The Great Gatsby

Nataliya

Rating: really liked it
Oh Gatsby, you old sport, you poor semi-delusionally hopeful dreamer with “some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life”, focusing your whole self and soul on that elusive money-colored green light - a dream that shatters just when you are *this* close to it.

Jay Gatsby, who dreamed a dream with the passion and courage few possess - and the tragedy was that it was a wrong dream colliding with reality that was even more wrong - and deadly.

Just like the Great Houdini - the association the title of this book so easily invokes - you specialized in illusions and escape. Except even the power of most courageous dreamers can be quite helpless to allow us escape the world, our past, and ourselves, giving rise to one of the most famous closing lines of a novel.

“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 — to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther... And one fine morning ——

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

Dear Gatsby, not everything I liked back when I was fourteen has withstood the test of time¹ - but you clearly did, and as I get older, closer to your and Nick Carraway's age, your story gathers more dimensions and more tragedy, fleshing out so much more from what I thought of as a tragic love story when I was a child - turning into a great American tragedy.

¹ I hang my head in shame at my ability to still belt out an enthusiastic (albeit poorly rendered) version of '...Baby One More Time' when it comes on the radio (provided, of course, that my car windows are safely up).

I blame it on my residual teenage hormones.

Jay Gatsby, you barged head-on to achieve and conquer your American dream, not stopping until your dreams became your reality, until you reinvented yourself with the dizzying strength of your belief. Your tragedy was that you equated your dream with money, and money with happiness and love. And honestly, given the messed up world we live in, you were not that far from getting everything you thought you wanted, including the kind of love that hinges on the green dollar signs.

And you *almost* saw it, you poor bastard, but in the end you chose to let your delusion continue, you poor soul.

Poor Gatsby! Yours is the story of a young man who suddenly rose to wealth and fame, running like a hamster on the wheel amassing wealth for the sake of love, for the sake of winning the heart of a Southern belle, the one whose “voice is full of money” - in a book written by a young man who suddenly rose to wealth and fame, desperately running on the hamster wheel of 'high life' to win the heart of his own Southern belle. Poor Gatsby, and poor F. Scott Fitzgerald - the guy who so brilliantly described it all, but who continued to live the life his character failed to see for what it was.

The Great Gatsby is a story about the lavish excesses meant to serve every little whim of the rich and wannabe-rich in the splendid but unsatisfying in their shallow emptiness glitzy and gaudy post-war years, and the resulting suffocation under the uselessness and unexpected oppressiveness of elusive American dream in the time when money was plenty and the alluring seemingly dream life was just around the corner, just within reach.

But first and foremost, it is a story of disillusionment with dreams that prove to be shallow and unworthy of the dreamer - while at the same time firmly hanging on to the idea of the dream, the ability to dream big, and the stubborn tenacity of the dreamer, “an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again” .

This is why Gatsby is still so relevant in the world we live in - almost a hundred years after Fitzgerald wrote it in the Roaring Twenties - the present-day world that still worships money and views it as a substitute for the American dream, the world that hinges on materialism, the world that no longer frowns on the gaudiness and glitz of the nouveau riche.

In this world Jay Gatsby, poor old sport, with his huge tasteless mansion and lavish tasteless parties and in-your-face tasteless car and tasteless pink suit would be, perhaps, quietly sniggered at - but would have fit in without the need for aristocratic breeding - who cares if he has the money and the ability to throw parties worthy of reality show fame???

Because in the present world just the fact of having heaps of money makes you worthy - and therefore the people whose voices are “full of money”, who are “gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor”, people who genuinely believe that money makes them worthy and invincible are all too common. Tom and Daisy Buchanan would be proud of them.

And wannabe Gatsbys pour their capacity to dream into chasing the shallow dream of dollar signs, nothing more.

“They were careless 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.”

This book somehow hit the right note back when I read it when I was fourteen, and hit even truer note now, deeply resonating with me now, almost a full century since it was written. If you read it for school years ago, I ask you to pick it up and give its pages another look - and it may amaze you.

Five green-light stars in the fog at the end of a dock.

——————
Also posted on my blog.

Sean Barrs

Rating: really liked it
This is a good book, though it is so ridiculously overrated.

There are so many great books out there that will never get the attention they deserve. They will be forgotten and their wisdom heard by only a select few who are willing to go looking for it. So it annoys me when books like this are acclaimed by critics and readers alike as the best pieces of fiction in existence (when they are not.) There’s so much more out there!

Anyway, rant over. The thing I like most about The Great Gatsby is the language, the subtlety’s and the suggestions, the things that are not directly said but are said nevertheless. It’s a true feat of writing and at times it reminded me of a stage piece. The dialogue does not give the answers, but it is the character’s actions and movements (so fantastically narrated) that give the game away: it reveals their internal worlds.

As such this is a book that can easily be skimmed over. The plot is basic and relatively unengaging and consequently I think an inattentive reader has a lot to miss here. It’s all about illusions and false appearances just like real life. The way people perceive us is not how we truly are and sometimes individuals actively work towards creating a desired appearance for the outside world. It’s easily done with enough time, effort and money. What Gatsby creates for the outside is a dream, an ideal life that looks perfect.

However, scratch the surface and it is so very, very, clear that not everything is perfect. His supposed “happiness” is hollow and dictated by the whims of society. It is fickle, egotistical and driven by status and all the silly little symbols that go with it. His success is what society demands success to be; thus, he positions himself into a place where he can chase his true dream. In doing so Gatsby shows us that not everything is as simple as it appears, and that society driven by such monetary values is a dangerous thing because everybody is so detached from what really matters in life. (The object of his affections, for example.)

I enjoyed The Great Gatsby though I certainly did not love it. Its popularity baffles me to a degree, I can think of books from the same era that deserve far more attention. Still, I enjoyed reading it and I’m glad I finally did so.

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Alex

Rating: really liked it
The Great Gatsby is your neighbor you're best friends with until you find out he's a drug dealer. It charms you with some of the most elegant English prose ever published, making it difficult to discuss the novel without the urge to stammer awestruck about its beauty. It would be evidence enough to argue that F. Scott Fitzgerald was superhuman, if it wasn't for the fact that we know he also wrote This Side of Paradise.

But despite its magic, the rhetoric is just that, and it is a cruel facade. Behind the stunning glitter lies a story with all the discontent and intensity of the early Metallica albums. At its heart, The Great Gatsby throws the very nature of our desires into a harsh, shocking light. There may never be a character who so epitomizes tragically misplaced devotion as Jay Gatsby, and Daisy, his devotee, plays her part with perfect, innocent malevolence. Gatsby's competition, Tom Buchanan, stands aside watching, taunting and provoking with piercing vocal jabs and the constant boast of his enviable physique. The three jostle for position in an epic love triangle that lays waste to countless innocent victims, as well as both Eggs of Long Island. Every jab, hook, and uppercut is relayed by the instantly likable narrator Nick Carraway, seemingly the only voice of reason amongst all the chaos. But when those boats are finally borne back ceaselessly by the current, no one is left afloat. It is an ethical massacre, and Fitzgerald spares no lives; there is perhaps not a single character of any significance worthy even of a Sportsmanship Award from the Boys and Girls Club.

In a word, The Great Gatsby is about deception; Fitzgerald tints our glasses rosy with gorgeous prose and a narrator you want so much to trust, but leaves the lenses just translucent enough for us to see that Gatsby is getting the same treatment. And if Gatsby represents the truth of the American Dream, it means trouble for us all. Consider it the most pleasant insult you'll ever receive.

Pollopicu

Rating: really liked it
This is my least-favorite classic of all time. Probably even my least favorite book, ever.
I didn't have the faintest iota of interest in neither era nor lifestyle of the people in this novela. So why did I read it to begin with? well, because I wanted to give it a chance. I've been surprised by many books, many a times. Thought this could open a new literary door for me.
Most of the novel was incomprehensibly lame. I was never fully introduced to the root of the affair that existed between Gatsby and Daisy. So they were in love...yeah..I've been in love too, who cares?
Several times I didn't even understand where characters were when they were speaking to each other. I also didn't understand the whole affair with Tom and Mrs. Wilson.. and something about her husband locking her up over the garage...? huh? then she gets run over by a car, then he sneaks in through the trees and shoots Gatsby? wha..? still..why am I suppose to care about all this?
Shallow and meaningless characters. Again, who cares?
I read this book twice. 2 times. I just didn't get it.
I can't believe this book is revered with the rest of the great classics. Truly unbelievable. Fitzgerald certainly kissed the right asses with this one.

What garbage.

Daisy quote:

“They’re such beautiful shirts,” she sobbed.… “It makes me sad because I’ve never seen such—such beautiful shirts before.”

...sob..sob.. boo-hoo-hoo. oh Please someone shut her the fuck up.

Lisa of Troy

Rating: really liked it
Fitzgerald, you have ruined me.

Fitzgerald can set a scene so perfectly, flawlessly. He paints a world of magic and introduces one of the greatest characters of all time, Jay Gatsby. Gatsby is the embodiment of hope, and no one can dissuade him from his dreams. Have you ever had a dream that carried you to heights you could never have dreamed otherwise? When Gatsby is reunited with Daisy Buchanan, he fills the space to the brim with flowers, creating a living dream. How is anyone supposed to compete with that?

The Great Gatsby perfectly makes use of a narrator, Nick. Why is Gatsby so great? Because Nick tells us. If Gatsby told us, we would just think that he is a braggard, the least humble person in the world.

This book is wildly addictive, so intricate yet perfectly woven together, a brilliant literary masterpiece. I have to keep going back to reconnect with Jay Gatsby, a naïve but beautiful and charming hope, perfectly imperfect, a relentless dreamer.

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Inge

Rating: really liked it
There was one thing I really liked about The Great Gatsby.

It was short.

Kemper

Rating: really liked it
Jay Gatsby, you poor doomed bastard. You were ahead of your time. If you would have pulled your scam after the invention of reality TV, you would have been a huge star on a show like The Bachelor and a dozen shameless Daisy-types would have thrown themselves at you.

Mass media and modern fame would have embraced the way you tried to push your way into a social circle you didn’t belong to in an effort to fulfill a fool’s dream as your entire existence became a lie and you desperately sought to rewrite history to an ending you wanted. You had a talent for it, Jay, but a modern PR expert would have made you bigger than Kate Gosselin. Your knack for self-promotion and over the top displays of wealth to try and buy respectability would have fit right in these days. I can just about see you on a red carpet with Paris Hilton.

And the ending would have been different. No aftermath for rich folks these days. Lawyers and pay-off money would have quietly settled the matter. No harm, no foul. But then you’d have realized how worthless Daisy really was at some point. I’m sure you couldn’t have dealt with that. So maybe it is better that your story happened in the Jazz Age where you could keep your illusions intact to the bitter end.

The greatest American novel? I don’t know if there is such an animal. But I think you'd have to include this one in the conversation.

svnh

Rating: really liked it
After six years of these heated and polarized debates, I'm deleting the reviews that sparked them. Thanks for sharing your frustrations, joys, and insights with me, goodreaders. Happy reading!

In love and good faith, always,
Savannah

Ahmad Sharabiani

Rating: really liked it
(Book 699 From 1001 Books) - The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Great Gatsby is a 1925 novel written by American author F. Scott Fitzgerald that follows a cast of characters living in the fictional town of West Egg on prosperous Long Island in the summer of 1922.

The story primarily concerns the young and mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby and his quixotic passion and obsession for the beautiful former debutante Daisy Buchanan.

Considered to be Fitzgerald's magnum opus, The Great Gatsby explores themes of decadence, idealism, resistance to change, social upheaval, and excess, creating a portrait of the Jazz Age or the Roaring Twenties that has been described as a cautionary tale regarding the American Dream.

Characters: Nick Carraway, Jay Gatsby, Daisy Buchanan, Tom Buchanan, Jordan Baker, Myrtle Wilson, Meyer Wolfsheim, George Wilson.

In Spring 1922, Nick Carraway—a Yale alumnus from the Midwest and a World War I veteran—journeys to New York City to obtain employment as a bond salesman.

He rents a bungalow in the Long Island village of West Egg, next to a luxurious estate inhabited by Jay Gatsby, an enigmatic multi-millionaire who hosts dazzling evenings.

One evening, Nick dines with a distant relative, Daisy Buchanan, in the fashionable town of East Egg. Daisy is married to Tom Buchanan, formerly a Yale football star whom Nick knew during his college days.

The couple has recently relocated from Chicago to a mansion directly across the bay from Gatsby's estate. There, Nick encounters Jordan Baker, an insolent flapper and golf champion who is a childhood friend of Daisy's.

Jordan confides to Nick that Tom keeps a mistress, Myrtle Wilson, who brazenly telephones him at his home and who lives in the "valley of ashes", a sprawling refuse dump. That evening, Nick sees Gatsby standing alone on his lawn, staring at a green light across the bay. ...

عنوانهای چاپ شده در ایران: «گتسبی بزرگ»؛ «طلا و خاکستر گتسبی بزرگ»؛ اثر: اف اسکات فیتزجرالد (فیتس جرالد)؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش ماه سپتامبر سال 2002میلادی

عنوان: گتسبی بزرگ؛ اثر: اف اسکات فیتزجرالد (فیتس جرالد)؛ مترجم: کریم امامی؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، انتشارات نیلوفر، 1379؛ در 288ص؛ موضوع داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده 20م

نخستین بار با عنوان «طلا و خاکستر گتسبی بزرگ»؛ با ترجمه جناب آقای «کریم امامی»، در تهران توسط انتشارات فرانکلین در سال 1344هجری خورشیدی در 204ص منتشر شده است

مترجمین دیگر این اثر بزرگوار، خانمها و آقایان: «فهیمه رحمتی»؛ «نفیسه رنجبران»؛ «مهدی سجودی مقدم»؛ «عباس کرمی فر»؛ «فاطمه جمالی»؛ «محمدصادق سبط الشیخ»؛ «رضا رضایی»؛ «مهدی افشار»؛ و «معصومه عسگری»؛ هستند

نقل از متن: «آنگاه کلاه طلائی بر سر بگذار، اگر برمیانگیزدت، اگر توان بالا جستنت هست، به خاطرش نیز به جست و خیز درآی، تا بدانجا که فریاد برآورد: عاشق، ای عاشق بالا جهنده ی کلاه طلائی، مرا تو باید».؛ پایان نقل

انگار هر کتاب نامدار، که در اینمورد در عنوانش نیز، واژه «بزرگ» خودنمایی میکند را، بیشتر باور داریم؛ پیشتر، چندبار خوانده بودم، دوستی نگارگر، در دو واژه، همین نویسنده را ستوده بودند، آن دو واژه چشمم را گرفت، و اینبار آخر، که کتاب را برداشتم، ساعت سه صبح روز سیزدهم مهرماه سال 1392هجری خورشیدی بود، که به انتهای راه خوانشش رسیدم، و بسیار هم خوش بگذشت، اینبار مدهوش شخصیت پردازیها، و صحنه آرائیها شده بودم، سخن شخصیتها یادم میماند، تند و تند میخواندم، تا به جاهایی برسم، که نگارنده، با واژه ی «دی زی»، صحنه ی داستان را بیاراید، میدانم که باز هم خواهم خواند

تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 23/05/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 06/05/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی

Gina

Rating: really liked it
Over drinks, I’ve observed—like so many smart alecks—that much of The Great Gatsby’s popularity relies heavily on its shortness. At a sparse 180 pages, Fitzgerald’s masterpiece could be argued to be the “Great American novella.” Gatsby, like so many other short classics, is easily readable, re-readable, and assessable to everyone from the attention-deficient young to mothers juggling a kid, a career, and a long-held desire to catch up on all those books “they should have read but haven’t gotten around to yet”.

I’ve now read Gatsby three times, and I admit that on my first reading during (like handfuls of others) my senior year English class, I wasn’t particularly fond of the book; I believe I used the adjective “overrated” on numerous occasions. Daisy Buchanan seemed like a twit of a woman, and I found Jay Gatsby to be pathetically clawing in his attempt to attain her. Nick, my guide, only annoyed me further with his apparent hero-worshiping of a man I found one-dimensional and his adoration for the kind of woman I’ve seen other men purport to be goddesses, but in fact, are dim-witted simpletons with nice figures.

Over my two subsequent readings—pushed along by friends whose judgment I trusted and who swore the book was “so funny and ironic”—I discovered within Fitzgerald’s fable a sardonic social wit and a heavily layered critique of the American Dream: the poor, working (wo)man rising above his or her social situation to discover money conquers all.

Fitzgerald has a discerning ability for sharp critiques of the economically privileged and, like Jane Austin, has an ear for realistic, bantering dialogue. Through Nick’s narration, we see a world that so many Americans dream of (its enviableness only further accentuated by our open disdain for it): a life of endless parties, delicious food, beautiful clothes, and Paris Hilton. Nick who’s paradoxically drawn to his cousin, Daisy’s, and her husband, Tom’s, lifestyle with gloating contempt echoes the contemporary American idolization of an elite lifestyle that none but a select few attain.

We watch Daisy with her voice that “sounds of money” flit about with uncompromising shallowness and vivacious school-girl frivolity, and through her, see so many of the inconsequential remarks and actions others (as well as ourselves) have made for the sheer sake of “having a good time”. In spite of her frivolity and weak disposition, we become, like Gatsby, “overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves, of the freshness of many clothes, and of Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor.”

Through Gatsby’s veneration of Daisy, we not only imagine what so many Americans desire (success), but also we see the goal and glittering fixation of all humanity: beauty. And like many Americans in the throes of Capitalism, Gatsby believes that money can buy beauty as well as love. Fitzgerald articulates this disillusion with haunting force, particularly voiced through Nick’s obsessive repulsion with the extravagant society his social status has allowed him and the sadness he finds while watching a “working man” attempt to enter it.

One critique of The Great Gatsby, which could also be argued as a positive, is the limited scope of action and themes Fitzgerald chooses to encapsulate. We only see the wealthy elite (or people wanting to be the wealthy elite), and only Nick really has any depth of characterization. Unlike a tome, such as War and Peace, Gatsby fails to have numerous interwoven plotlines within a grand historical context. Yes, the Jazz Age is the novel’s backdrop, but Fitzgerald fails to engage in any discussion beyond a summer among the wealthy youth partying into the wee hours of the night in the West Egg. Yet, the control with which Fitzgerald expresses his limited themes makes the novel’s lack of scope forgivable.

Gatsby is short and easily accessible, and I have no doubt these aspects of the novel do lend to its everlasting popularity. At the same time, it should never diminish its truly admirable ability to tease apart some of the most confounding qualities American culture values: money, beauty, youth, hard work, and the ever effusive, love.

Miranda Reads

Rating: really liked it
2.5 Stars

1) Always google who you are going to fall in love with.

Reserving judgments is a matter of infinite hope.

2) For the love of God, make a 401K

They had spent a year in France for no particular reason, and then drifted here and there unrestfully wherever people played polo and were rich together.

3) Never swallow a thesaurus.

I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.

Jay Gatsby is rich - the kind of exorbitant rich that other rich people like to hang out with him, just so they can bask in his richness.

He's also in love, with one Daisy Buchanan...who's already married to one, surly, cheating and backstabbing man.

Our narrator has front row seats to all the glitz, the glam and the gore that circles around Jay Gatsby's chaotic life. (Cause, whenever you throw that much money at something, you better be prepared for something to be thrown back.)

Overall, I liked this one better the second time around. I'm a bit more familiar with the story, and I have more of a feel for the way Fitzgerald writes.

I really enjoy the character of Gatsby this time around and love Daisy a little bit less.

The one thing I disliked in round 1 (and have disliked every time I go through this novel) is the language. It just seems...SO over-the-top and flowery.

It really just takes forever to say anything in this book. Like this:

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

and this:

It was the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again.

AND THIS:

Gatsby turned out all right at the end; it is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men.

Ultimately, this one was not the one for me. Maybe I'll give it another shot in a couple of years...

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Ilse

Rating: really liked it
Bright lights, big city

When I avowed my disenchantment with Tender Is the Night, a few GR friends urged me to read The Great Gatsby to truly appreciate F. Scott Fitzgerald. I cannot but admit The Great Gatsby was a far more exhilarating read than I had expected it to be, its tight composition and restless pace a remarkable contrast with the muddled slow mess that made Tender Is the Night hard for me to get through, the exquisite, visual opulent writing more than in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button unfurling in all its grandeur, alternating the scrumptious and the gritty, just like the narrative unfolding more coherently.

Reading The Great Gatsby immediately after Tra donne sole (among women only) by Cesare Pavese, featuring also some bored socialites as seen by an outsider who almost unwillingly turns into an insider, it struck me how little difference living in 1922 New York or fifties Turin seemed to make, at least for a certain class of people, the ones leisured and wealthy – however Pavese’s women seem more despondent and philosophical, responding to the shallowness of their lives by cynicism, nihilism or suicide.

F. Scott Fitzgerald paints brightly lit places, populated by shady people. Daisy and Tom Buchanan, Jay Gatsby, Jordan Baker and the outsider-insider narrator Nick Carraway are a fine fleur of unlovable, amoral and superficial characters, representatives of old and new money being equally dreadful, reducing friendships and loving relationships to commodities, cheating and lying themselves through their lives, crooks, dishonest to the core, whether in golf, in business or in relationships, so corrupt that even the narrator who conspicuously prides himself on his honesty makes himself untrustworthy by doing so. These are people who are moved to tears by a soft rich heap of beautiful shirts ordered from England, in the meantime thoughtlessly wrecking other people’s lives without even blinking (Pavese’s novel also pivots around haute couture).

They were careless people... they smashed up things and creations and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness... and let other people clean up the mess they had made.

Among many other things, the Great Gatsby is also tale of the ludicrous things we do for love (and which inevitably will leave us with empty hands), a painful story about holding on to illusions against one’ s better judgment and a cautionary tale on the (at that time perhaps) quintessential American belief in the malleability of the individual, the American dream, at which I am aware as a European I can only look at from a unbridgeable distance, bemused at a cultural trope which feels alien to me. Reading The Great Gatsby as a trenchant commentary on this belief however, Fitzgerald to my surprise struck me as a sheer visionary, illustrating sharply the downsides and dangers of this belief and capitalist ethos even if he couldn’t foresee how this pseudo-meritocratic mentality would spread and spill over times and oceans, how it would change societies and poison individuals with it all over the world in the wake of capitalism and neo-liberalism, which would make it into a personal vocation and permanent responsibility to remodel and market oneself to be a worthy individual in a hyper competitive society (and on the flipside blame oneself if one fails to succeed or succumbs under the pressure to achieve and be happy) – an ethos conditioning individuals who are made to think of themselves as one-person enterprises, judged by (and judging themselves) by what they have and do rather than what they are. If you are so smart why aren’t you rich? No wonder people are lonely and struggle with a warped view of the self and feelings of failure (Paul Verhaeghe, What about Me? The Struggle for Identity in a Market-based Society). By Jay Gatsby’s fate, Fitzgerald exposes the vicious lie that we can be what and who we want to be if we only work on ourselves and that we will be loved if doing so.



(Illustration: Michelle Lagasca)

As a counterpoint to all the extravagant and baffling materialism of the world he evokes, F. Scott Fitzgerald gently invites the reader to contemplate past, present and future in a burst of melancholic beauty that will glow on in my mind for a long time.

"Most of the big shore places were closed now and there were hardly any lights except the shadowy, moving glow of a ferryboat across the Sound. And as the moon rose higher the inessential houses began to melt away until gradually I became aware of the old island here that flowered once for Dutch sailors’ eyes—a fresh, green breast of the new world.

Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby’s house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an æsthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.

And as I sat there, brooding on the old unknown world, I thought of Gatsby’s wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.

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 one fine morning——

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."

Stephen

Rating: really liked it


Casual, self-absorbed decadence, the evaporation of social grace, money calling all the shots and memories of the past holding people hostage from the future that lies before them. Yes, Mr. Fitzgerald has nailed it and written one of THE great American novels.

This book was a surprise. I LOVED it and all of the deep contradictions swimming around its heart. At once a scathing indictment on the erosion of the American Dream, but also a bittersweet love letter to the unfailing optimism of the American people. Call it dignified futility…obstinate hopefulness. Whatever you call it, this novel is shiny and gorgeous, written with a sort of breezy pretension that seems to mirror the loose morality of the story. Rarely have I come across a book whose style so perfectly enhances its subject matter.

Set in the eastern United States just after World War I, Fitzgerald shows us an America that has lost its moral compass. This fall from grace is demonstrated through the lives of a handful of cynical “well-to-dos” living lavish but meaningless lives that focus on nothing but the pursuit of their own pleasures and whims.

Standing apart from these happenings (while still being part of them) is our narrator, Nick Carraway. As the one honest and decent person in the story, Nick stands in stark contrast to the other characters. “Everyone 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.” Nick relays the story of the summer he spent in Long Island’s West Egg in a small house sandwiched between the much larger mansions of the area. His time in Long Island is spent with a group that includes his second cousin, Daisy Buchanan, and her rich husband Tom who live in Long Island’s East Egg. At one point in the story, Nick provides the following description of the pair which I do not think can be improved upon:

They were careless 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.

In addition, we have Jordan Baker who is a poster child for the pretty, amoral, self-centered rich girl whose view of the world is jaded and unsentimental. Basically, she’s a bitch.

The most intriguing character by far is Jay Gatsby himself, both for who he is and for how Fitzgerald develops him through the course of the narrative. When we are first introduced to Gatsby, he comes across as a polite, gracious, well-mannered gentleman with a magnetic personality who our narrator takes to immediately.

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.

However, from that very first encounter, Fitzgerald slowly chips away at the persona and peels back the layers of the “Great” Gatsby until we are left with a flawed and deeply tragic figure that in my opinion ranks among the most memorable in all of classic literature. Nick’s journey in his relationship with Gatsby mirrors our own. “It is invariably saddening to look through new eyes at things upon which you have expended your own powers of adjustment.”

Through a series of parties, affairs, beatings, drunken escapades, the lives of the characters intermesh with terrible consequences. I don’t want to give away major parts of the story as I think they are best experienced for the first time fresh, but at the heart of Fitzgerald’s morality tale is a tragic love that for me rivaled the emotional devastation I felt at the doomed relationship of Heathcliff and Catherine in Wuthering Heights. In general, Fitzgerald’s world of excessive jubilance and debauchery is a mask that the characters wear to avoid the quiet torments that haunt them whenever they are forced to take stock of their actions. Rather than do this, they simply keep moving. "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."

In the end, Fitzgerald manages the amazing feat of creating a sad, bleak portrait of America while maintaining a sense of restrained optimism in the future. Both heart-wrenching and strangely comforting at the same time. I guess in the end, this was a book that made me feel a lot and that is all I can ever ask. I’m going to wrap this up with my second favorite quote from the book (my favorite being the one at the very beginning of the review):

And as I sat there, brooding on the old, unknown world, I thought of Gatsby's wonder when he first picked out Daisy's light at the end of his dock. He had come such a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close he could hardly fail to grasp it. But what he did not know was that it was already behind him, somewhere in the vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.

5.0 stars. HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!

may ➹

Rating: really liked it
the only thing I got from this is that Nick is gay

2.5

Anne

Rating: really liked it
So this was a weird little story about people with too much money.
The main characters just kind of flopped around drinking cocktails, smoking, and complaining about the heat. When they weren't cheating on their spouses, that is.



The gist is that this guy Nick, who is the only person with normal human emotions in the entire book, is recounting his special summer with The Great Gatsby.



Gatsby is this ultra-mysterious man with gobs of money who likes to throw lavish wingdings. Everyone who is anyone shows up to drink his booze, eat his food, and party till they puke.
BUT! He has a secret and he needs Nick's help.
He's in love. <--with Nick's cousin, Daisy
Daisy, however, is married to a douchebag named Tom, who is cheating on her with a floozy named Myrtle, who is married to a wimp named George, who wants to buy one of Tom's cars.
It's the great circle of life.



Gatsby was...? I don't know.
Part of me felt sorry for him because he pulled himself up by his bootstraps and made a shitload of money just to win over the woman he loved. Sure he did it illegally, but how the fuck else are you supposed to make a shitload of money? Not by believing that anyone can be anything in America, that's for damn sure.
The other part of me thought he was an idiot who just wanted what he couldn't have. If Daisy threw him over for a guy with money, then that right there should tell you something.
Move on, dumbass.



Daisy was...? Kind of a dick, obviously. Of course she 100% deserved Tom. How Gatsby didn't see it coming is something that boggles the mind. <--we've all known a Gatsby, though, right? Unwilling to face the fact that his crush is a bitch on roids.



Myrtle was...?
Well, that shit was just funny. She didn't deserve to be road pancake, but if it had to happen to someone, at least it wasn't her dog.



Jordan was...? A golfer, a bit of a klepto, and Nick's quasi-love interest. You never get the feeling they're really dating-dating. <--more like they're both killing time? She was somewhat of a non-character for me.



Tom was...? An entitled, smarmy buffoon. But apparently, that's a good look on some people, because everything seems to come up roses for him.



At the end of the day, I'm not really sure why this is considered a must-read.
It's basically just a slice of asshole life. The very wealthy, very bored, and very cliqueish don't necessarily interest me and this story really wasn't an exception. I think it has the same appeal as those reality shows that follow rich housewives, or television series about wealthy a-holes doing shit like murdering their business rivals on yachts. Like, somehow I'm supposed to think, "Oh, look! Their lives aren't perfect, either!" but all I really end up thinking is, "You miserable fuckers can't think of anything better to do on a yacht?", because I sure as hell could come up with something a bit more fun than that.



The best thing about The Great Gatsby was the length. I loved that it didn't drag on and on and on. There weren't a lot of words wasted on unnecessary side plots that didn't go anywhere or descriptions of scenery that didn't matter. I appreciated that quite a bit.



Oh, the version I listened to had a bunch of letters written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Some of them were interesting, but oh my god, the guy sounded like such a snobby cunt when he was talking about how worthless and low-brow other authors of his day were. This didn't really matter to the story, but it was sort of a pathetic note to end the book on. And maybe the intent of putting those letters out there wasn't to make him look bad? Maybe I'm supposed to think he's right and that he and his pal Hemmingway were a step above everyone else? True literary champions!
If I'm honest about it, I'm exactly the sort of peasant reader that enjoys the more unpretentious novels, so to hear one author bashing another one for being too easily digested by the sweaty masses doesn't give me the warm fuzzies.



Then again, these were the guy's private thoughts, so it's not really any of my business. Plus, I can be a real twat when I'm venting to someone close to me, so who am I to judge?



This one won't go down as a favorite but it is another beloved classic that I can check off of my list.



As far as the audiobook goes? I think Tim Robbins is a good reader, but this is my 2nd book read by him and he's not my favorite. He has this tendency to lower his voice and whisper sometimes. Thing is, my hearing is SHIT, so I end up either having to go back and relisten or just kind of miss a few words. I'm not blaming Robbins, just my eardrums. I'll probably try to avoid books by him in the future, but not because he sucks.

Tim Robbins - Narrator
Publisher: HarperCollins
Edition: Unabridged
Awards:
Audie Award Nominee
Best Audiobooks
Listen Up Award