Great Gatsby Read-Along Week 4: My heart, it hurts

So here's the deal, guys. I finished The Great Gatsby, and then I loaned it to a friend. So I no longer have the book, which means all I have are my notes, which means this might be a short post.

Myrtle died violently. I remember that much. This was EXTRA tragic because she thought she was running toward Tom's car and a possible escape from her husband (whose suspicions of her infidelity had driven him to The Bad Place). Instead, she ran right into the path of Gatsby's car, with Daisy at the wheel. Oh, poetic justice . . . you are poetic and just but also kind of a jerk.

I know Daisy was distraught because she had just realized she would have to stay with Tom and actually face the consequences of her choices (and by that I mean her choice to marry Tom . . . she gets away with everything else), but she didn't even stop after she hit Myrtle. And then she let Gatsby take the fall for her by saying HE was driving. And THEN she conspired with Tom to tell Mr. Wilson that it was Gatsby who had been romanticizing Myrtle. So it's HER FAULT Gatsby got shot.

"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." (p. 179) 

I wanted to like Daisy (probably because Gatsby did), but she turned out to be just a bored housewife (with no actual homemaking or child-rearing responsibilities). A poor little rich girl. She didn't even have a great reason for giving up on Gatsby and marrying Tom. She was just young and immature and wanted her life to happen without delay. She made her choices and then blamed everyone else for her unhappiness.

Gatsby was a flawed character, absolutely . . . but I can't help but see him as a victim. A victim first of his poor social standing, then of his hopeless love for Daisy, then of Wolfshiem (who I suspect took advantage of the vulnerable young Gatsby), and, ultimately, of Tom and Daisy's selfishness. He had a foolish need, even at the last, to believe that Daisy never loved another man. But his desperation to believe the best of her finally gave way to harsh reality.

"He must have looked up at an unfamiliar sky through frightening leaves and shivered as he found what a grotesque thing a rose is and how raw the sunlight was upon the scarcely created grass." (p. 161)

"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." (p. 180)

So, Fitzy, well done I guess. You kind of ruined my day.

UNHAND HIM, YOU WILY MINX.

Great Gatsby Read-Along Week 3: The golden s*** hits the fan

This last stretch with Gatsby was pretty stressful. I now have an intense cold, and I'm not saying it's Fitzy's fault . . . but I'm fairly certain it's Fitzy's fault.

Poor Gatsby (how many times am I going to say that before I'm done with this book?). He finally has Daisy in his house, where he can show her how fancy he is. He even flaunts his very full closet of metrosexual attire, which brings her to tears.

"'They're such beautiful shirts,' she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds. 'It makes me sad because I've never seen such---such beautiful shirts before.'" (p. 92)

Because who DOESN'T cry in the presence of pretty clothes?

Any excuse. Any excuse at all.

But this is the beginning of the spell breaking. Daisy has been unattainable for too long, and he's built her up too much in his mind. With her standing next to him, he looks across the bay to the place where the green light at the end of her dock used to be his only connection to her. "Now it was again a green light on a dock. His count of enchanted objects had diminished by one" (p. 93). And the enchantment surrounding Daisy keeps diminishing, because she can't possibly live up to the "colossal vitality of his illusion" (p. 95).

But before he met her, Jay Gatsby (aka James Gatz) couldn't think of anything but breaking into the "universe of ineffable gaudiness" (p. 99; meaning, he wanted to be rich, yo). He shunned his parents in favor of seeking his fortune. He became contemptuous of women, "of young virgins because they were ignorant, of the others because they were hysterical about things which in his overwhelming self-absorption he took for granted" (p. 98). Basically, he was earning his degree in douche-baggery.

Despite ALMOST inheriting $25,000 from a new friend, he hadn't made his fortune yet when he first met Daisy. He didn't STOP pursuing wealth (her parents would never let her marry a poor officer), but I think he started pursuing it more selflessly. She became his entire reason for attaining The Dream, which explains why he's so fixated on her and so determined to turn the clock on their relationship back 5 years, to the day they met. He demands a do-over.

Then Nick says/narrates something infuriatingly cryptic: "I was reminded of something—an elusive rhythm, a fragment of lost words, that I had heard somewhere a long time ago. For a moment a phrase tried to take shape in my mouth and my lips parted like a dumb man's, as though there was more struggling upon them than a wisp of startled air. But they made no sound, and what I had almost remembered was uncommunicable forever" (p. 111).

This BETTER NOT be uncommunicable forever.

Now that Daisy has sashayed back into Gatsby's life, he once again makes some life changes. He puts an end to the lavish parties (because she doesn't like them) and fires all his servants (because I don't know why). All that's left is for Daisy to give Tom the old heave-ho.

Then, on a scorching hot day at the end of summer, it all goes to hell. Gatsby and Nick go over to the Buchanan household for an incredibly awkward lunch. I'm not sure what the goal of this gathering was (maybe Daisy and Gatsby were ready to wave their love flag under Tom's nose), but I think part of the reason was that Daisy wanted to show Gatsby her daughter. She parades her out for just a moment, as if to say, "Remember this small human I birthed?" Apparently, Gatsby needed the reality check: "Afterward, he kept looking at the child in surprise. I don't think he had ever really believed in its existence before" (p. 117).

Once they're all seated at the table, Gatsby and Daisy do their very worst impression of two people who don't care about each other. Tom isn't the shiniest coin in the piggy bank, but it takes him exactly 5 minutes to ascertain what's going on between them . . . and he doesn't like it one bit.

He doesn't call them out right away, but when the party moves into a stifling suite at the Plaza Hotel, Tom hoists himself onto his self-righteous soapbox.

"I suppose the latest thing is to sit back and let Mr. Nobody from Nowhere make love to your wife. Well, if that's the idea you can count me out. . . . . Nowadays people begin by sneering at family life and family institutions, and next they'll throw everything overboard and have intermarriage between black and white." (p. 130)

WHAT is the world coming to?

But, no matter, because Daisy is leaving Tom. And Gatsby gets a little overconfident and decides to add that she never loved Tom in the first place. Right, Daisy? RIGHT, DAISY?

Crickets. Get it?

Then Tom gets a little overconfident and points out that Gatsby is involved in nefarious activities and is a fraud in general . . . and Daisy shrinks further and further into herself as she realizes that NEITHER of the men she loves are going to provide her the life of marital bliss she so badly wants.

Thus ends the most uncomfortable social gathering in the history of ever. And Nick tells us "that unfamiliar yet recognizable look was back again in Gatsby's face" (p. 134). NICK! What did I tell you about saying things that aren't things? Maybe you should rethink your future as a narrator.

Great Gatsby Read-Along Week 2: The plot thickens

I've spent this whole week making the social rounds in my hometown, which I haven't visited since November 2010. I tell you this so you'll have mercy on me when you discover that I can't seem to form a coherent thought. I feel as though I've had too much champagne at a Gatsby party.

Let's do this thing.

I love that Jordan drags Nick all around the mansion looking for Gatsby and then doesn't even tell him that the man of about his age at the table where they sit is, in fact, Gatsby. Good job, Jordan. Way to make it awkward.

So Nick sort of embarrasses himself by talking ABOUT Gatsby TO Gatsby, but at least he doesn't say anything insulting before he knows who he is. For someone who has consumed two bowls of champagne, that's a small miracle.

Speaking of Gatsby gossip, these crazy party guests can't stop talking about the host, but they know absolutely nothing about him and don't really care to find out the truth. As far as they're concerned, "he's just a man named Gatsby" (p. 48) who throws big parties and may or may not have gone to Oxford and may or may not have killed a man---a curiosity, not a human being. And he doesn't seem overly interested in them either. He isolates himself, physically and psychologically.

"I wondered if the fact that he was not drinking helped set him off from his guests, for it seemed to me that he grew more correct as the fraternal hilarity increased." (p. 50)

And that leads nicely into the three-page drunk-driving PSA. The library dude doesn't even make it off Gatsby's property before the friend he came with drives them into a ditch. Then all the party guests have to explain to the wasted driver that his wheel has separated itself from the vehicle and no more driving will be happening. And no one is AT ALL concerned that he's drunk off his rocking horse . . . they just think maybe he shouldn't try driving at night. These people make a pretty good case for prohibition.

This is another moment where Gatsby's isolation is highlighted. While everyone is gathered around the car in the ditch, Nick glances back at the house as he heads home.

"A wafer of moon was shining over Gatsby's house, making the night fine as before, and surviving the laughter and the sound of his still glowing garden. A sudden emptiness seemed to flow now from the windows and the great doors, endowing with complete isolation the figure of the host, who stood on the porch, his hand up in a formal gesture of farewell." (p. 55)

Doesn't that make you want to cry for poor Gatsby? Of course it does. As it should.

So Nick's friendship with Gatsby blooms, but he realizes there's not anything especially unusual about his new friend. "My first impression, that he was a person of some undefined consequence, had gradually faded and he had become simply the proprietor of an elaborate road-house next door" (p. 64).

But, Nicholas, you're so wrong. Gatsby is much more than just a little man in a big house. He DID go to Oxford, and then he hunted things (animals and rubies and other twinklies) and painted things and tried to forget about The Very Sad Thing that happened to him. He also fought things in a war. He even has mob connections. Aren't you sorry you ever doubted him?

There are some hints that he may be engaging in some sort of nefarious activity with a man named Wolfsheim, who really can't be trusted. I mean . . . that NAME. And his cuff links are made from human molars. So there's that.

And The Very Sad Thing (not to be confused with The Terrible Awful) is that Gatsby dated Daisy when he was a lieutenant, and for some reason not yet revealed she married Tom instead. She wasn't thrilled about marrying Tom. In fact, Jordan says that she nearly didn't make it down the aisle and had a ROYAL temper tantrum right before the wedding. But after they returned from their honeymoon, Daisy was so attached to Tom that she couldn't function when he left the room. Intriguing.

Gatsby bought the house across the bay from Daisy so he could keep tabs on her, but he has lived there for 5 years without ever speaking to her. This is a case of something that SHOULD be really creepy but somehow comes off as sweet. I think?

Nick seems to approve of this revelation. "He came alive to me delivered suddenly from the womb of his purposeless splendor" (p. 75). So Nick arranges for Daisy to come over, and Gatsby is finally able to see her without Tom's hulking mass coming between. And whatever they talk about makes Daisy cry and cheers Gatsby up considerably.

Just one more tiny thing before I succumb to sleep's sweet embrace. When Nick is out walking with Jordan, after she tells him about the Gatsby/Daisy saga of doomed love, he has a phrase running through his head: "There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy, and the tired" (p. 79). It doesn't make immediate sense in context, but I think it must be important. Sorry . . . that's all I've got on that.

Also, Nick decides without any lead-up that he and Jordan should exit the friend zone, just because he has nothing better to do (or no ONE better to do, as the case may be).

"Unlike Gatsby and Tom Buchanan, I had no girl whose disembodied face floated along the dark cornices and blinding signs, and so I drew up the girl beside me, tightening my arms. Her wan, scornful mouth smiled, and so I drew her up again closer, this time to my face." (p. 80)

It must be love.

*Passes out*

Great Gatsby Read-Along Week 1

I'm participating in a loverly read-along hosted by Wallace at Unputdownables. Any excuse to reread The Great Gatsby is an excuse I will take and put in my pocket and use to justify all decisions.

In addition to my posthumous love affair with The Hemingway, I am also quite partial to The Fitzgerald. Hemingway is the one who will whisk me away to Paris and buy me lots of alcohol and maybe get into a brawl to defend my honor.

Fitzy is the one who sees romantic comedies with me and knows how I take my coffee and reads me poetry in bed.

Together, they make the perfect man. Unfortunately, their separate vices combined would create the most poisonous alcoholic yet known to the world.

Moving right along.

I haven't read Gatsby since college, and, although I remember loving it, I don't remember much else. This time around, I read the first 45 pages twice because the language is so DELICIOUS. Our Fitzy sure can turn a phrase. And he has a way of getting straight to the point whilst pouring flower petals and confetti all over the pages. It shouldn't be possible, but there it is.

This is the part where I say, if you haven't read Gatsby yet, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? And also, maybe stop reading this post because I'm about to get a little spoiler-happy up in here.

First of all, Nick Carraway. What a dear he is. I love his description of himself as someone who is willing to reserve judgment and hear people out, even when he wishes they would refrain from oversharing. As he says, "Reserving judgments is a matter of infinite hope" (p. 2). Such a simple act, yet impossible for most people to manage. So I'm already thinking Nick is a tiny bit superhuman. And perhaps it's that quality in Nick that draws him to Gatsby, whom he describes as having "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" (p. 2).

So there you have it. Two spectacular male characters. Oh, and then there's Tom Buchanan, "one of those men who reach such an acute limited excellence at twenty-one that everything afterward savors of anticlimax" (p. 6). And maybe THAT explains why he's stepping out on his wife, Daisy: simply for the thrill of it.

But what about Daisy? Frankly, I worry about her. There's something about her forced cheer and nervous energy that warns of an impending emotional breakdown. She puts on a brave face, but her social efforts are a bit manic. And in her first conversation with Nick, the cracks start to show. "Well, I've had a very bad time, Nick, and I'm pretty cynical about everything" (p. 16). You see, she knows about Tom's "woman in New York," the lovely (?) Myrtle Wilson. He doesn't even try to hide it. And Myrtle is about as different from Daisy as any woman could be, as different as a myrtle bush is from a wild daisy.

And Myrtle is unhappily married, too, and kind of disgusting in her desperation to be more than she is in the social/wealth equation. How this incredibly materialistic woman ever ended up with a lowly mechanic she can't stand, living above a garage, I don't know. But "Tom's the first sweetie she ever had" (p. 35), so she's not a TERRIBLE person, right? Right? Barf.

Let's end this post on a more positive note that doesn't paint such a dismal view of marriage. Let's talk about Gatsby: the man, the myth, the legend. He invites hoards of people to his mansion for these elaborate parties, and bunches more just show up without invitations, but few actually meet him because they don't really care about the host so much as all the free booze and food. And he just stands demurely on the sidelines and watches as the crowd goes from drunk to drunker to absolutely pissed. And he has a "high Gothic library, panelled with carved English oak, and probably transported complete from some ruin overseas" (p. 45), full of books he hasn't read. And he may or may not have killed a man. Oh, Gatsby. You're a head scratcher . . . but still a delight.