The Great Gatsby: Notes on chapter VI
The reporter’s arrival: foreshadowing.
Platonic conception
“So he invented just the of 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.”
“ferocious indifference to the drums of his destiny, to destiny itself”: the college didn’t seem to recognize that James Gatz was full of swag.
Madame de Maintenon.
(I know you are highly likely to see this name and not recognize it, and I know that you have the intellectual curiosity stop and take the 30 seconds it takes to look it up.)
When Tom and the two others show up unexpectedly on horseback, take note of the fickleness of social interaction, and Gatsby’s naivety in believing it.
“I’d rather look at all these famous people in – in oblivion.” The wisest thing Tom ever says.
Later, “Tom appeared from his oblivion”
Has Tom always womanized? What’s your evidence for that? (do you get the notion that “what’s your evidence for that” indicates that I might ask you for an essay on it?)
Daisy’s reaction to West Egg on page 108.
What is the etymology of “bootlegger”?
“And she doesn’t understand,” he said. “She used to be able to understand. We’d sit for hours – –”. Brother, I feel you.
“Can’t repeat the past?” he cried incredulously. “Why of course you can!” How does this tie into the clock on the mantelpiece?
Nick tries to form a phrase that won’t congeal, and is incommunicable forever. Deeply symbolic.
The Great Gatsby: Notes on chapter V
The visual imagery of coming around the corner and thinking the house is on fire.
If you don’t know what “sardines – in – the – box” is, I know you’ll look it up.
“A greenhouse arrived from Gatsby’s” is what figure of speech?
The symbolism of the Gatsby’s attire.
The symbolism of a defunct clock almost smashing.
We have to guess what transpired between Daisy and Gatsby while Nick tactfully took a brief walk. Well played, Fitzgerald. Well played.
“I keep it always full of interesting people, night and day. People who do interesting things. Celebrated people.”
Return to page 93 after you’ve read through to page 153
The shirts.
The Great Gatsby: guiding questions on chapter IV
Read quickly the names and the brief description of the characters who came to Gatsby’s mansion as a sort of background.
This is a novel of onomatopoeia: note especially “jug-jug-spat!”
The meaning of names: look up Wolfsheim and Fay.
The dialogue of Wolfheim: gonnegtion, Oggsford, a wrong man
What do Wolfsheim’s cuff links suggest?
Drunk Daisy: where do they find the $350,000 string of pearls and what about the letter crumpled up in her hand?
“Where’s Tom gone?”
A review of basic party etiquette
A review of basic party etiquette
There are certain duties of the host and the guest. This review, in the style of 50’s instructional filmstrips, is funny yet telling.
See also the video links in the “On Etiquette” tab.
DISCLAIMER: Some people find the title “The Art of Manliness” to be sexist, but I consider the site to be of use in reviewing the art of being the gentleman, and moving those social skills forward into the yet-to-be-realized era of true equality.
The Great Gatsby: thoughts on chapter III
“…the two or three people of whom I asked [Gatsby’s] whereabouts stared at me in such an amazed way, and denied so vehemently any knowledge of his movements, that I slunk off in the direction of the cocktail table” (42). It is good manners to find, and be greeted by, the host.
innuendo appears several times.
The owl-eyed man (45) appears only twice (not counting his exit from the party), yet his character embodies character. You’ll meet several people like this in your life.
Belasco (46)
The meeting of Nick and “the young roughneck.” Compare the paragraph focusing on his smile with that of the focus on Daisy’s voice (9).
“I like large parties. They’re so intimate. At small parties there isn’t any privacy” (50).
Mascara as musical notation. (51)
Honesty. (58-60) Nick gives himself the “cardinal virtue” of honesty. Does this hold with his NYC side trip with Tom and Myrtle in chapter two?
cardinal
The Buchanan’s mansion
The film set visualization.
Gatsby’s mansion
An idea of the grandeur: film set visualization compared to the actual building that might have inspired F. Scott Fitzgerald.
The Great Gatsby: some thoughts, chapters I and II
“To a certain temperament the situation might have seemed intriguing” means that some people enjoy watching the “drama” and secrecy of affairs of others: Jordan Baker’s actions appear to put her in this category. “–my own instinct was to telephone immediately for the police”(16). Nick is alarmed. But then how would he explain his actions in chapter two?
“as if to a vigil beside a perfectly tangible body” (16). Be prepared to explain the simile.
Daisy doesn’t seem to be serious about anything; when she says “I’ve had a very bad time, Nick, and I’m pretty cynical about everything,” (17) do we believe she becomes so? Why? Where was Tom when Daisy gave birth? And her statement about what a what a woman should be?
“God–I’m sophisticated” (18).
“as if she had asserted her membership in a rather distinguished secret society to which she and Tom belonged” (18).
Come back to 16-18 at the climax and denouement of the novel. It’s like a slap. Or perhaps a punch, depending on how much validity you are willing to give to Gatsby’s dream.
Chapter II
The imagery of the “farm” that grows men and cars from ash (23-26).
smoke/spirit/gray/ghostly/body vs. ectoplasm. Note the shifts of the spatial within the chapter.
Myrtle is not beautiful per se, but…
“you’d of thought she had my appendicitis out” (31). This says of her character…
The grotesque image of the whirling, enlarging Myrtle (31).
Is Tom in love with Myrtle? No. What’s your evidence for that?
Kingsley Andersen 