Personal Review

Frankly, I was disappointed with The Great Gatsby. I enjoyed the wit and writing style of Fitzgerald immensely, but it was emotionless. It's social commentary from a time I can't imagine; about issues that are unrelatable to me. Gatsby may have once been in love with Daisy, but that love soured over time into a motivation for acquisition. The only character remaining that has any redeemable qualities is Nick Carraway, yet his emotional involvement is limited to a few short paragraphs describing his relationship with Jordan Baker. Looking at the big picture, Gatsby represents the American Dream; he rose from nothing in an attempt to win over Daisy, and died for it. It's possible that I don't have the intelligence or imagination to understand what Fitzgerald was truly trying to say, but the only message I received is that happiness is not acquired through being industrious, or winning the affections of surrounding people; it's much more elusive than that.

Text Connections

The text-to-text connection between The Great Gatsby and West Side Story isn't immediately apparent, but it definitely exists. In both stories there is a rivalry between two factions, the Jets and the Sharks in West Side Story, and East Egg and West Egg in The Great Gatsby. At the end of both novels, the death of a friend makes the main characters realize the ridiculousness of the tension between the two groups. In response to this realization, Nick Carraway leaves for the west while the main characters of the West Side Story reconcile their differences.

A second connection can be found when Fitzgerald first describes Nick meeting Tom Buchanan.

Tom asks Nick if he had “read 'The Rise of the Colored Empires' by this man Goddard?”(12). This is referring to The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy by Stoddard, where Stoddard postulates that the collapse of the white world empire would be due to population growth of non-white races. By Fitzgerald including this text-to-world connection, he paints a clearer image of the personality and hospitality of Tom Buchanan. The former being cruel, and the latter being non-existent.

Syntax

• “But with every word she was drawing further and further into herself, so he gave that up, and only the dead dream fought on as the afternoon slipped away, trying to touch what was no longer tangible, struggling unhappily, undespairingly, toward that lost voice across the room”(134).

The dreams of Gatsby and all that he had worked for died in this moment, where Daisy chooses Tom instead of Gatsby. Fitzgerald uses this long punctuation-less structure as a way to make the sentence feel uncontrolled and frantic. Perfectly modeling the way Gatsby feels; unable to change the past, but wanting to return to it. He can't defend himself to Daisy, because Tom's accusations are true, and in his attempt to convince Daisy that the accusations are false he does the exact opposite.

• “They were gone, without a word, snapped out, made accidental, isolated, like ghosts, even from our pity” (135).

The short choppy phrases increase the effect of the action they describe often making it seem more violent or aggressive. The relationship between Daisy and Gatsby that had waited so long to bloom, now came to a sudden halt and the syntactical style helps emphasize how incredibly sudden it was. It also shows how distant Nick felt from Daisy and Gatsby, accentuating that they became like ghosts to him.

Diction

• While buying a dog for his mistress Myrtle, Tom corrects the salesman,“'It's a bitch,' said Tom decisively. 'Here's your money. Go and buy ten more dogs with it'”(28). Tom is seen as a despicable character and Fitzgerald uses him to satirize the upper class. Through the word “decisively,” Fitzgerald is showing Tom's absolute certainty in himself. Tom commands the dog salesman to “Go and buy ten more dogs with [the money Tom payed him],” almost angry with the salesman for not knowing the sex of the puppy. Using this exchange the author is able to show how ridiculous the upper class behaves, lashing out at an unclarified mistake and being angry when spending such a relatively small sum.
• Speaking about Daisy, Nick remarks “'She's got an indiscreet voice...It's full of--' [Nick] hesitated. 'Her voice is full of money,' [Gatsby] said suddenly”(120). Money represents Daisy's lifestyle: she is sure of herself, and knows that she will always be provided for. She lives in excess and she doesn't care about real world problems. Nick was often lost trying to describe her voice, but Gatsby statement connotes that her only appeal was her wealth. By looking at Daisy's later actions we see that having a “voice full of money” is not good, it leads people to believe they are privileged over others and manipulate them for their advantage.

Rhetorical Strategies

• Allusion: “'Have you read 'The Rise of the Colored Empires' by this man Goddard?'”(12).
• Simile: “In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars”(39).
• Personification: “[F]loating rounds of cocktails permeate the garden outside, until the air is alive with chatter and laughter”(40).
• Paradox: “'And I like large parties. They're so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy'”(49).
• Adage: “'One thing's sure and nothing's surer/ The rich get richer and the poor get—children'”(95).
• Alliteration: “His hand took hold of hers”(96).
• Symbolism: “Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us”(180).

     In The Great Gatsby Fitzgerald makes use of rhetorical devices to emphasize his articulate writing style and Nick Carraway, the narrator's, personality. Symbols are continuously used throughout the story, but none so much as the green light at the end of the Buchanan dock. At first this light represents Gatsby's love for Daisy and his determination to win her affection, but as time goes on it accrues other meanings. It begins to represent the steps he had to take to be in that position, how he earned his wealth and social status. Extending it even farther the green light becomes symbolic for the American Dream; that if one is determined enough one can achieve anything, no matter the likelihood. Of all the objects Fitzgerald could have chosen to represent this array of messages, he chose one of the most simple things, light. This reflects how simple and clear his own writing style is, and is in perfect contrast with the society he is describing. While speaking to Nick at one of Gatsby's parties, Jordan Baker paradoxically states “'And I like large parties. They're so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy'”(49) . Without an explanation, this statement is almost meaningless; it represents the convoluted nature of high society and the backwards thinking of the individuals involved in it. The disparity between Jordan's statement and the surrounding text only helps to further the readers appreciation of and increase the clarity of Fitzgerald's writing, and Nick's thoughts.