The Great Gatsbyby F. Scott Fitzgerald

What do you need to know before you read the novel?

Define the American Dream“Life should be better, richer, fuller for everyone”

• Be successful– Have material wealth; financial security– Work a job you choose…white collar; not blue collar

• Create your own identity; hard work pays off• Be more successful than parents• Freedom• Be well-liked• Conceal weakness• Imagery

– White picket fence– 2.5 children– Dog

Let’s see if we can link: American Dream to P Themes

• Be successful political- success comes at great risk/power struggle a lot of the time– Have material wealth; financial security– Work a job you choose…white collar; not blue collar puritan

because white collar is “better” or “right”

• Create your own identity; hard work pays off puritan• Be more successful than parents political- conflict• Freedom The idea that the American Dream is unique

implies the puritan P Theme..so many people immigrate here

• Be well-liked puritan• Conceal weakness political• Imagery is “perfection" pastoral

– White picket fence– 2.5 children– Dog

Viability of the American Dream• Do all US citizens have equal opportunities or are there still conflicts

concerning the origin or believes of certain groups? • If we say that everyone can become rich if they work hard enough–

does that mean that the poor are only too lazy? • Why does it have to be the American dream? Wouldn’t the same

dream be possible in other countries? • What makes so many people want to live in the United States? • What are the advantages / disadvantages (for the individual and

society) if people only try to pursue their very own dreams? • Why is the word “happy” not included in the tenets of the dream? Is

it just assumed that happiness will occur with the obtaining of the tenets? Is it possible to be UNhappy even with the tenets of the dream?

• Is the American Dream alive and well now or is it just an illusion? In other words, is the American Dream a reality?

• What do musicians say about the Dream? Can you think of any particular songs that comment on it?

The Author known as “Speaker of the Jazz Age”

Time Period

• “Roaring Twenties”- economy roared through the roof..

• New rich vs. old rich• Partying everywhere

(secretly)=speakeasies• Prohibition= legal ban on alcohol• Made gin in their own bathtubs or bought from

organized crime• Jazz Age - glittering lights and unbridled

romance• Setting of novel: Summer 1922

                                   

• The Silent Screen stars included:the chic Rudolph Valentino , sexy  Clara Bow.   Rudy Vallee  sang through his megaphone. 

• The first talking picture, Don Juan, starring John Barrymore premiered on Broadway in 1926.  This made movies big business. 

• The first Oscars were given in 1927.  First Oscar movie was a Paramount Picture, Wings. . Broadway reached an all time peak. Gershwin was hot with  An American in Paris,  Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein created Show Boat starring Helen Morgan. Fred and Adele Astaire opened in Funny Face.  There were 268 plays offered in New York City in the year 1927.  This compared with 50-60 in the 1970s.

• Radio networks began during this decade:  David Sarnoff's NBC and William Paley's CBS both went on the air.  Billboard Magazine published its first charts in 1928.  Bing Crosby and other crooner singing stars aided their sales with their live and recorded radio performances.

FADS & FASHION• Slag terms used for "girls or

women":  a broad, a bunny, a canary (well, one who could sing), a charity girl (one who was sexually promiscuous), a dame, a doll, cat's meow, cat's whiskers

• Coined words and phrases:– 23 skiddoo -- to get going; move along; leave; or scram– The cat's pajamas -- the best; the height of excellence– Gams -- legs– The real McCoy -- sincere; genuine; the real thing– Hotsy-totsy -- perfect– Moll -- a female companion of a gangster– Speakeasy -- a place where alcohol was illegally sold and

drunk during Prohibition– The bee's knees -- excellent; outstanding– Ossified - drunk

• Jazz age jargon included: Joe College - better yet a Joe Yale - or a Joe Zilch , jazzbo, jellybean, blind date, upchuck, jazz babies, pos-a-loot-ly, and the real McCoy.

• Games included mah-jongg, Ouija boards, and crossword puzzles

• Endurance races of all sorts gained popularity and included  Marathons and flagpole sitting

• Dance marathons - began in 1923 and really became the rage.

• Harry Houdini was the great escape of the 1920s.

• American Baseball!  and other sports were very popular.

• Miss America contest began in Atlantic City in 1921. Margaret Gorman (16 years old) was the first winner with measurements of 30-25-32

• Dance crazes included the Charleston,  the Black Bottom, and the Shimmy.

• Dining at Sardi's. • Bible Belt= region on south US where

fundamentalism was dominant

“There's nothing surer; the rich get rich and the poor get poorer." was considered the credo of the Roaring 20’s.

 

                                                                                                                  

• Harlem was hot!– Chicago was hot! 

• The Cotton Club was open to both whites and blacks & packed nightly.  – Jazz was hot!

. . . whether men purchased their suits in the United States, strolled through the shops of London's Savile Row, or had one custom made in a small tailor's shop in Rome (like Al Capone) men's fashion in the 1920's was distinctive yet classic.

Historical and Cultural Events

• Living the 1920’s• First Transatlantic flight: Charles Lindbergh, James Doolittle first

one-day.  – Air flying companies outbid the railroads for transporting the mail  (1926)  – Business travelers took to the skies on scheduled coast to coast flights  

• Prohibition, speakeasies and bootleg alcohol  • Gangland warfare,  Sing Sing, sawed-off shotguns, and Al Capone  • Inventions of the 1920’s• Women vote for the first time in a national election in 1920 • Ku Klux Klan is active in the south and midwest • Admiral Byrd - Flew over the North and South Poles during the 20s  • Stock Market Crashed: October 24, 1929, bank closed - panic on

Wall Street

Setting of the novel Long Island & Manhattan 1922

Source: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Macmillan, 1992.

The “green light” can be seen across the bay at Tom And Daisy Buchanan’s dock (which is in East Egg)

Nick lives in West Egg; So does Gatsby

Nick lives near the train & takes it into work in Manhattan

•  F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic The Great Gatsby is not set in just one location. From Long Island to Chicago to Detroit, pertinent action takes place all over the United States. These locations in the 1920s, however, were nothing like they are in modern times. If one considers the phenomenal technological breakthroughs that have occurred in modern times, one can begin to appreciate how much the following modern cities have changed from the era that the novel takes place

• New York City•

   Years ago, New York City was a small-scale version of the bustling metropolis that it is today. The 1920s was a time of great change and innovation and a town of "roaring music, gaudy entertainment and perpetual prosperity" (Arakian and Smith n.p.).    New York City is composed of five different sub-cities, known as "boroughs." The five boroughs are Brooklyn, Manhattan, the Bronx, Queens and Staten Island. In The Great Gatsby, Nick, Myrtle, and Tom most likely go to Manhattan on their excursion, as Manhattan is the "original New York" (Climo). Manhattan is the home of skyscrapers, subways, Fifth Avenue, Greenwich Village, theaters, museums, and concert halls. Even in the 1920s, buildings as high as 66 stories stretched to the sky. The subway, originating only a decade earlier, was growing and becoming a staple in NYC transportation. Tom would be particularly attracted to Manhattan because of the fashionable Fifth Avenue and trendy Greenwich Village, both appealing to the wealthy in general.    One distasteful aspect of New York City to many of the members of East Egg was the incredible diversity. With a population of over 350,000, those of wealth and the impoverished walked the streets together. Over half of NYC residents were foreign-born or had foreign-born parents. Many immigrants came into the city as soon as they passed through immigration on Ellis Island, located just off the coast of Staten Island. The majority of the population was Roman Catholic, but over 15% was Jewish. Many of the citizens were African American partially due to the fact that Harlem is a division of Manhattan. Racism was at its peak all over the country, but the Harlem Renaissance was earning African Americans some respect in the city.    As it is today, New York City in the 1920s was on the cutting edge. The new electric lights lit up the city, earning Broadway the nickname of "the Great White Way." Broadway shows were also a new development in American culture. By the mid 1920s, over 250 shows were playing as the theater and cinema were becoming more and more prominent in society.    New York City, in Fitzgerald's time, was the Mecca of society. As a Harlem jazz musician put it, "There are a lot of apples dangling from the tree of America, but there's only one Big Apple."

• Long Island•

    Long Island is a suburb of New York City. Bordering Queens and directly across the Long Island Sound from the Bronx, Long Island provided a suburb with easy access to the city while being nestled away in its own quiet corner of the state. Although Queens is technically on the island, what is actually known as "Long Island" begins where Queens ends at the border of Queens and Nassau County.

    The majority of the novel takes place somewhere in the vicinity of Long Island, which is an island off the coast of New York. Divided into the fashionable East Egg and the more common West Egg in the novel, these geographical divisions occur on Long Island today though with different names. West Egg is known now as the Great Neck, and East Egg is commonly known as Manhasset Neck. As far as we can tell, the terms East Egg and West Egg were made up by Fitzgerald and completely fictitious. Jutting into the Long Island sound, the "Eggs" are located on the eastern part of the island.

• NYC/Long Island•     In The Great Gatsby, action is divided between the East and West Egg, but Long Island as a whole is divided into East and West Long

Island. (2 counties are Suffolk and Nassau) West Long Island, where the Eggs are located, is a suburban area while East Long Island is primarily rural.

    Although the average summer temperature in Long Island is only 73 degrees, Long Island is known for its miles of ocean beaches. In the 1920s, prominent members of society began to build mansions and summer homes all over the island. Mansions were particularly common place in the towns of Sand Point, Port Washington, Glen Cove and Mill Neck, all of which neighbor the East and West Eggs. Although portrayed as tasteless and gaudy in the novel, those that lived on the West Egg were still generally well-to-do members of the middle class.

Themes in The Great Gatsby• Identity

– Become other than you are (create a new self)– Broken men– Money=identity– Rumor/reputation– Multiple identities

• The American Dream• Repeating the Past

– Get back to things they way they used to be• Immorality

– Nothing bad will ever happen to me• Spirituality

– Is God dead? Cover art – “Celestial Eyes”• Materialism/Excess

– What is important is related directly to money• Failure

Main Characters

• Narrator: Nick Carraway – Holds himself to high

esteem, but does envy Gatsby

• Protagonist: Jay Gatsby– Rich, majestic– Unclear how he made

his money (1919 World Series)

– Motivated to earn money to impress Daisy (the girl that got away)

• Nick’s cousin: Daisy Buchanan– Material girl

• Antagonist: Tom Buchanan– Comes from money– Yale graduate

Things to look for1. What does it mean to be GREAT? The title has that word in it.2. How does Gatsby represent the American Dream? What does the

novel have to say about the condition of the American dream in the 1920s? In what ways do the themes of dreams, wealth, and time relate to each other in the novel’s exploration of the idea of America?

3. Compare and contrast Gatsby and Tom. How are they alike? How are they different?

4. “Tell me who your friends are and I will tell you who you are.” Look at the alliances…both romantic and plutonic. Who likes whom for what reason?

5. What about the color green? A green light is an important image. Notice it and interpret it.

6. Look out for imagery that might seem religious.7. How is this novel the quintessential “Jazz Age” novel? 5k