THE GREAT GATSBY F SCOTT FITZGERALD https www

THE GREAT GATSBY F. SCOTT FITZGERALD https: //www. planetebook. com/free-ebooks/the-great-gatsby. pdf

NARRATOR AND CHARACTERS • Nick Carraway – (unreliable) narrator and character in the novel • Jay Gatsby – the elusive and enigmatic eponymous protagonist • Daisy and Tom Buchanan – very wealthy married couple. Daisy is Nick’s cousin and Gatsby is in love with her. • Jordan Baker – a friend of the Buchanans, beautiful, cynical, young professional golfer – a sporting celebrity • George Wilson – runs a garage in an area called the Valley of the Ashes on the way to New York • Myrtle Wilson – George’s wife and Tom Buchanan’s mistress

SETTING • The setting of the story is New York City and on Long Island, in two areas known as "West Egg" and "East Egg"—in real life, Great Neck and Port Washington peninsulas on Long Island. • The main events of the novel take place in the summer of 1922, in the period now known as the Jazz Age, just after the First World War and before the Great Depression of the 1930 s. • However, there are flashbacks to Gatsby’s past and the time when he first met Daisy.

SYNOPSIS • Set on Long Island New York City, The Great Gatsby is narrated by 29 -year-old Midwesterner Nick Carraway – also a character in the story, who comes to New York in 1922 to work in the bond business. • He rents a cheap bungalow next door to a mysterious man called Jay Gatsby who lives in a mock French mansion, and who throws extravagant parties every Saturday night. • Nick reconnects with his cousin, a Southern debutante named Daisy, the wife of Nick's racist Yale classmate, the staggeringly wealthy ex-football star Tom Buchanan. • Nick meets Jordan Baker, friend of the Buchanans, the beautiful professional golfer. • He learns that Tom has a mistress, Myrtle Wilson, wife of a garage mechanic in Valley of the Ashes, a grey industrial dumping ground on the way to New York.

SYNOPSIS • Eventually Nick is invited to one of Gatsby’s famous parties and discovers that no one there actually knows who Gatsby is. • However, he meets Gatsby and they become friendly. However, Nick realises that Gatsby lies about his past and he remains a mystery for Nick (and the reader) • Nick discovers that Gatsby is in love with Daisy whom he met and fell in love with during the war when he was in uniform, and therefore unidentifiable as poor and working class, which he was. • Gatsby's obsession with Daisy, whom he loved as a young Army officer stationed in Louisville right before World War I, fuels this tale of longing and loss, of dreams and disillusion.

BUT WHAT IS THE NOVEL ACTUALLY ABOUT? • The American Dream – about acquiring wealth and status in society; – Gatsby represents America itself • Greed and hypocrisy • Fitzgerald decouples wealth and greatness. In this novel wealth is associated with corruption and amorality. • Truth • Class divisions • A reflection on the hollowness of a life of leisure • Gatsby is obsessed with controlling time: he wants to create a beautiful future by restoring the past. This is what leads Gatsby to say his most famous line "Can't change the past? Why, of course you can. "

OTHER IDEAS …IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER! • A love story – but more! Does Gatsby really love Daisy? Is Daisy capable of love? • Daisy – an unlikeable character, but interesting! • She has a sense of entitlement coming from a wealthy, privileged class of inherited wealth; she has limited empathy, is vapid (insipid), unable to make difficult choices. • So is Gatsby really in love with her? Most say he is in love with the DREAM of Daisy and what she represents. • For Gatsby, (represents America) it is not enough that Daisy says she loves him, she must also say she never loved Tom. In America, and western cultures – enough is never enough – we always want more, so the dream is doomed.

CHARACTERS … • None of the characters in The Great Gatsby is very likeable. • They are flawed and very hard to sympathise with, but in a sense that is the beauty of the book; flawed characters are always interesting! • Of course you hate Daisy Buchanan! Of course you hate Tom! You even begin to slightly dislike Gatsby, to whom it is not enough for Daisy to say that she loved him, but he requires her to state that she never in her five year marriage loved her husband Tom, which is unreasonable! • Jordan Baker cheats at golf! • But Gatsby, to most readers, remains Great right until the end of this book.

IRONY … • First mention of Gatsby – ambiguous – ‘Gatsby, who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn… there was something gorgeous about him, … No, Gatsby turned out alright at the end; it is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams …’ • Fitzgerald further emphasises the cruelty and injustice of the world – because of the irony that only the rich and idle survive in this novel. • The rich continue to be careless, for that is the dream, is it not, for all of us? To live a carefree life? • Yet Fitzgerald highlights the horrors of being a careless person: "They [Tom and Daisy] smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money and vast carelessness. " • However, Tom and Daisy aren't careless to be malicious - that is just their nature. And that in itself is a very sad thing. They do not care for their daughter, for Myrtle, for Gatsby nor even each other. They are unable to care.

IS GATSBY ‘GREAT’? • Fitzgerald’s language elevates Gatsby’s triumphs and tragedies to greatness. • The language is magnificently complex and rich, it is a dense read because every sentence is packed with detail and care. • Many consider The Great Gatsby to be depressing because, in the end, those who dream do not achieve their aspirations. However, the main message that Fitzgerald sends to us is not that dreaming will lead to despair, but that chasing an unworthy dream will lead to tragedy. • Daisy was not a worthy dream, but Gatsby is great because of his courage and that he never lost his sense of hope - he died believing that Daisy would call him back. • He died still reaching towards his dream.

GATSBY – THE AMERICAN DREAM • Gatsby was a ‘great’ man. • Unfortunately, he dreamed for something unworthy of his pursuit. • He was kind and warm and giving, but to all the wrong people. He built himself up from nothing to this fantastic life of mansions and high-class parties. • He was the American Dream. This is what most Americans believe is the American Dream, or a similar variation – and this is what Fitzgerald seems to say – that it is false.

MORE … • Fitzgerald's writing is almost like a work of poetry, with waves of literary brilliance creating a rich and lush rhythm which you can almost tap your foot to. • The descriptions are jarringly, magnificently beautiful so that it almost makes your heart ache.

CRITICAL COMMENTS • The story is fundamentally trivial’ - surely this is misjudged? The Novel is a bitter, savage satire on the moral failure of the Jazz Age which is placed within a perspective of American images of success and American history • Fitzgerald defines the moral chaos of a society which has rejected any values except wealth. • The novel offers a bleak affirmation of the difficulties of reaching a mature moral vision amid the hedonism and limitless, almost fabulous, wealth of modern America

CLIPS FROM 2013 FILM • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=ZQHhi. ZUNM 3 Q Chapter 1, ‘Beautiful little fool’(3 minutes) • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=2 z. HHk. Su 1 br 4 Chapter 3 Mysterious Mr Gatsby (3 minutes) https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=2 Qz 0 AREgsd. Q Jordan tells Nick about Gatsby and Daisy(3 minutes) https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=Yj. WA 03 Wk 49 w (11 minutes) The Great Gatsby - Behind The Scenes - Leonardo Di. Caprio / Tobey Maguire

A COUPLE OF YOUTUBE VIDEOS … ONCE YOU HAVE READ THE NOVEL • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=xw 9 Au 9 Oo. N 88 11 minutes – Great Gatsby part 1 crash course – a lively presentation, entertaining as well as informative! • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=cn 0 WZ 8 -0 Z 1 Y 8. 49 minutes Part 2 crash course, considers the question: Is Gatsby ‘great’?