Significant Gatsby?
So far, what do you find most prevalent and significant about the characters, tone, and atmosphere in The Great Gatsby? In your response, please include one quotation from Chpts. 1-5 that really supports your claims about prevalence and significance. (This blog response must be completed by Wed., March 3rd at 2:30p.m.)
posted by Greg T at Monday, March 01, 2010
20 Comments:
In The Great Gatsby, there are significant inferences to colors which signify attitudes of characters. The narrorator describes Gatsby's house, parties, and person with illusive imagery that exemplify the traits of the matter. For example, when describing Gatsby's house, he describes it as, "... his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings of a champagne and the stars." This imagery indicates the perfect life that literally surrounds Gatsby.
Also, a significant event took place when Nick and Gatsby went to lunch. Beginning the drive, Nick would subtly sneer at Gatsby's approach to proving his legitimacy. Not until Gatsby produced a photograph did the indications hit home for Nick. This event shows the degree at which people are hesitant to trust this mysterious character as well as foreshadows Nick's personality.
i beleive that the improtant ton is the onoe that poeple suffer yet never show it. An exsamlp i find of that is in the first chaper when he gose and sees his cousin. there is the allutoin that daisy and tom would ahve the perfect life and wouldbe the idea of a family yet you learn that things are not going wekk my quoute of this illution would be at the end of the firsat chapter. "They came to the door with me and stood in a chearful square of light." that just gives me the idea of a happy family yet you know tom is cheating and dasiy isnt that happy. Other exsamples are withthe party that people dont wasnt to leave and return to there lifes.
F. Scott Fitzgerald uses color imagery in his novel The Great Gatsby to illuminate his themes, especially character development. A couple examples of the color imagery include green respresenting youth and hope, white meaning innocence, and grey representing the hopelessness of the novel. He uses imagery to engrave permanent images into the readers brain. As the novel progresses the imagery of Gastby's life increases.
I think the most important theme from this book is the idea of wealth and old east coast money. Gatsby tries to use this to impress Daisy and so far he seems pretty successful. He is always showing off his equity when he lights up his entire house and when he cruises the town in his Rolls. Everyone knows the way to impress girls is to have a ridiculous amount of money and if you have the financial backing personality becomes trivial. Daisy has gotten bored with Tom’s money and one of the only people who can compete is Jay. This book exemplifies my American Dream of getting money, getting paid.
One significance in this book is how much they use color imagery to describe the characters and their surroundings. The color imagery adds to the surrealism of this book and where it takes place and what happens in it. One quote that i found that really describes Gatsby when he is not in his comfort zone. "Gatsby, in a white flannel suit, sliver shirt, and gold-colored tie, hurried in. He was pale, and there was dark signs of sleeplessness beneath his eyes." This is the point in the book when Gatsby is meeting with Daisy for the first time in many years. You can tell that he is extremely nervous and outside his comfort zone. This quote describes this state very well. He is wearing a ridicules outfit and looks like he is in a daze. If this book did not have this color imagery it would be hard to imagine what Gatsby would look like at this point in time.
In The Great Gastby the use of color and wealth are significant. Throughout the first five chapters, color is used significantly to show the personalities of the characters. Wealth is also used to show how it can make people act. Gatsby likes to flaunt his success around others from his parties to his house. In chapter 3, the quote "... his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings of a champagne and the stars" shows not only the significance of wealth but also color. This was around the time of one of his grand parties. The color shows the personality of Gatsby.
In The Great Gatsby, I think F. Scott Fitzgerald uses colors to describe the characters and their surroundings. Throughout the book, he uses colors towards to people and describing them and the tone they have. "The sister, Catherine, was a slender, worldly girl of about thirty, with a solid, sticky bob of red hair..."(30). This quote show that this lady could be very vibrant and but also confused and fiery at the same time.”...And now the orchestra is playing yellow cocktail music..."(40) .This quote shows that the music is very mellow and calming, it offers a sense of wanting to be close to one another. It gives a sense of how everyone is different in the World and nothing can be that way we want it to be. There are things that are exotic and things to calm us down. There is always going to be both which is delightful about us.
I think that the most prominent aspect of "The Great Gatsby" so far is the aspect of wealthiness and being civilized (of particularly white people) clearly prevailing over poverty and being uncilivized. Throughout the book, you notice instances where you can clearly see the cultural and social differences between the rich and civilized v. poor and uncivilized. And often times the rich white people feel that they are dominant and deserving of this. "The idea is if we don't look out the white race will be-will be utterly submerged. It's all scientific and stuff; it's been proved" (12-13). This quote exemplifies the feelings of white rich dominance and the clear cultural difference between white rich and poor etc... ""You make me feel uncilivlized, Daisy," I confessed on my second glass of corky but rather impressive claret. "Can't you talk about crops or something?"" (12). This quote shows the clear difference between the wealthy and poor in even a social situation
"I have been drunk just twice in my life, and the second time was that afternoon;..." (29). This quote exemplifies the the relaxed lifestyle these people have. They don't care too much for work of indulging in ultra expensive items. They live for the moment and don't think about tomorrow until tomorrow comes. it's a fairly relaxed novel that presents it in a "drunken" way.
The use of wealth and color in The Great Gatsby is the main thing that helps set the tone of this book. Color is used in this story to correctly display the personalites of each of the characters and wealth is used to show the price and significance of everything in the story. Most people in this book live a very relaxed life style that can be contributed to the ideas of wealth and color that he uses.
In the Great Gatsby what I find most significant is the wonderful life Gatsby is portrayed in with wealth and color. F. Scott Fitzgerald exposes Gatsby’s life as perfect and untainted. Fitzgerald describes Gatsby’s flawless house in a sense of jealousy to everyone else that sees it, when he says “His blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings of champagne and the stars." This also shows that Gatsby is extremely wealthy in which he can spend the money on someone to spend hours upon hours to make his garden as beautiful as can be.
Reading through The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald I have come to the conclusion that most characters throughout this book live relatively leisure lives without many financial problems. However even though the characters such as Gatsby and Tom Buchanan are rich they do not seem to be content with what they have and must strive for more. For instance Gatsby throws ridiculous parties and buys elegant accessories for him and others to improve his image and life style, yet Gatsby’s main goal by doing so was to get Daisy’s attention by all those extremities to get her attention. For instance Nick finds many instances where he thinks Gatsby may be trying to hide facts about his life and he thinks, “He hurried the phrase “educated in Oxford,” or swallowed it, or choked on it, as though it had bothered him before. And with this doubt his whole statement fell to pieces, and I wondered if there wasn’t something a little sinister about him, after all.” Tom also isn’t happy with his choice in women and is having an affair in the city.
In the great Gatsby, reoccurring theme is wealth and achievements, like in the description of the Buchanan house the reds and gelds signify the rich looking house, and pure looking people that live there, also this theme comes up on page 67 when Gatsby talks about his war experience in Montenegro, hunting tigers and the treasure finding he encountered, then having the medals and pictures with him to sustain the truth. This time period I think was very wealth focused and very materialistic, the age of new inventions and when your social status was a very important factor played a huge role, like the people that cam e to the ravishing parties at Gatsby’s all had some kind of wealth to their persona and nick explained in detail all the people who attended on page 63, like American capitalists, the head of the American legion and the men who arrived with numerous mistresses. Then there was nick that wasn’t the wealthiest person, but was drawn to Gatsby by his house and very confident personality.
In "The Great Gatsby" there are 2 significant things. Like the colors. "... His blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings of a champagne and the stars." The colors describe Gatsby and the mood he is in. This was around the time of one of his parties. The other significant is the tone. It is very mysterious. Everyone talks in a suspicious way."You look at him sometimes when he thinks nobody's looking at him. I'll bet he killed a man"(44). This shows one of the mysterious ways of Gastby.
In The Great Gastby the most significant items are wealth and color. In the first five chapters, color is used to show the personalities of each character. Also, wealth is used to show peoples actions. Gatsby likes to show his success around others when he has the opportunity to do so, such as at his parties. This quote from chapter 3 shows how important color and wealth are to the story "his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings of a champagne and the stars." The color shows the personality of Gatsby.
"I have been drunk just twice in my life, and the second time was that afternoon" (29) I think that this quote shows a easy lived lifestyle in The Great Gatsby because it shows that he doesn't do wild parties or just throw his life away. The people in this story just relax and go with the flow of things. They don't themselves get involved in major expensive items that you would normally see rich people do.
The use of colors to describe the surrounding has a large significance in this book. The color imagery adds to the surrealism of this book and where it takes place and what happens in it. One quote that i found that really describes Gatsby when he is not in his comfort zone. "Gatsby, in a white flannel suit, sliver shirt, and gold-colored tie, hurried in. He was pale, and there was dark signs of sleeplessness beneath his eyes." This is the point in the book when Gatsby is meeting with Daisy for the first time in many years. You can tell that he is extremely nervous and outside his comfort zone. This quote describes this state very well. He is wearing a ridicules outfit and looks like he is in a daze. with the addition of color imagery the situations that the characters find themselves in is much more realistic and easier to identify with.
I have fount that the most prevalent aspect of The Great Gatsby so far is how Fitzgerald makes Nick's thought process so real by having him say or think things that are do not necessarily pertain to the story but rather follow his thought process sometimes to seemingly random places. "There was a machine in the kitchen which could extract the juice of two hundred oranges in half an hour if a little button was pushed two hundred times by a butler's thumb" This line could have been left out and Fitzgeralds point and storyline would not be affected one bit. What is important is that by following Nicks thought process, and not leaving things out, we get a more believable character and as a reaction, a more believable story.
The whole novel so far seems like a great big relaxing summer. All the characters seem to care about is their cigarettes their parties and themselves. It's a very selfish novel. However the tone seems to shift slightly whenever Gatsby is in a scene. His struggle to find love seems to always make a new kind feeling arise in the reader. "...men and girls came and went like moths..." this quote seems to exemplify the laziness or non-caring attitude that these characters have. I believe that these characters are simply mourning in their failed attempts at the American dream by living a false dream of delinquency.
I think the idea of morals and all the imagery adds to the whole plot of The Great Gatsby. From the very first chapter we see that Nick is someone that envies Gatsby even though he has all the opposite morals. He is this high class man that is seen as "great". I also think that through the imagery all the tone it set for the characters. For example when Nick and Daisy are on the porch, "For a moment the last sunshinefell with romantic affection upon her glowing face; her voice compelled me forward breathlessly as I listened-then the glow faded, each light deserting her with lingering regret, like children leaving a pleaseant street at dusk." This whole scene just sets the feeling for what the characters are going through. You feel almost as though you know the characters personally and are sitting with them in every situation.
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