Greatness and Vulgarness

Why did you choose this particular book?

When I first come across the title of the book The Great Gatsby, I wondered why the man Gatsby is great and how. The word “great” is always on our lips: we say a man is great, a party is great, a situation is great. It seems that evrything can be great, it is somewhat like an interjection exhaled by us whenever we feel “great”. However, the original meaning of this word is meant to be awesome，majestic, magnificent and momentous. So it really kept me intrigued that why the author use so simple and so complicate a word “great” to discribe the hero in the title.

Title

Abstract：It is a kind of book review of The Great Gatsby , I firstly give a brief introduction to the auther F. Scott Fitzgerald, then concisely represent the plot and the analysis of the main characters in this novel. At last I talk about the greatness and vulgarness represented in this novel and make a study of the reason why Gatsby failed to realize his dream.

Key word: F. Scott Fitzgerald, plot, character analysis, greatness, vulgarness, Gatsby.

Title

1.      Brief Introduction of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald is born in September 24, 1896 Saint Paul, Minnesota, to an upper middle class Irish Catholic family and died of heart attack on December 21, 1940. though an intelligent child, he did poorly in school and was sent to a New Jersey boarding school in 1911. Despite being a mediocre student there, he managed to enroll at Princeton in 1913. when he was at the college, he always have academic problems and never graduated. But in 1917, he was enlisted in the army as World War I neared its end.
  Fitzgerald became a second lieutenant, and was stationed at Camp Sheridan, in Montgomery, Alabama. There he met and fell in love with Zelda Sayre. He wanted to marry her but she hesitated for he is not so rich. Until his work This Side of Paradise was published in 1920 which owned Fitzgerald great fame in literature, and enough money that Zelda finally agreed to marry him.

After marriage, they lead a wild, reckless life-style of parties and decadence.

He amasses a great deal of wealth at throwing parties buy luxuries. As the giddiness of the Roaring Twenties dissolved into the bleakness of the Great Depression, however, Zelda suffered a nervous breakdown and Fitzgerald battled alcoholism, which hampered his writing. He published Tender Is the Night in 1934, and sold short stories to The Saturday Evening Post to support his lavish lifestyle. In 1937, he left for Hollywood to write screenplays, and in 1940, while working on his novel The Love of the Last Tycoon, died of a heart attack at the age of forty-four.

He is a famous American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigm writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself and is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century.

2.     Plot

It is a sad story about the man Gatsby which is narrated in a third person’s view by Nick Carraway. Nick is a young bachelor from a patrician Midwestern family and Daisy is the second cousin of Nick. He rented a small bungalow between two mansions in West Egg, a wealthy community on Long Island Sound. Across the bay was East Egg, inhabited by the "old aristocracy," including Tom and Daisy Buchanan. One day he visited his cousin Daisy and her husband Tom, in their house he also met Jordan Baker, a well-known female golfer. It is she that firstly mentioned Gatsby and told Nick that Tom has a mistress in New York City. This mistress come to the stage in Nick and Tom’s later trip to New York. On the way, they stop at a shabby garage owned by   George Wilson where Nick is introduced to the owner's wife, Myrtle. She is a fat woman and is the evry mistress of Tom.

Jay Gatsby is Nick’s next-door neighbor, who owns that splendid maison and throws big parties almost every night. The parties are really big and wild, a lot of people who even don’t know Gatsby appear in the parties and there are different kinds of rumors pervaded in the crowd. Nick is also curious ablout him. Attending himself at the party after an invitation one weekend, he acquaints  Gatsby a little dramatically.

At first, Nick feels a bit sick about Gatsby, but later, he changes his mind through the things happens following.

The main line of the story firstly come to the scene at the lunch in New York City with Meyer Wolfsheim. When Nick sees Tom and tries to introduce Gatsby he finds that Gatsby has disappeared. His strange look and sudden disappearance buries a hint to the following story.

And later the story or Gatsby’s secret gradually come to the surface. Jordan Baker reveals to Nick that Gatsby had fallen in love with Daisy long ago as an Army Lieutenant stationed near Daisy's hometown, Louisville. After the war, Gatsby came here and bought his mansion near Daisy and Tom, where he hosts parties hoping she will visit. Jordan says Gatsby would like Nick to arrange a meeting with Daisy. Nick agrees and invites Daisy and Gatsby to his house. Thus they renew their relationship

Daisy invites Gatsby and Nick to her mansion, and Tom discovers that relationship between Daisy and Gatsby. When they are leaving, Tom insists changing the cars with Gatsby, as he stops by Wilson's garage for gas he shows off Gatsby's car. And at the hotel Tom put their affair to the air. Gatsby demands Daisy to say that she loves him and never loves Tom; while Daisy hesitated and she says she loves both of them. Tom scornfully tells Gatsby that he will never win. Gatsby retorts that the reason Daisy married Tom was because he (Gatsby) was too poor to marry Daisy. Tom visibly loses composure and reveals that Gatsby is a bootlegger. Gatsby tries to defend himself to Daisy. Tom knows Daisy's materialistic nature and by taking away Gatsby's air of financial security, Daisy is now beyond his reach. With the situation between Tom and Gatsby tense, Daisy runs out of the hotel with Gatsby following her to Gatsby's car, where she insists on driving home as it will calm her nerves. Tom believing he has beaten Gatsby, leaves with Nick and Jordan.

George Wilson, suspicious that his wife is having an affair argues with her. Myrtle runs outside as Gatsby's car coming near and she mistaken Gatsby as Tom, and finally strucked by the car and died. Daisy and Gatsby speed away. Later Tom, Jordan and Nick notice a commotion by Wilson's garage on their way to East Egg and stop. While George mourns, moaning over his wife's body, a bystander tells of having seen a yellow car strike Myrtle. As George takes in this information, Tom tells George the car wasn't his but George doesn't seem to listen and Tom, Jordan and Nick leave.

Later Nick gets the truth of the accident from Gatsby that it is Daisy who was driving when the car struck Myrtle. Next morning Nick finds Gatsby depressed, unsure wether Daisy still loves him and awaits a call from her. Regarding himself as Gatsby’s closest friend, Nick suggests Gastby to leave for some days. But it is obvious that Gatsby will never leave the place where Daisy is there.

On another hand, Wilson finally finds Gatsby’s home. He kills him and then commits suicide.

In Gatsby’s funeral, few people would like to come though Nick has made great efforts. In the end, only Nick, Gatsby's father and the "owl-eyed" man who admired the books in Gatsby's library, appear in Gatsby’s funeral.

Later Nick accidentally come across with Tom, who admits that he revealed to George Wilson that Gastby is the owner of the car, leading the deranged man finally finds Gatsby and kills him.

Digusted with Tom, Daisy and Jordan, Nick returns permenently to the Mid weast, reflecting on Gatsby’s dreams and the sad and cyclical nature of the past.

3.     Character Analysis

Nick Carraway: Nick Carraway is a young bachelor from a patrician Midwestern family After World War I, he returns to the Midwest before settling in New York City to "learn the bond business." As the neighbour of Gatsby, he naturally acquaintes Gatsby and become a close friend of him. He is somewhat a hinge in the relationship of all the characters in the novel as well as the narrator. It is him who promoted the development of the story. He witnesses the affair of Tom and his mistress Myrtle, arranges the meeting of Daisy and Gatsby, partakes their arguments and finally settles Gatsby’s funeral. He is a part of the story as well as a outlooker of the story of Gatsby. From the novel we can see that he is absolutely a moral man. Firstly, he is a common young man who are tolerant, reserve and good-tempered, but gives me an impression of nonchalance. He cares little, when he sees the mistress of Tom, he shows no anger or criticize. But later, as with the develpoment of his relationship with Gastby, I see his change, his gradually being a full character who has a clearcut of what is wright and what is wrong. Through Gatsby’s tragedy, he learns the hypocracy, indifference, decadence, shelfishness of the so-called upper class. Above all, he is a man of great moral. He disgust Tom and Daisy for their selfishness and cowardness, he detest those so-called friends of Gatsby who even dare not attend his funeral. Beliving himself the close friend of Gatsby, he suggests him to leave after the accident, arrange the funeral himself after Gatsby’s death. Without doubt, he is a loyal friend. And through the development of the story, he himself gets matured in his moral sense and deepens his congnition of the world.

Jay Gatsby: Hero of the novel, Gatsby is firstly a poor young man from village and has a hard time in his youth. And we can see that he is abosolutely a intelligent and disciplined man of the disposition of a romantic poet. At the end of the novel, we see a schedule  and general resolvesof Gatsby. Busy engaged in self-improving, he really would be a great man, if he left his dream of Daisy behind and looked forward. As his father says he would help build the country. Come back to the point, as a poor young guy, he serendipitously meets the Captain and later owns a position in the army, while after the captain’s death, he would lose his position whenver possible, while then he fall in love with Daisy, a decent beauty in his mind. While they don’t get married for he is so poor a guy then. He asks her to wait for him and then go to the war. Not resolute enough, Daisy gives up to the reality and marry Tom. Gatsby come back withgreat fortune but only to find his beloved one has alreay been other’s wife. By all manners of means, he meets Daisy again, but died as a price. His life is a tragedy as all his life he lives in his lonely and illusory dream. He unscrupulously gains his wealth trying to win back Daisy’s heart with his material wealth. Inherently he is romantic, when he is poor, his courtship to Daisy is romantic but that does not win him her final chose, later, ironically, he uses the vulgar means( his great wealth and lavish parties) to win Daisy’s love which he thinks is romantic. However, in front of that accident, Daisy gives him up again and chose to run away with Tom to protect herself. and our poor Gatsby is killed innocently. I don’t know what he thinks the moment of his death. But I know at that moment, his dreamsall vanish into the air, his dream of love, his dream of wealth, all those dissolve into ashes and finally evaporates in that money-eyed and hypocritic world. “He didn’t 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.”

Daisy Buchanan: As Gatsby’s love, Nick’s cousin, and Tom’s wife, she however is a shallow flabby and coward woman though attractive and beautiful.  But in my mind, she was not so shallow and vulgar as she is later in the novel. Five years ago, with her attractive figure and charming voice, she wins Gastby’s love, I believe there must be also something beautiful in her inward world. And she really does love Gatsby that time, but she falls into the main stream of the hypocitical world and goes after for material wealth. She finally gives up to the reality and choses to marry Tom, a wealthy but flabby man. she has no reason to reject the courtship in the value of that world. In such a decadent world, she is not resolute enough to stick to her innocent love, she is designed to degenerate, leaving only a beautiful but vacuous body. Five years later, with her illusory image still in Gatsby’s mind, Daisy herself has already become a shallow and selfish woman worships money and status. Under Gatsby’s persue with great fortune, she decides to leave her husband and go away with him, however, when Tom reveals that Gatsby is a bootlegger, she feels Gastby’s wealth and status is not secure, she again sways, what’s more, after the accident, she relentlessly abandon Gastby and run away with Tom and indirectly killed Gastby. But she is even indifferent to his death and not attend his funeral. She is completely degraded, as Gastby once said to Nick: her voice is full of money.

Tom Buchanan: Tom is the husband of Daisy. He is a typcal representative of the upper class of that time: wealthy, arrogant, selfish, flabby and hypocritical. He thinks he loves Daisy, but he has an affair with Myrtle, a fat and frippery woman who is also the wife of George B. Wilson. He wasonce a famous football player but now outdated. When he finds Gastby loves Daisy, his words become acrimonious and his behaviour become stupid. This is not blameful but compared with Gatsby, his flabby origin comes to the scene and then his wealth and high status become a irony for him. After he finds that Gatsby loves Daisy, he insidiously makes an investigtion to Gatsby, and tries to win back Daisy by disclosing his dark business. Later it is he insists swiching the car with Gatsby, which later contributes Myrtle’s mistaking Gatsby with him and finally leads to that accident. It can be said that it is he that directly caused the accident and the tragedy. While in front of deranged George Wilson, he conceals the truth. His selfishness,and cowardness in fully embodied in the development of the story.

Jordan Baker: She is the friend of Daisy, and have an intrest of Nick. In the novel, she also plays a role who reveals the story in anoter person’s view. While she lies a lot and is also every selfish.

George B. Wilson: He is a mechanic and owner of a garage and also the husband of Myrtle. From the story we can see that he is ship before his wife who never say a word aloud to her. But tragically he could not win his wife’s heart. When he finally gets suspicous of his wife and desides to beat her, his wife died in the accident. To unleash his sorrowness to his wife or his anger towards his poor experience, he kills Gastby and commits suicide.

Myrtle Wilson: George Wilson's unstable wife and Tom Buchanan's mistress.she is also a woman worships Tom’s wealth and status.

Klipspringer: a sponger who virtually lives at Gatsby's mansion.

Henry C. Gatz: Gatsby's somewhat estranged father.

4.     comment:

Greatness and Vulgarness

   

“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.”

In the end of this novel, we can see these paragraph narrated by Nick, making us wrenching deep in the heart for Gatsby’s innocent death and for the ruin of his dream. The maximal tragedy is to smash the best things before one’s eyes. Through all the novel, Gatsby’s qualities win the Nick’s friendship and respect as well as our readers’. I’m deeply moved by his selfless sacrifice for Daisy and his obsession with his dream, his green light across the river.

The Great Gatsby, the line to divide great and vulgar is blurred in Gatsby. He has many great qualities which win our hearts but also intrigued in the darkside of the society, his gaining of wealth, his business, all these can not and should not be negleacted.

He is great for his consistence in love. Never does he once abandons his deep love for Daisy. We can learn from the novel that he throws splendid parties with great music and dizzy lights and champagne. Hundreds of people both invited and uninvited come to the party making lots of whisperings. While in such a flashy and noisy background, Gatsby himself “never drinks and stand alone on the marble steps with his tanned skin drawn attractively light on his face anf his short hair looked as though it were trimmed everyday”. The stricking comparison between the decadence and friuppery of the party and the neatness and dignity of Gatsby making his loneliness more impressing. The various people and splendid parties and music and the bouquet of champagne  in his own house never reach to his soul. It seems that he is isolated like a lonely islet surrounded by the roaring sea. However, all these loneliness are all for one girl: Daisy, his dream. Never has he once swings and left the dream behind even to his death though he himself realizes that her voice is full of money. And all his strange behavour can be explained once we relate them to Daisy. He strechs his arms to the darkness facing the river. Since, Daisy lives across the river. He is hugging his Daisy instead of the darkness in his own mind. All his decorations in his house are designed to win Daisy’s favour, when Daisy firstly visits his house, we see how neverous he is. He dismisses his servents to avoid their talking of Daisy which will harm her fame. He would rather to take the accusation after the accident, what he cares is only that whether she is safe and fine. He refuse to leave the house for he is waiting for Daisy’s acception to leave with him, and finally pays his life as the price. All his short life is streched only for his Daisy.

He is great in his manners and his discipline. “He smiled understandingly-much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with quality of eternal assurance in it...it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey.” “ He looks from one group to another with approving eyes.” In the novel it is easy for us to find these kinds of discription of his manner. And at the end of the novel we see a schedule  and general resolvesof Gatsby. All these assure us that he is a gentle man. This quality is also represented in the comparison with Tom and with Daisy. They are careless people and always go away after making a mass and this time they indirectly killed Gatsby.

However, Gatsby’s greatness is set off by the vulgarness of other characters and environment in the novel. In that dark world, the cloud of hypocricy and selfishness and decadence embraces that time, and Gatsby’s appearance likes a dim light, and this is the few light’s extinguishing piles up the desparate atmosphere. In the novel, Daisy, the goddess in Gatsby’s mind, however is such shallow, selfish and money-worshipping woman. Inside her beautiful and charming appearance is her vulgar inner soul. The author arranged this stricking gulf between Gatsby’s dream and the reality, highlighting the sorrowness in readers’ heart. And Tom’s vulgarness also serves as a contrast image to highlight Gatsby’s greatness. Though he is the so-called upper class, we can see his decadent inner qualities: arrogant, selfish, flabby and hypocritical. And Klipspringer, a sponger who virtually lives at Gatsby's mansion, calls back after Gatsby’s death only for his shoes for a picnic. At last, only three person arttend Gatsby’s funeral. Compared with those thronged and noisy parties, his funeral is obviously an irony of the people and of the time.

However, Gatsby is also vulgar. In those five years, how he gained  his wealth and what is his business that own him so large a fortune? Though it is not detailed in the novel, but we still can get a hint from the discriptions of others, from Tom, Meyer Wolfsheim and still some others. It is obvious that his business is not legitimate. And that later become Tom’s stake to win Daisy. He discloses he is a bootlegger and makes Daisy sways. To own the credentials to win Daisy’s love, he devotes himself in gaining posessions insidiously. We readers aways neglect this point for his deep love of Daisy and automatically forgive him.

In the time of vugarness, Gatsby seems doomed to fail. And we can say that in some extent, it is he himself who caused his faliure. Busy engaged in self-improving, he really would be a great man, if he left his dream of Daisy behind and looked forward. As his father says he would help build the country. His stubbornness and unwilling to come to the reality lead him to his final death. He does have a great inner soul, however, misguied by the time and people, he mistakenly believes that money and status will win him his dream and finally falls into vulgarness.

Conclusion: Gatsby is great, however, he lives in a time of vulgarness and among the vulgar people, he is doomed to fail. His death is a condenm of the world of that time and a condemn of the so-called upper class. A lot of themes like the decadence of the upper class and darkside of people are reflected in this book, and the way of plotting the story and the beautiful languange, to dig them out, I should read morecarefully.