy]]: Myrtle.

* [[Byronic Hero]]: Gatsby.

* [[Catch Phrase]]: "...old sport."

* [[Chekhov's Gunman]]: {{spoiler|Owl-Eyes.}}

** Same with {{spoiler|Wilson and Myrtle. They've basically been put into the story as a means of killing off Gatsby; Myrtle gets hit by Daisy when she is driving Gatsby's car. Wilson thinks Gatsby killed his wife, so he goes off to get his revenge.}}

* [[Completely Missing the Point]]: Supposedly, one of the most common complaints from high schoolers is that most of the characters aren't very likable. They're not supposed to be.

* [[Consummate Liar]]: Jordan. Nick suspects Gatsby of this.

* [[Crap Saccharine World]]: The world of the [[Idle Rich]] is ultimately hollow and depressing despite the pretty trappings.

* [[Daydream Believer]]: Gatsby really believes that millionaires are [[Gentleman Adventurer|Gentleman Adventurers]] and his [[Multiple Choice Past]] are stories everyone thinks are ridiculous… at first. But given Gatsby is [[The Charmer]], he manages to make others believe, even for a little while, in his story. In chapter 4, he is confessing his past with the skeptical Nick:

With an effort I managed to restrain my incredulous laughter. [[Cliché Storm|The very phrases were worn so threadbare]] that they evoked no image except that of a turbaned "character" leaking sawdust at every pore as he pursued a tiger through the Bois de Boulogne … My incredulity was submerged in fascination now; it was like skimming hastily through a dozen magazines. }}

** And after Gatsby produces a medal from Montenegro Republic and a photo of him with the actual Earl of Dorcaster, when they were at Oxford, Nick was forced to believe:

** The valley of ashes itself has a foreshadowing meaning if you're going to take a [[Wild Mass Guessing]] to that level.

* [[Gold Digger]]: Daisy. She only married Tom and had a relationship with Gatsby for their money.

* [[Great White Hunter]]: One of Jay's [[Multiple Choice Past|Multiple Choice Pasts]] paints him as one of these.

* [[Have a Gay Old Time]]: It was published in 1925, after all. But it doesn't help that there's also a healthy dose of [[Ho Yay]]

* [[Karma Houdini]]: When his mistress is killed, Tom directs her suicidally mournful ''husband'' to Gatsby. Meanwhile, Tom and Daisy? Drift off to Chicago, leaving the entire unholy mess in their oblivious wake. However, it is implied that their relationship has been ruined by the whole experience. This is one of the themes of the novel: that the rich make a huge mess and leave, making others clean it up.

* [[Kissing Cousins]]: Daisy gives off this vibe towards Nick early in the novel.

* {{spoiler|[[Lonely Funeral]]: Three people come-- Nick, Owl-Eyes, and Gatsby's father (who is pathetically trying to justify to himself the fact that Gatsby ran away and never came back).}}

* [[Love Dodecahedron]]: Gatsby has his heart set on Daisy, who's married to Tom, who's conducting an open affair with Myrtle, who herself is married to George, who later on believes that Gatsby is responsible for killing Myrtle...

** Not to mention that poor George Wilson was played like a fiddle by Tom (who pointed George to Gatsby) and George never even realized it.

* [[Meaningful Name]] - Daisy Faye. There's color symbolism throughout the book, associating white with purity and yellow with corruption, and what famous flower is white on the outside but yellow on the inside? And Faye has [[The Fair Folk|unpleasant connotations too...]] Also, her daughter's name, Pamela, not only refers to a very sentimental and idealistic novel by Samuel Richardson, refers to Daisy herself - it means "honey." And then there's Gatsby himself; "Gat" is a slang term for a gun...

* [[The Messiah]]: Gatsby, in some readings, up to and very much including the unbearable suffering... Or maybe just [[Messianic Archetype]]?

* [[The Mistress]]: Myrtle Wilson

* [[Mysterious Past]]: Gatsby at first.

* [[Naive Newcomer]]: Nick, literally at the beginning of the novel. The entire story thereafter is dedicated to shattering his illusions.

* [[Only Sane Man]]: Nick.

* [[Opposites Attract]]: Nick and Jordan. He [[Will Not Tell a Lie]]; she's a [[Consummate Liar]].

* [[Took a Level in Jerkass]]: Nick, albeit a short one, and under extreme provocation.

* [[Trailers Always Spoil]]: The back cover of the most common U.S. publication of the book these days spoils Gatsby and Daisy's relationship.

* [[Unfortunate Names]]: A few of the names from Nick's list of Gatsby's guests from [[What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic|July 5th]]: The Leeches, the Fishguards, the Ripley Snells, Mrs. Ulysses Swett, S.B. Whitebait, Maurice A. Flink, Gulick, James B. "Rot-gut" Ferret, the Scullys, S.W. Belcher, and the Smirks.

* [[Unreliable Narrator]]: Nick's narration is colored by his perception of Gatsby at this particular moment. Whether that's because he's soft-hearted or just providing some poetic embellishment is up to the reader (and/or the reader's English teacher).

 

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[[Category:Lit Fic]]

[[Category:School Study Media]]

[[Category:Literature]]