The Great Gatsby

turgon

This came up in the books I hate thread. I dont hate this book, I just cant appreciate it. Well I can see some good parts, but I dont see why its better than others Ive read, and I dont see why it should be second in the Modern Library's best 100 books of the 1900's.

Can anyone enlighten me as to why they feel this book is so good?

Hermy

I can't.
I was left totally underwhelmed by it.
I don't hate the book but I see absolutely no reason why it is so highly regarded.

metrovelvet

I dont think it sold that well when it first came out. Probably why it got so much recognition is that it pressed the right buttons with the collective conciousness and gave a name and identity, "the jazz age" to the period which followed the depression. I think it pressed historical buttons rather than being a great read.

magicass

:DI agree it aint all that great!

Earthhorse

Yeah, I'm another sucker who found himself completely underwhelmed by this book. It's not a bad read but I never really found myself interested in the characters or enthralled by the language.

If you want an answer to your question it does seem to be that it captured the spirit of the age, though I have heard people say they liked it so I guess it's like any classic, or non-classic, in that not everyone is going to like it.

silvine

I've heard nothing but bad things about this book. Definately want to read it now!

InvisibleBadger

I really enjoyed it. Thought it was an enjoyable tale.

TelePaul

I thought/think it's an incredible book. One of my all-time favourites.

johnnyskeleton

InvisibleBadger wrote: »

I really enjoyed it. Thought it was an enjoyable tale.

Enjoyable tale is probably the best description it can get. It is a good story, well told, with interesting characters and a twist. It does not have a moral or social point to make, so in a sense it wouldn't be a book that changes the world, but it's an enjoyable read.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Earthhorse

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

It does not have a moral or social point to make, so in a sense it wouldn't be a book that changes the world, but it's an enjoyable read.

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Yes, I realise that, and to js I would say that is the point of the novel in a way. To capture that sort of hedonistic, amoral mob in all its glory.

Tristram

zeitwhatnow etc.

monellia

Some people find Fitzgerald too self-indulgent as a writer because the subject matter mostly pertains to the problems which face the exclusive rich upper-class in society, but that doesn't change the fact that he can write like no other. I think it takes a particular kind of reader to appreciate Fitzgerald - that is, one who can look beyond the storyline and find substance in the very words. I think TGG is one of the greatest literary achievements of the 20th century, not for the issues it addresses, but for the outstanding quality of the writing. Said the Irish Independent of The Great Gatsby: "The words lap over, like gentle, narcotic waves of literary fragrance". I couldn't have said it better myself!

metrovelvet

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Yes I cant remember exactly what it is called -the pathetic fallacy?- when you employ the same qualities you want to comment on - like writing a boring book about boredom to get your point across.

Talliesin

I stand by [post=55280276]what I said before[/post]

Earthhorse

monellia wrote: »

Some people find Fitzgerald too self-indulgent as a writer because the subject matter mostly pertains to the problems which face the exclusive rich upper-class in society, but that doesn't change the fact that he can write like no other. I think it takes a particular kind of reader to appreciate Fitzgerald - that is, one who can look beyond the storyline and find substance in the very words. I think TGG is one of the greatest literary achievements of the 20th century, not for the issues it addresses, but for the outstanding quality of the writing. Said the Irish Independent of The Great Gatsby: "The words lap over, like gentle, narcotic waves of literary fragrance". I couldn't have said it better myself!

Perhaps I need to read it again but I wasn't impressed with the writing at all. It wasn't bad but I failed to see what was great about it, and I do regard myself as a lover of language. Everyone raves about that last line but I just don't see it.

metrovelvet wrote: »

Yes I cant remember exactly what it is called -the pathetic fallacy?- when you employ the same qualities you want to comment on - like writing a boring book about boredom to get your point across.

The pathetic fallacy is where you imbue objects with human traits e.g. "The cloud climbed over the mountain to get a better look at the city".

theCzar

Thought the language was great, but the story didn't interest me much. Probably had expectations so came away disappointed.

metrovelvet

Earthhorse wrote: »

The pathetic fallacy is where you imbue objects with human traits e.g. "The cloud climbed over the mountain to get a better look at the city".

Thanks. It been a while since ive been in lit crit. I know its some kind of fallacy. I thought what you mention is anthropomorphism?

Talliesin

Yes, it's "pathetic" in the sense of the word that means "having feeling", which humans do and clouds do not. Similarly, it's "anthropomorphic" meaning "being human", another things humans do more readily than clouds. The pathetic fallacy and the anthropomorphic fallacy are the same.

turgon

I moderately liked it, but it didnt stand out to me at all at all. Thats why I was surprised its considered like on of the greatest books ever written.

Locamon

A long time since I read this but it has to be one of my favourite reads and I am disappointed to see people say it is a book about rich people when the main character is clearly an outsider propelled into their midst by his mysterious success. To me this book was about our inability to escape who we are in spite of the mask we throw up and the futility of the same. Yes we can change but we retain an essential part of us that we cannot and should not discard. FitzGerald's sparse but concise prose leaves you pondering multiple meanings long after you have finished the novel.

Dades

Was a fav of mine for a long time.

Haven't read it in years, but some parts of that book really stick in my mind still.

godspal

In Tender is the Night Fitzgerald developed the protagonist as a frustrated individual; the novel commits itself to making Dick Diver a shadow of his former self by using society’s expectations of him to wear him down. While Fitzgerald uses society as an erosive force in Tender is the Night and Dick as a man among this society, conversely in The Great Gatsby we are presented with a perspective of a society from the outside, and with two men trying to make their way in to this society; Nick Carraway and Jay Gatsby. However Fitzgerald denies the two men access to this society; this consequently leads to the self-exiling of Nick Carraway, and the destruction of Jay Gatsby. East Egg is a society built upon the hedonistic ideals of the twenties: sex, adultery, drinking, partying and having a good time without consequence. Nick and Jay are, however, men removed from this revelry, whereas Tom and Daisy are people faithfully invested in this lifestyle. Accordingly Fitzgerald constructed a novel that captures the spirit of the “Jazz Age.”

The Great Gatsby was praised by one critic as: “It was not a book for the ages, but it caught superbly the spirit of a decade.” (Bruccoli 1985, 2) In doing so Fitzgerald presented the thoughts and lives of many of the people of his generation by using an objective narrator, Nick Caraway, to observe the events, which lead to the down fall of Jay Gatsby, the flamboyant, ideal man of “The Roaring Twenties.” Therefore Jay Gatsby is a man who continually tries to define himself within his generation; as a result he presents himself as a man of action; ‘“After that I lived like a young rajah in all the capitals of Europe-Paris, Venice, Venice, Rome-collecting jewels, chiefly rubies, hunting big game, painting a little, things for myself only, and trying to forget something very sad that had happened to me long ago.”(The Great Gatby, 66)

At the same time Tom and Daisy are presented as people epitomizing a society that is detached from any action. Fitzgerald elaborates on their lifestyle as taking a toll on them; at times when the façade of the roles they play breaks down and they show themselves to be immensely unhappy. Daisy summarizes this unhappiness early in the novel:

“I’m glad it’s a girl. And I hope she’ll be a fool- that’s the best thing a girl can be a beautiful little fool.”

‘You see I think everything’s terrible anyhow,’ she went on in a convinced way. ‘And I know. I’ve been everywhere and seen everything and done everything.’ Her eyes flashed around her in a defiant way, rather like Tom’s and she laughed with thrilling scorn. ‘Sophisticated – God I’m sophisticated.’(23)

Daisy shows us that she has convinced herself, vacantly, to perform the role of “a beautiful little fool.” And Tom and Daisy have managed to convince the rest of the world of the beautiful grandeur of East Egg by constantly performing the roles that they believe is expected of them.

In the following chapter I will explain how Jay Gatsby allows himself to be won over by Tom and Daisy’s performance, and how Gatsby naively believes he has managed to construct himself as some sort of great, self-reliant man, while Nick and “Owl Eyes” watch as this tragedy unfolds, and both marvel at Gatsby’s sheer romantic vision, and both hail him as a misunderstood hero.

This is an extract from my Thesis on F. Scott Fitzgerald's novels. While this extract centres on the story and its interwoven characters I fail to mention the wonderful prose style of Fitzgerald himself.
Fitzgerald used this rhythmetically brilliant, flowing adjective style which paces the novel wonderfully. It also produces these amazingly constructed scenes:

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 aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.

Nick sits on the coast watching out across the water trying to deal with a problem that plagues post-modernist culture... We can no longer produce anything original. Fitzgerald wrote this book in 1925 and even though many modernist writers grasped the idea that they could not produce anything original they used old styles and structures and deconstructed them in attempt to bring literature into a new era, Fitzgerald voices through Carraway that this might not be attainable. And the imagery that he uses is sublime.

I could go on for hours explaining in fine-detail why this book is amazing. However what I mentioned above would be the cornerstones of my argument.

Amazotheamazing

godspal wrote: »

I could go on for hours explaining in fine-detail why this book is amazing. However what I mentioned above would be the cornerstones of my argument.

You're obviously the guy to ask, what do you make of the parallels between the Great Gatsby and Les Grand Meaulnes by Alain Fournier? (Think I've asked this before?)

godspal

Haven't read Les Grand Meaulnes by Alain Fournier, however from what I can gather from descriptions on the net... They both centre around characters obsessed with romantic ideals: (James Gatz becoming his ideal, Jay Gatsby, while Augustin Meaulnes through costumes explores his ideals.) I really would have to read this book, but still this what I can gather. I have a lot of books to read and I put this to the list.

Amazotheamazing

godspal wrote: »

Haven't read Les Grand Meaulnes by Alain Fournier, however from what I can gather from descriptions on the net... They both centre around characters obsessed with romantic ideals: (James Gatz becoming his ideal, Jay Gatsby, while Augustin Meaulnes through costumes explores his ideals.) I really would have to read this book, but still this what I can gather. I have a lot of books to read and I put this to the list.

Something like that, well worth a read, imo.

damselnat

First time I read this book I really didn't think a whole lot of it.
Then, a few years later, a friend was studying it and talking glowingly about it, so I thought, hey, I'll give it another chance. I read it a second time; and I loved it. I was fascinated by Gatsby and the life led by the characters and the whole self-indulgence of it all. I've often found that with Fitzgerald, however, that I rarely ever "get" his work on the first go. I leave it a while and return to it and it blows me away.
Can't explain it! Think it's a great book though, there's so much to it