The Great Gatsby

THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald

1. Nick Carraway,a young man, has moved to West Egg in New York, and his next door neighbor happens to be a very popular, wealthy man, named Jay Gatsby. After settling in, Nick, his cousin Daisy, and her husband Tom,grow close and attend Gatsby's grand parties late in the summer. That is where Nick discovers his love interest,Jordan Baker. Soon the discovery of Gatsby's past secret love affair with Daisy and the reality of the affair that is continuing throughout the summer. When Tom's suspicions of the affair get a hold of him, he begins accusing Gatsby of crimes and put his fury upon Daisy. He does not even question his own affair and the effects it has had. After a night out, Gatsby and his company are driving and accidentally kills Myrtle with his car. When Myrtle's husband finds out Gatsby was the one who killed her, he kills Gatsby and after shoots himself. The novel ends in the summer with Gatsby's funeral and leaves West Egg. He reflects on his relationships and experiences in West Egg.


2. The main themes in this novel is the corruption of the American dream and the lack of values and morals in high society. The main focus many have is on their rise in society and the next grand party they will be attending. The American Dream has been distorted and somehow turned into something different than it once was, which is the want of a steady job, house, and family life. These wealthy people don't work for their money, set themselves up high on a bar, and still manage to go on in life with no care. Almost, as is their life is being handed to them on a silver platter.

3. Nick has an admiration tone, when discussing Gatsby and all his pleasures. Which is only natural when one is exposed to those grand pleasures. The odd thing, was Nick's disapproval and almost judgmental dislike towards the other wealthy people in town. He felt they were merely rude and had a lack of integrity. NIck did have a tone of hope, but only when it came to love.
-"He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God,"
-"He had one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself,"
-"I felt a haunting loneliness sometimes, and felt it in others--young clerks in the dusk, wasting the most poignant moments of night and life."

4. Fitzgerald used many literary techniques throughout the novel. He was able to use symbolism through the green light to display Gatsby's hope for love and to rekindle his relationship wit Daisy. It had also symbolized the corruption of the American Dream and how it was dimmed down. Fitzgerald's diction was crucial in describing every little detail and making it as clear and thorough as possible. He took on the wealth people's persona and was able to portray them in an understandable way. Foreshadowing plays a crucial role in the unraveling events in the story. Gatsby's car crash early in the novel gives a hint of what is to come to later. Fitzgerald sets this novel during the early 1920's, which is around the time most had looked to heavy partying and drinking. The standards for American and their goals had decreased.
-"A single green light, minute and faraway, that might have been the end of a dock,"
-"I see now that this has been a story of the West, after all--Tom and Gatsby, Daisy and Jordan and I, were all Westerners, and perhaps we possessed some deficiency in common which made us subtly unadaptable to Eastern life,"
-"...with her chin raised a little, as if she were balancing something on it which was quite likely to fall."