The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: A review

The story is well known by all the literate or movie-going world. It's a story told by Nick Carraway, a young man from the Midwest who moves to New York in the early 1920s to seek his fortune in the city selling bonds. He rents a cottage in a (fictional) village called West Egg on Long Island. That cottage just happens to be next door to a gaudy mansion belonging to an entrepreneur named Jay Gatsby. Just across the water in the village of East Egg is another mansion which belongs to fabulously wealthy Tom and Daisy Buchanan. Daisy, serendipitously, turns out to be a cousin of Nick's.

And Daisy is the first love of Jay Gatsby. The time is 1922 and the Great War is over, but five years before and before Gatsby went off to fight in that war, he and Daisy had a passionate affair and were deeply in love and planned to spend their lives together. But once Gatsby went away, they gradually lost touch and Daisy met Tom and married him and they had a daughter together.

Now Gatsby is back and purchased his mansion, where he gives extravagant parties, in the knowledge that Daisy is just across the water. At night he stands on his dock gazing longingly across at the green light that shines all night on the Buchanans' dock.

Gatsby's origins are mysterious as is the source of his wealth, but we gradually learn that he was born and grew up in poverty and that everything he has acquired since has been a scheme to attract the attention of his beloved Daisy.

Tom Buchanan, though extremely wealthy, is an extraordinarily unpleasant man, a bully who is serially unfaithful to his wife and is currently conducting an affair with a working-class woman named Myrtle whose husband owns a garage.

Through Nick's efforts, Gatsby and Daisy reunite, but, ultimately, she is unwilling to leave her life of luxury with Buchanan. Recklessly driving Gatsby's car on the night she makes this known to him, she hits Myrtle who has walked into the road. The woman is killed and Daisy speeds away.

Myrtle's husband believes that Gatsby was driving and goes to Gatsby's house and kills him and then kills himself. Daisy and Tom are free to continue their lives of decadence and excess.

The end.

I first read this book many years ago - I can't remember exactly when - and was underwhelmed by it. I couldn't really see what all the fuss was about. Reading it now, all these years later, my reaction is a bit different and the book has risen in my assessment.

The novel seems a very focused and deliberate piece of writing and there are themes and symbols there that I simply don't remember noticing when I first read the book. For example, there is Tom Buchanan's casual racism and misogyny and his proto-fascism.

In the first chapter of the book, when Nick first meets Tom, there is this conversation:

"Civilization's going to pieces," broke out Tom violently. "I've gotten to be a terrible pessimist about things. Have you read 'The Rise of the Coloured Empires' by this man Goddard?"

"Why, no," I answered, rather surprised by his tone.

"Well, it's a fine book, and everybody ought to read it. The idea is if we don't look out the white race will be - will be utterly submerged. It's all scientific stuff; it's been proved."

I can't remember that that made much of an impression on me at all with my first reading and yet now it stands out like a flashing neon light on the page. This is representative of Tom's opinions as expressed throughout the book. What an awful man he is!

In fact, there are really no likable characters in this short book. Nick Carraway comes closest, but even he is not someone that one would choose as a friend. The writing is polished like a crystal; the language is rich but the characters are cold and distant. By design, I think.

The edition of the book that I read this time had a foreword by Fitzgerald's granddaughter, Eleanor Lanahan, which gave some familial context to the writing of the book. But, best of all, it had an introduction written by Jesmyn Ward, who is quickly becoming one of my favorite writers. Her introduction helped me to see things that I had not seen before and to understand the book in a new way. Her introduction was my favorite part of this reading experience.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Poetry Sunday: Don't Hesitate by Mary Oliver

How about we share another Mary Oliver poem? After all, you can never have too many of those. In this one, the poet seems to acknowledge that it is often hard to simply live in and enjoy the moment, perhaps because we are afraid it can't last. She urges us to give in to that moment and fully experience the joy. Although "much can never be redeemed, still, life has some possibility left." Don't Hesitate by Mary Oliver If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happens better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is no...

Poetry Sunday: Blackberry-Picking by Seamus Heaney

My mother was a farm wife and a prodigious canner. She canned fruit and vegetables from the garden, even occasionally meat. But the best thing that she canned, in my opinion, was blackberry jam. Even as I type those words my mouth waters! Of course, before she could make that jam, somebody had to pick the blackberries. And that somebody was quite often named Dorothy. I think Seamus Heaney might have spent some time among the briars plucking those delicious black fruits as well, so he would have known that "Once off the bush the fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour." They don't keep; you have to get that jam made in a hurry! Blackberry-Picking by Seamus Heaney Late August, given heavy rain and sun For a full week, the blackberries would ripen. At first, just one, a glossy purple clot Among others, red, green, hard as a knot. You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust ...

Poetry Sunday: Hymn for the Hurting by Amanda Gorman

You probably remember poet Amanda Gorman from her appearance at the inauguration of President Biden. She read her poem "The Hill We Climb" on that occasion. After the senseless slaughter in Uvalde this week, she was inspired to write another poem which was published in The New York Times. It seemed perfect for the occasion and so I stole it in order to feature it here, just in case you didn't get a chance to read it in the Times . Hymn for the Hurting by Amanda Gorman Everything hurts, Our hearts shadowed and strange, Minds made muddied and mute. We carry tragedy, terrifying and true. And yet none of it is new; We knew it as home, As horror, As heritage. Even our children Cannot be children, Cannot be. Everything hurts. It’s a hard time to be alive, And even harder to stay that way. We’re burdened to live out these days, While at the same time, blessed to outlive them. This alarm is how we know We must be altered — That we must differ or die, That we must triumph or try. ...

The Nature of Things

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