Great Gatsby Chapter 1 - introducing Nick and the Buchanans

He comments that he is ‘inclined to reserve all judgements’.  Has he been able to do this in telling the story of the eponymous Gatsby?

• No.  Firstly, he contradicts himself when he has stated and described himself as tolerant and non-judgemental then makes clear ‘snobbishly’ that he views himself as morally privileged – he knows that ‘a sense of fundamental decencies is parcelled out unequally at birth’. More importantly, he goes on to admit that his tolerance ‘has a limit’ and that when he ‘came back from the East last autumn I felt that I wanted the world to be in uniform and at a sort of moral attention for ever’.  It is obvious he has been disgusted, upset, unsettled, horrified by what he has seen.  Fitzgerald gives Nick his mortal and human side here.  His tolerance has a limit, and it is the challenge to this limit that forms the basis of this novel.

What do you think he means when he claims that “Conduct may be founded on the hard rock or the wet marshes”?

• He refers to the manner in which one has been brought up – by what standards and moral code – does it rest on a firm or insecure base – what is your code of morality?

What are his feelings towards Gatsby and why is this unusual?

• “Gatsby, who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn.  If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him…”
• He admires Gatsby greatly despite the fact that he represents everything he detests about New York.  
• He found his personality irresistible, magnificent, larger than life, charismatic.

Setting is highly important in ‘The Great Gatsby’.  The relationship between geography and social values is an important motif in the novel.  How does Nick describe where he lives in New York?

• West Egg – less fashionable (to say the least) – describes Gatsby’s house next door
• East Egg – white palaces – exotic  - more fashionable

• It is important to understand that although both Eggs have beautiful mansions, East Egg is home to “old money”, people whose families have had great wealth for generations.  West Egg, although also home to the rich, was home to “new money”, people whose wealth was recently earned, as well as to working class people such as Nick.  On another level , the delineation between the Eggs can also be a metaphorical representation of the sensibilities of people from the Eastern and Western parts of the United States.

What do we find out about the Buchanans before we meet them?

• Daisy is Nick’s second cousin (once removed)
• He knew Tom in college
• Tom is good at American football and came from a wealthy family
• Nick says he reached his physical peak at 21
• Tom is a spendthrift/overly flamboyant  with money – likes to show off – ostentacious
• They had been in France and ‘drifted’ to New York ‘unrestfully’

What is significant about “two old friends whom I scarcely knew at all”?

• This underlines the nature of the society described in the novel in an ever-present ironic tone – you do not call someone a friend if you do not know them – none of Gatsby’s friends stick with him in the end.

What are your first impressions of Tom Buchanan?

• “hard mouth and a supercilious manner”  - he is arrogant and superior
• “two shining arrogant eyes” – untrusting, suspicious
• “aggressively” – intimidating
• “great pack of muscle shifting” – sheer power, violent tendencies?
• “a cruel body” – capable of great harm
• “impression of fractiousness” – irascible, could easily snap
• “there was a touch of paternal contempt in it” – again authoritative air/scorn for those he regards as inferior
• “there were men…who hated his guts”
• Invokes strong emotion from people

Look at the description of the room in the Buchanan house.  What are your impressions of it? Can you find any strands of imagery running through the description?

• Throughout the novel there are many references to the sea – sea imagery permeates the novel.  
• Everything is moving in the room – “ A breeze blew through the room, blew curtains in at one end and out the other like pale flags, twisting them up towards the frosted wedding-cake of the ceiling and then rippled over the wine-coloured rug, making a shadow on it as wind does on the sea.”
• This imagery is continued with ‘two young women buoyed…anchored…rippling and fluttering…’
• This description really serves to tell us more about the two characters Daisy and Jordan.  These are people who concern themselves with eking out a living – doing as little as humanly possible
• It’s a very superficial setting – just as they are superficial people – it’s a dream-like setting suggesting their inability to deal with reality
• It also relates to the restlessness and drifting mentioned earlier in reference to the Buchanans.  This highlights their lack of purpose and aim – they have no real direction or values in life.
• The women seem light as feathers, no real substance, empty and amoral