The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald

1. The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald Alex Ridley Andrew Dreelin Catherine Hudson Claire Galbraith Jackson Mansour Meghan Twigg Neely Kennon Taylor Timmons

2. About the Author • Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was an American author of numerous novels and short stories usually about the Jazz Age • Finished four novels: This Side of Paradise, The Beautiful and Damned, Tender Is the Night, most famously, The Great Gatsby • Fifth novel, The Love of the Last Tycoon, was left unfinished because of his death • Wrote many short stories about the themes of youth, along with despair and age • Lived a short life of parties and careless spending • Died at the age of 44

3. More about the Author • While living in Montgomery, Alabama, he fell in love with Zelda Sayre • Zelda had great influences on his writings and he sometimes used direct quotes from her writings • After his publication of This Side of Paradise, he became almost instantly famous. Fitzgerald and Zelda lived an extravagant life as young celebrities. • Fitzgerald had been an alcoholic since he was in college, leaving him in poor health by the late 1930s • Fitzgerald suffered two heart attacks in the late 1940s • His manuscript was edited by his friend, Edmund Wilson, and published in 1941 as The Last Tycoon

4. Characters

5. Jay Gatsby • Around thirty years old • Protagonist of the story • Changed his name from James Gratz to Jay Gatsby • Born in North Dakota • Lives in a mansion in West Egg • Throws parties at his mansion every Saturday night in order to gain Daisy’s love • Parties are elaborate and over the top, they do not seem to please him as he is usually found standing alone, watching the crowd • Met Daisy while training to become a military officer in Louisville, Kentucky and fell immediately in love with her • Daisy said she would wait on Gatsby to return home, but while he was at war, Daisy got married Tom • Killed on property by George Wilson because George believes whoever killed Myrtle in the car accident must have been her lover

6. Nick Carraway • Narrator of the story • Young man originally from Minnesota • Moves to West Egg to learn about the bond business • Lives next door to Gatsby • Daisy’s cousin • Nick becomes great friend’s with Gatsby • As a favor for Gatsby, he invites Daisy over to his house, so that he can see Daisy • One of the only people who still supported and missed Gatsby after his death • Arranged a funeral and no one attended except Gatsby’s father and himself

7. Daisy Buchanan • Is married to Tom Buchanan • Nick’s cousin • Originally from Louisville, Kentucky but moved to East Egg • Kills Myrtle Wilson in a car accident, but lets Gatsby take the blame

8. Tom Buchanan • Daisy’s husband • Extremely wealthy and lives in East Egg • Is in love with Myrtle Wilson also • Becomes angry when he begins to think that Daisy is cheating on him • Tells George Wilson that Gatsby was the owner of the car that killed his wife so that he could get rid of Gatsby • Moves away with Daisy in the end of the book without telling where he is going • Nick describes Tom and Daisy after Gatsby’s death by saying, “I couldn’t forgive him or like him, but I saw that what he had done was, to him, entirely justified. It was all very careless and confused. They were carless people, Tom and Daisy-they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.” (179;ch.9)

9. Jordan Baker • Daisy’s friend • Meets Nick at Daisy’s house one night while having dinner • Is a competitive golfer • Sometimes referred to as “a cheater” • Falls in love with Nick

10. Nick Describes Jordan • Nick describes Jordan by saying, “At first I was flattered to go places with her, because she was a golf champion, and everyone knew her name. Then it was something more. I wasn’t actually in love, but I felt a sort of tender curiosity. The bored haughty face that she turned to the world concealed something and one day I found what it was. When we were on a house-party together up in Warwick, she left a borrowed car out in the rain with the top down, and then lied about it- and suddenly I remembered the story about her that had eluded me that night at Daisy’s. At her first big golf tournament there was a row that nearly reached the newspapers- a suggestion that she had moved her ball from a bad lie in the semi-final round. The things approached the proportions of a scandal- then died away. A caddy retracted his statement, and the only other witness admitted that he might have been mistaken. The incident and the name had remained together in my mind. Jordan Baker instinctively avoided clever, shrewd men, and now I saw that this was because she felt safer on a plane where any divergence from a code would be thought impossible. She was incurably dishonest.” (57;ch.3) • Nick later describes Jordan again by saying, “She was dressed to play golf, and I remember thinking she looked like a good illustration, her chin raised a little jauntily, her hair the color of an autumn leaf, her face the same brown tint as the fingerless glove on her knee.” (177;ch.9)

11. Myrtle Wilson • Lives in the Valley of Ashes • Married to George Wilson • Has an affair with Tom Buchanan • Is in a fatal car accident • Nick describes her by saying, “Then I heard footsteps on a stairs, and in a moment the thickish figure of a woman blocked out the light from the office door. She was in the middle thirties, and faintly stout, but she carried her surplus flesh sensuously as some women can. Her face, above a spotted dress of dark blue crepe-de-chine, contained no facet or gleam of beauty, but there was an immediately perceptible vitality about her as if the nerves of her body were continually smoldering.” (25;ch.2)

12. George Wilson • Myrtle’s husband • Owns a old auto shop in the Valley of Ashes • Shoots Gatsby after he finds out that Gatsby killed Myrtle and then shoots himself

13. Important Facts • Narrator: Nick Carraway • Setting: Summer of 1922 in New York • Point of View: Nick tells the story from the first and third person point of view

14. Plot Summary • Nick Carrawaymoves beside Jay Gatsby • Nick travels to New York City with Tom and Myrtle • Nick attends Gatsby’s party • Gatsby and Daisy have an affair • Tom finds out about the affair between Gatsby and Daisy • Daisy kills Myrtle • Gatsby is murdered • Nick holds a funeral and ends his relations with Jordan

15. Symbols

16. The Green Light • Situated on Daisy’s dock in East Egg • Represents Gatsby’s hopes and dreams • First associated with Daisy in chapter one • Gatsby’s desire for Daisy is associated with the American Dream • Chapter 9 Nick compares the light to how America looked to settlers

17. The Valley of Ashes • Between West Egg and New York City • Desolate land created by dumping of industrial ashes • Moral and social decay resulted from pursuit of wealth • Poverty: living among ashes

18. Eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg • Pair of eyes painted on an old billboard over Valley of Ashes • Suggested to be God looking down upon American society • Fitzgerald suggest characters instill the meanings • Symbol of God exists in George Wilson

19. East Egg and West Egg • Two imaginary communities on Long Island • East Egg is the posh, wealthy, “old money” community • West Egg is the extravagantly wasteful “new money” community • Both show class levels

20. Themes • Prevailing theme of love • Decline of the American Dream in the 1920s -Over shadowed by greed and pursuit of pleasure -Declining social and moral values i.e. Gatsby’s opulent parties • Shallowness of the Upper class -New money vs. old money

21. Important Quotes Explained • “I hope she’ll be a fool—that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool” -Daisy says this while talking to Jordan and Nick about how she hopes her daughter will grow up to be. This comment shows a little bit of who Daisy is, a woman in a society where woman’s intelligence is insignificant. Daisy says this in a tone of sadness because she conformed to societies expectations,so that she would be more appreciated and her hopes is that her daughter will be the same.

22. Continued “About half way between West Egg and New York the motor road hastily joins the railroad and runs beside it for a quarter of a mile, so as to shrink away from a certain desolate area of land. This is a valley of ashes- a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air. Occasionally a line of gray cars crawls along an invisible track, gives out a ghastly creak, and comes to a rest, and immediately the ash-gray men swarm up with leaden spades and stir up an impenetrable cloud, which screens their obscure operations from your sight.” (23;ch. 2) -Nick describes the Valley of Ashes as a dark and empty place between two big cities. The quote also describes the demeanor of one of the characters who lives there, George Wilson.

23. Continued • “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 faced, or seemed to face, the whole external world for an instant and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself.” - Nick describes Gatsby’s character after getting his first close look. It shows the way Gatsby looks to everyone in the outside world. Hissmile is an important part because it acts as a characteristic of the life Gatsby has planned for himself. Additionally, Nick talks about how Gatsby has the power to make anyone feel important just by his smile or a compliment.

24. Continued • “The truth was that Jay Gatsby, of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God—a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that—and he must be about His Father’s business, the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty. So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen year old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end.”(98;ch.6) -After just describing Gatsby’s early life, Nick continues in describing the invention of the Gatsby name.The comparison of Gatsby and Jesus illustrates Gatsby’s formation of his life of luxury.

25. Continued • “That’s my Middle West . . . the street lamps and sleigh bells in the frosty dark. . . . 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.”(176;ch.9) -Nick concludes the geography theme. When Nick says this, he realizes that although he liveson the east coast, he has an acquaintance with Midwestern values and morals, and this person is the one causing all the tension and drama in his life. Nick also blames people’s attitudes on the New York desire for wealth and a good name. This quote offers insight as to why Nick left The East Coast and went to Minnesota.

26. Continued • “Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther. . . . And then one fine morning—So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”(180;ch.9) -This concludes the novel. It shows Nick returning back to his old ways and dreams. There is a focus on the determination of people to reach their goals by reverting to the past. However, it shows that people cannot move along from the past, being illustrated with “boats against the current…”

27. Important Question for the Reader • Is Nick a reliable narrator? Why or why not? -Yes -Says he is the most trustworthy person he knows “Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.” (59;ch.3) -He says that he is not judgmental or prejudiced -He does not stop arguments or interrupt (in this sense, he is removed) -No -He has physical interactions with the characters (biased towards some) -He is human (innate prejudices of the time) -Relationship with Jordan Baker -Alcohol

28. Citations • http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090509211839AAnRqWX • www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._Scott_Fitzgerald(About the author) • www.sc.edu/fitzgerald/biography.html(About the author)