Book 3: The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Dates: January 7
Books read: 2
Books remaining: 98
Blog Post:
Okay so if you look at my book list, The Great Gatsby is actually #3 on the list, not #2. Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust. However, I have the book on hold from my local library, and there’s only ONE copy for the whole area’s metropolitan library. I really did want to read the books in the randomized order of my list, but if I’m going to read them all within 365 days, I can’t waste days waiting for my holds to be ready. SO– I’ve moved onto #3. I’m going to do my best to read them in order, but you have to be flexible on quests.
Moving on to The Great Gatsby–I was looking forward to reading this one for many reasons: (1) it’s much shorter than the first two books, readable within one day; (2) I’ve read it previously when I was in high school, and I was looking forward to re-reading it with a new, older (but not like, a lot older, okay?) perspective; and (3) everyone has strong opinions about The Great Gatsby–it’s a popular book.
I remember reading The Great Gatsby in high school and liking it, but I didn’t really remember why I liked it. And having now reread it, I have no idea why I liked it back then. Maybe I was in love with the idea of being rich (who isn’t?), maybe I found Gatsby’s love for Daisy incredibly romantic. Whatever the reason, the feeling did not last. First, before I go any further, I do NOT remember reading this incredibly gay scene, when Nick is in the city getting drunk with Tom and his mistress, and he leaves the apartment with the artist, Mr. McKee:
"Come to lunch someday," [Mr. McKee] suggested, as we groaned down in the elevator.
"Where?"
"Anywhere."
"Keep your hands off the lever," snapped the elevator boy.
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. McKee with dignity, "I didn't know I was touching it."
"All right," I agreed, "I'll be glad to"Come to lunch someday," [Mr. McKee] suggested, as we groaned down in the elevator.
"Where?"
"Anywhere."
"Keep your hands off the lever," snapped the elevator boy.
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. McKee with dignity, "I didn't know I was touching it."
"All right," I agreed, "I'll be glad to."
" . . . I was standing beside his bed and he was sitting up between the sheets, clad in his underwear, with a great portfolio in his hands.”
Like, clearly this isn’t overtly a hook up between Mr. McKee and Nick, but I’m 100% convinced that it happened and I don’t know how I missed it the first time I read the book. That said, I went to a very conservative high school so maybe that’s to be expected. Anyway.
Moving on: each and every single character in this book is sooooooo annoying. Nick is a rich, pretentious idiot who thinks he’s better than everyone. Actually, he might be better than everyone we meet in the book, but unfortunately for him, that’s not saying much. Tom is a racist, sexist asshole who peaked in college (literally: “one of those men who reach such an acute limited excellence at twenty-one that everything afterwards savors of anticlimax.”). Jordan, my favorite character in the book, is a liar committed to being a bystander. Daisy was born with a silver spoon in her mouth and is doing her best to be miserable about it. And finally, Gatsby is a poor man who got rich quick doing something unsavory–it’s never explicitly said what–who is so obsessed with a woman that he can’t handle the fact that that woman loves her husband, even a little.
Jordan is my favorite character in the book, even though Nick tells us she’s a liar and implies that she cheated at one of her golf championships, because at one point Tom says she’s too wild and her family shouldn’t “let her run around like that.” What can I say, I love a woman who goes against the grain.
The book is really well written and is filled with the kind of imagery that is perfect for exploring in a high school/college literature class, so I understand why it is as popular as it is. But the “love story” between Daisy and Gatsby stinks of a man obsessed with the idea of being rich and earning the love of a woman far above his station in life, without needing to know anything about the woman herself, and a woman who’s bored and wants to get back at her husband for cheating on her. This obsession fails him in the end, as it’s too much for Daisy: “‘Oh, you want too much!’” she cried to Gatsby. “‘I love you now–isn’t that enough? I can’t help what’s past.’” She began to sob helplessly. “‘I did love him once–but I loved you too.’” Poor little rich girl with two rich men fighting over her. It’s a very boring love story–the only exciting thing about it is Gatsby’s murder.
Nick and Jordan’s relationship is 1000 times more interesting to me, even if it is less obsessive and romantic. Nick initially admires her self-sufficiency (and of course, she’s beautiful). He goes to many parties with her, and decides that she avoids clever men so that she can get away with her lying. Jordan says she herself is careless (in the context of driving), and hates careless people, and that’s why she likes Nick. Nick can never decide if he’s in love with Jordan, he considers himself careful, and “one of the few honest people [he has] ever known.” In the end, after Nick breaks off their relationship, Jordan says “‘You said a bad driver was only safe until she met another bad driver? Well, I met another bad driver, didn’t I? I mean it was careless of me to make such a wrong guess. I thought you were a rather honest, straightforward person. I thought it was your secret pride.’” Something about how Jordan is hurt by Nick is closer to real emotion than anything else felt by anyone in this book.
I really feel like Jordan could have been redeemed, if Fitzgerald gave her a chance. Sure, she’s a liar willing to stand off to the side while Tom and Daisy hurt each other, other people, and themselves, but before Nick “throws her over,” Jordan takes steps to distance herself from Tom and Daisy. However, we’ll never know if that was her decision, or if that was a result of Tom and Daisy running away from Myrtle’s murder. Personally, I kinda hope Jordan is still out there lying to the sexist men of the 1920’s.
It is actually really impressive that Fitzgerald, after introducing us to the worst people we’ve ever met, is able to make us (okay, maybe just me? I’m not sure who “we” are) feel bad for Gatsby after his death. Nick does his best to get any of the hundreds of people who would come out to Gatsby’s parties to go to his funeral, and fails. Instead, Gatsby is buried with only his dad (who apparently beat him), Nick (who met him that summer, like three months ago!!) and a guy called “Owl Eyes” (who is a drunk guy that was amazed that Gatsby’s library has real, actual books in his library, rather than fake cardboard covers) as attendants to his funeral. Owl Eyes says it best:
“‘I couldn’t get to the house,’ he remarked.
‘Neither could anybody else.’
‘Go on!’ He started. ‘Why, my God! they used to go there by the hundreds.”
He took off his glasses and wiped them again, outside and in.
‘The poor son-of-a-bitch,’ he said.”
In sum, I enjoyed rereading this book–I really love to hate things sometimes, and this book includes so many characters and situations to hate.
My favorite lines/quotes of the book:
“Almost any exhibition of complete self-sufficiency draws a stunned tribute from me.” Nick, when he meets Jordan for the first time.
“‘In two weeks it’ll be the longest day in the year.’ She looked at us all radiantly. ‘Do you always watch for the longest day of the year and then miss it? I always watch for the longest day of the year and then miss it.’” Daisy. This line is something that has stuck with me since I read the book the very first time–because, yes, I do normally miss the longest day of the year, even after all winter of wishing for more daylight hours. I’ve always wanted to be married, or do something special on the Solstice, so that I always have something to celebrate that day and never miss it.
“‘What’ll we do with ourselves this afternoon?’ cried Daisy. ‘And the day after that, and the next thirty years?’ ‘Don’t be morbid,’ Jordan said. ‘Life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall.’” This is just a lovely line.
“‘I love New York on summer afternoons when everyone’s away. There’s something very sensuous about it–overripe, as if all sorts of funny fruits were going to fall into your hands.” - Jordan.