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| Edition: | Penguin Books (Paperback) |
| Author: | F. Scott Fitzgerald |
| Published: | January 2007 |
| Pages: | 192 |
| ISBN 10: | 0140620184 |
| New: | $10.00 (6) |
| Used: | $0.01 (34) |
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The Great Gatsby is a novel by the American author F. Scott Fitzgerald. First published on April 10, 1925, it is set in Long Island's North Shore and New York City during the summer of 1922.
The novel chronicles an era that Fitzgerald himself dubbed the "Jazz Age". Following the shock and chaos of World War I, American society enjoyed unprecedented levels of prosperity during the "roaring" 1920s as the economy soared. At the same time, Prohibition, the ban on the sale and manufacture of alcohol as mandated by the Eighteenth Amendment, made millionaires out of bootleggers and led to an increase in organized crime. Although Fitzgerald, like Nick Carraway in his novel, idolized the riches and glamor of the age, he was uncomfortable with the unrestrained materialism and the lack of morality that went with it.
Although it was adapted into both a Broadway play and a Hollywood film within a year of publication, it was not popular upon initial printing, selling fewer than 25,000 copies during the remaining fifteen years of Fitzgerald's life. It was largely forgotten during the Great Depression and World War II. After its republishing in 1945 and 1953, it quickly found a wide readership and is today widely regarded as a paragon of the Great American Novel. The Great Gatsby has become a standard text in high school and university courses on American literature in countries around the world, and is ranked second in the Modern Library's list of the 100 Best Novels of the 20th Century. Time included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.
Plot summary
The story is presented as a recollection of Nick Carraway, a young man from a patrician Midwestern family who lived in New York after graduating from Yale in the early 1920s. Nick declares that, following his father's advice, he avoids judging people: a habit that has caused trouble, exemplified by events concerning a man named Gatsby.
Nick explains that in 1922 he was renting an inexpensive cottage sandwiched between two mansions in West Egg, a seaside community of wealthy parvenus on Long Island Sound. Directly across the bay was East Egg, inhabited by members of the "old aristocracy", including Tom and Daisy Buchanan. Daisy is Nick's second cousin once removed; Nick knew of her husband Tom, a celebrated football player at Yale. Nick describes the Buchanans through a visit to their opulent East Egg mansion: although phenomenally wealthy, Tom's glory days are behind him; he is a brutish, overbearing dilettante and Daisy, although engaging, gay, and attractive, is pampered and superficial with a largely ignored two-year-old daughter. Nick detects a strain in the relationship and Daisy's friend Jordan Baker, a well-known lady golfer, tells him that Tom has a mistress in New York City.
Tom offers Nick a lift to the city and on the way they stop at a shabby garage owned by George Wilson, where Nick is introduced to the owner's brassy wife, Myrtle Wilson. Her colorless husband George has no suspicion that she is Tom's mistress. Nick passively accompanies the couple to their urban love-nest, where Myrtle presides over a pretentious party that includes her sister Catherine. Catherine approves of the extramarital affair and informs Nick that both lovers cannot stand the people they married and would marry each other if Tom's wife was not a Catholic who "doesn't believe in divorce", something Nick knows to be untrue. Nick finds the evening increasingly unbearable but is unable to leave until Tom breaks Myrtle's nose in a spat. Nick, drunk, leaves with Chester McKee, a would-be artistic photographer. After a very strange night of drunkenness, which does call attention to a rather controversial aspect of the novel, Nick wakens to blearily go off to his job as a bond salesman.
What old aristocracy possesses in taste, however, lacks in heart, as the East Eggers prove themselves careless, inconsiderate bullies who are so used to money's ability to ease their minds that they never worry about hurting others.
Nick's next-door neighbor is the wealthy and mysterious Jay Gatsby, who each weekend throws lavish parties hosting hundreds of people. Nick receives a formal invitation from Gatsby's butler and attends. The party is wild and fun, but he finds that none of the guests know much about Gatsby and rumors about the man are contradictory. Many have never even met their host, as the parties are open and guests often attend uninvited. Nick runs into Jordan Baker, but they are separated while searching for Gatsby. A man strikes up a conversation with Nick, claiming to recognise him from the US Army's First Division during the Great War. Nick mentions his difficulty in finding their host and the man reveals himself to be Gatsby himself, surprising Nick, who had expected him to be older and not as personable. Gatsby invites Nick to more get-togethers, and an odd 'friendship' begins.
One day Gatsby appears in a magnificent yellow roadster and drives Nick to New York City, irritating him with the odd statement that Jordan will be asking Nick for a favor on Gatsby's behalf. Gatsby then presents a clichéd description of his life as a wealthy dilettante and war hero to an incredulous Nick, but the latter is convinced when Gatsby displays a Montenegrin war decoration. Gatsby then introduces a bemused Nick to underworld figure Meyer Wolfsheim, but when Nick sees Tom and tries to introduce Gatsby, Gatsby disappears.
Jordan reveals to Nick that Gatsby fell in love with Daisy before the war and hosts parties in the hope that she will visit. Gatsby has asked Jordan to ask Nick to get him a meeting with Daisy. Nick agrees: the reunion is initially awkward, but Gatsby and Daisy begin a love affair. An affair also begins for Nick and Jordan, but Nick knows of Jordan's shortcomings and predicts that their relationship will be superficial.
Later, Daisy invites Gatsby and Nick over to her mansion and the three, accompanied by Tom and Jordan Baker, depart for a hotel in the city at Tom's suggestion. Tom also insists that he and Gatsby switch cars; he takes advantage of Gatsby's compliance by flaunting Gatsby's roadster to George Wilson. At the hotel, Tom eventually notices Gatsby's love for Daisy and, in front of Gatsby, Daisy, Nick, and Jordan, claims that he has been researching Gatsby. Tom alleges that Gatsby is a bootlegger and expresses his loathing of him. Gatsby urges Daisy to say that she never loved Tom; Daisy says that although she did love him, she still loved Gatsby as well. Tom mockingly tells Gatsby that nothing can happen between him and Daisy. Gatsby retorts that the only reason Daisy married Tom was because he (Gatsby) was too poor to afford to marry Daisy at the time. Tom is angered and for the second time in the novel he visibly loses his composure. Gatsby and Daisy drive off together in Gatsby's car while Tom takes his time getting home in the company of Nick and Jordan.
The suspicions of George Wilson, husband of Tom's mistress Myrtle, have also been aroused and he too has been arguing with his wife. Myrtle runs outside only to be struck and killed by Gatsby's car, which is driven by Daisy. Daisy and Gatsby speed away. Later, Tom, Jordan, and Nick notice a commotion by the garage on their way to East Egg and stop. George Wilson, half-crazy with shock, rants about having seen a yellow car and Tom tells Wilson privately that the yellow car not his (as he said earlier) but was Gatsby's, but Wilson does not seem to listen and Tom, Jordan, and Nick leave. The half-crazed Wilson, however, later makes a mental connection between the driver of the car and Myrtle's lover and resolves to pursue it.
The following day Nick learns the truth about the accident while breakfasting with Gatsby by his pool. Gatsby is depressed, unsure of whether Daisy still loves him and hoping for a call from her. Seeing himself as Gatsby's closest friend, Nick advises Gatsby to leave for a week. "They're [Daisy, Tom, Jordan] a rotten crowd," Nick says, "You're worth the whole damn bunch put together." Gatsby smiles the irresistible smile that Nick describes as having "faced—or seemed to face—the whole world, then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor".
Wilson appears at the Buchanan mansion with a gun, finding Tom packing to escape with Daisy. Tom, unaware of Daisy's culpability, names Gatsby as the driver of the car that killed Myrtle. Wilson finds Gatsby floating in his pool and kills him before committing suicide nearby.
Gatsby's funeral devolves upon Nick, whose attempt to find other mourners is virtually fruitless; not even Gatsby's shady business associates will attend. Apart from Gatsby's servants and Nick, the only other mourners are "Owl Eyes" (a Gatsby party guest) and Gatsby's father, Mr. Gatz. Left in the past by his son, he shows Nick a well-worn photograph Gatsby sent him of his mansion and a notebook from Gatsby's youth that he feels illustrates his son's drive and ambition.
Nick severs connections with Jordan (who claims to be engaged to another man), and, after a brief run-in with Tom, Nick returns permanently to the Midwest, reflecting on Gatsby and concluding that the American dream has been corrupted by the sole, empty pursuit of money.
