Today we are going to finish vocabulary (so we can play vocab charades tomorrow), look at Langston Hughes and begin the "Hills Like White Elephants" project many of you wanted to do.
Learning Goal: Analyze a case in which grasping a point of view
requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is
really meant.
What we'l do today. Look at the dialogue of "Hills Like White
Elephants" and determine the tone and subtext of the conversation
between the man and woman. You will write out this script with a
partner. Note - you will eventually perform this script so try so think
about your interpretation and how it backs up your ideas about the
story, about the relationship, and about the choices this man and woman
make.
If you're having trouble with subtext go here
Your script should look something like this:
Girl: What should we drink?
(emotion/tone):
(subtext):
Man: It’s pretty hot.
(emotion/tone):
(subtext):
Girl: Let’s drink beer.
(emotion/tone):
(subtext):
Man: Dos cervezas (to waitress behind curtain).
(emotion/tone):
(subtext):
Wednesday 30 March 2016
Tuesday 29 March 2016
Hills Like White Elephants
Learning Goal: Analyze the impact of the author's choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story.
What we'll do: Read "Hills Like White Elephants" and discuss characters, setting, point of view and imagery. Sample questions: How is the story being told? Why? Is there anything confusing about how it is presented? What is going on with the characters? Who are they? Where are they going? What is the conflict between them? What is the setting? Does the setting represent anything?
After reading: Students will draw the setting, take a photo of it and post it to their blogs, and then reflect in a brief paragraph their thoughts about the characters. How do you feel about this man and woman? How do you feel about the situation they are involved in?
Background info:
Bio of author: Ernest Hemingway (go here)
or watch the following
For audio of "Hills Like White Elephants" go here
What we'll do: Read "Hills Like White Elephants" and discuss characters, setting, point of view and imagery. Sample questions: How is the story being told? Why? Is there anything confusing about how it is presented? What is going on with the characters? Who are they? Where are they going? What is the conflict between them? What is the setting? Does the setting represent anything?
After reading: Students will draw the setting, take a photo of it and post it to their blogs, and then reflect in a brief paragraph their thoughts about the characters. How do you feel about this man and woman? How do you feel about the situation they are involved in?
Background info:
Bio of author: Ernest Hemingway (go here)
or watch the following
For audio of "Hills Like White Elephants" go here
Monday 28 March 2016
Home Burial
Today, we are going to read Robert Frost's "Home Burial" and discuss how it fits the Modern Period. This is probably Robert Frost's most disturbing poem and taken with T.S. Eliot's "Prufrock" one of the best that we will read.
Before we begin let's talk a little about who is Robert Frost and what makes a poem? What do you know about Robert Frost?
Here's a link to a reading of the poem - in case you need to listen to it again: Home Burial
Go HERE for the POEM
Questions from Shmoop!
Before we begin let's talk a little about who is Robert Frost and what makes a poem? What do you know about Robert Frost?
Here's a link to a reading of the poem - in case you need to listen to it again: Home Burial
Go HERE for the POEM
Questions from Shmoop!
- What do you think happens to the couple after the end of the poem, and why?
- Which character in this poem do you identify with more, and why?
- Do you agree with what the woman says in lines 101-109, that no matter what people pretend, everyone dies alone? Why, or why not?
- Which character do you think has the most power in this relationship? Does the power shift as the poem progresses? How so?
- Do you agree or disagree with the woman's disgust at the man's manner of digging their son's grave (lines 75-92)? What's your reasoning?
- What's the effect of having most of the poem in dialogue? Would you have rather come at it from the wife's perspective? Or the husband's?
Thursday 17 March 2016
Poetry
Today - we are going to talk about "A Changing Awareness" - what you read last night.
Then we are going to read Imagist poetry - Pound and H.D. - and the poets Marianne Moore and e. e. cummings.
Homework - choose one poet and write how their work fits into the Modernism movement.
Then we are going to read Imagist poetry - Pound and H.D. - and the poets Marianne Moore and e. e. cummings.
Homework - choose one poet and write how their work fits into the Modernism movement.
Wednesday 16 March 2016
T.S. Eliot
We are going to look at T.S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" today (page 968) and then do study questions on page 974 (#1-3, #5, #8).
Homework: read pages 864-873. Be prepared for a quiz on these pages.
First today, let's look at page 957.
Homework: read pages 864-873. Be prepared for a quiz on these pages.
First today, let's look at page 957.
Monday 14 March 2016
Things to Know
The Great Gatsby
Things to KNOW
1)
List four sub-plots and be able to outline them
according to the six elements
2)
Outline the main plot
3)
List all the rumors
4)
MOTIFS – explain the following and how it works
in the overall meaning of the text: TIME, Car Crashes, Weather
5)
SYMBOLS- explain the following and how they work
in the overall meaning of the novel: Eyes of Eckleburg, Green Light, Settings,
Biloxi, Daisy’s voice, songs
6)
Characters: Nick, Jordan, Tom, Daisy, Gatsby,
Klipspringer, Wilson, Owl Eyes, Myrtle, Mr. and Mrs. Sloan, Mr. Gatz, Dan Cody,
Mr. and Mrs. McKee
7)
Quotes
8)
List all the dreams/illusions of the characters
in Gatsby
9)
Allusions – KNOW AT LEAST FIVE ALLUSIONS and be
able to discuss their importance
10)
Classes – discuss the different classes and there
representatives in Gatsby
11)
THEMES: The Death of the American Dream; The
Roaring Twenties; Time – The Meaning of Time; Social Classes and Social
Structure in America
12)
Meaning
of characters names.
1)
List three symbols from the novel and briefly in
a few sentences discuss what they mean in relation to one of the major themes.
2)
Who is the dynamic character and how does he
change?
3)
List for settings in the novel (be exact) and
discuss the purpose of each setting.
4)
Exactly when does the novel begin and when does
it end?
5)
List the importance of the following
characters. Why are they important to
the novel?
DAISY:
GEORGE WILSON:
TOM:
MYRTLE:
OWL EYES:
JORDAN:
6)
Outline the main plot (give at least 3 events in
the rising action)
7)
What are some ways (at least five) that Jay Gatz
reinvented himself as Jay Gatsby?
8)
List and discuss one major theme from the novel
and give examples of scenes that reinforce the idea.
9)
Who is the protagonist of the novel? And make an argument using examples to back
this idea up.
FOR THE FOLLOWING QUOTATIONS NAME
THE SPEAKER:
10)
“Nowadays people begin by sneering at family
life and family institutions and next they’ll throw everything overboard and
have intermarriage between black and white”
_____________________
11)
If it wasn’t for the mist we could see your home
across the bay. You always have a green
light that burns all night at the end of the dock.”
______________________
12)
“It’s really his wife that’s keeping them
apart. She’s a catholic and they don’t
believe in divorce.”
______________________
13)
“Let us learn to show our friendship for a man
when he is alive and not after he is dead.”
______________________
14)
“What’ll we plan? What do people plan?”
______________________
15)
“I’ve been drunk for about a week now, and I
thought it might sober me up to sit in a library.”
_______________________
16)
“You said a bad driver was only safe until she
met another bad driver? Well, I met
another bad driver didn’t I?”
______________________
Friday 11 March 2016
Vocabulary and Crash Course
1)
Wan
2)
Prodigality
3)
Feigned
4)
Languidly
5)
Colossal
6)
Complacency
7)
Levity
8)
Extemporizing
9)
Supercilious
10)
Infinitesimal
11)
Fractiousness
12) Incredulously
13) Contemptuously
14) Incurably
15) Cardinal
16) Pasquinade
16) Pasquinade
Thursday 10 March 2016
Chapter 7
Today we will take a quiz on chapter 7.
And then discuss chapter 7 and the where you think the book is going.
And then discuss chapter 7 and the where you think the book is going.
Wednesday 9 March 2016
The American Dream
Today we are going to go over your dialectical journals, and then read chapter 7.
Here is the reading schedule for the rest of the week:
Wednesday - chapter 7
Thursday - chapter 8
Friday - chapter 9
Note, we also have some vocabulary words we should start looking at
Here is the reading schedule for the rest of the week:
Wednesday - chapter 7
Thursday - chapter 8
Friday - chapter 9
Note, we also have some vocabulary words we should start looking at
1)
Wan
2)
Prodigality
3)
Feigned
4)
Languidly
5)
Colossal
6)
Complacency
7)
Levity
8)
Extemporizing
9)
Supercilious
10)
Infinitesimal
11)
Fractiousness
The Themes:
1.This novel is filled with multiple themes but the predominate one focuses on the death of the American Dream. This can be explained by how Gatsby came to get his fortune. Through his dealings with organized crime he didn't adhere to the American Dream guidelines. Nick also suggests this with the manner in which he talks about all the rich characters in the story. The immoral people have all the money. Of course looking over all this like the eyes of God are those of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg on the billboard.
1.This novel is filled with multiple themes but the predominate one focuses on the death of the American Dream. This can be explained by how Gatsby came to get his fortune. Through his dealings with organized crime he didn't adhere to the American Dream guidelines. Nick also suggests this with the manner in which he talks about all the rich characters in the story. The immoral people have all the money. Of course looking over all this like the eyes of God are those of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg on the billboard.
2.The second theme that needs to be
acknowledged is the thought of repeating the past. Gatsby's whole being
since going off to war is devoted to getting back together with Daisy
and have things be the way they were before he left. That's why Gatsby
got a house like the one Daisy used to live in right across the bay from
where she lives. He expresses this desire by reaching towards the green
light on her porch early in the book. The last paragraph, So we beat
on, boats against the current, born back ceaselessly into the past
reinforces this theme.
3.Fitzgerald was in his twenty's when he wrote
this novel and since he went to Princeton he was considered a spokesman
for his generation. He wrote about the third theme which is the
immorality that was besieging the 1920's. Organized crime ran rampant,
people were partying all the time, and affairs were common play. The
last of which Fitzgerald portrays well in this novel.
4.The eyes of
T. J. Eckleburg convey a fourth theme in this novel. George Wilson
compares them to the eyes of God looking over the valley of Ashes. The
unmoving eyes on the billboard look down on the Valley of Ashes and see
all the immorality and garbage of the times. By the end of the novel you
will realize that this symbolizes that God is dead.
Tuesday 8 March 2016
Chapter 6 Notes
Chapter 6 starts with the back story of Gatsby. Gatsby invented himself. He was James Gatz of North Dakota. He went to St. Olaf College in Minnesota and dropped out after a week. He met Dan Cody, became Cody's steward, mate, skipper, secretary, and jailor. Gatsby doesn't drink because of Cody; Gatsby learns about women through Cody; Gatsby travels around the continent three times with Cody. Cody is Gatsby's university.
Mr. and Mrs. Sloane along with Tom stop by Gatsby's for a drink. They are "old" money and have been out horseback riding.
Gatsby tells Tom, "I know your wife." This concerns Tom. He says, "I may be old-fashioned in my ideas, but women run around too much these days to suit me." Ha ha.
Mrs. Sloane invites Gatsby to dinner but leaves before Gatsby is ready to go. It's an empty invitation.
Tom brings Daisy to Gatsby's next party. Gatsby - in a little joke - introduces Tom as "the polo player".. Daisy gives Tom a gold pencil and tells him "if you want to take any addresses here's my little gold pencil". Daisy tells Nick that the girl Tom is interested in is "common but pretty".
Daisy voice: "When the melody rose, her voice broke up sweetly, following it, in a way contralto voices have, and each change tipped out a little of her warm human magic upon the air."
Daisy doesn't like West Egg. She doesn't like Gatsby's parties because they are chaotic, loud, full of drunks and there are lots of people who come who haven't been invited. There is no safety here. It doesn't match Daisy "white girlhood" as a Southern Belle from Kentucky.
Tom - "I'd like to know who he is and what he does. And I think I'll make a point of finding out."
Daisy - "I can tell you right now. He owned some drug-stores, a lot of drug-stores. He built them up himself."
(Ah - Tom is offended by Gatsby, and Gatsby has told Daisy some half-truth).
Gatsby wants "nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: 'I never loved you.'" Then he could truly repeat the past.
The last page of chapter six - is the true meaning of the green light (and Daisy is the green light in some ways): there's a flash back to 1917 (the fall equinox) and this poetic scene of Gatsby first kiss with Daisy. Until he kisses her everything is possible - "he could suck on the pap of life, gulp down the incomparable milk of wonder" - and yet "when kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God." Until Gatsby gives Daisy that first kiss his world is open and boundless. When he kissed her - she the siren - his life dream is Daisy. She is the only "green light" that remains for him.
"Three O'Clock in the Morning" plays as the party is breaking up. Here is another reference to time.
Mr. and Mrs. Sloane along with Tom stop by Gatsby's for a drink. They are "old" money and have been out horseback riding.
Gatsby tells Tom, "I know your wife." This concerns Tom. He says, "I may be old-fashioned in my ideas, but women run around too much these days to suit me." Ha ha.
Mrs. Sloane invites Gatsby to dinner but leaves before Gatsby is ready to go. It's an empty invitation.
Tom brings Daisy to Gatsby's next party. Gatsby - in a little joke - introduces Tom as "the polo player".. Daisy gives Tom a gold pencil and tells him "if you want to take any addresses here's my little gold pencil". Daisy tells Nick that the girl Tom is interested in is "common but pretty".
Daisy voice: "When the melody rose, her voice broke up sweetly, following it, in a way contralto voices have, and each change tipped out a little of her warm human magic upon the air."
Daisy doesn't like West Egg. She doesn't like Gatsby's parties because they are chaotic, loud, full of drunks and there are lots of people who come who haven't been invited. There is no safety here. It doesn't match Daisy "white girlhood" as a Southern Belle from Kentucky.
Tom - "I'd like to know who he is and what he does. And I think I'll make a point of finding out."
Daisy - "I can tell you right now. He owned some drug-stores, a lot of drug-stores. He built them up himself."
(Ah - Tom is offended by Gatsby, and Gatsby has told Daisy some half-truth).
Gatsby wants "nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: 'I never loved you.'" Then he could truly repeat the past.
The last page of chapter six - is the true meaning of the green light (and Daisy is the green light in some ways): there's a flash back to 1917 (the fall equinox) and this poetic scene of Gatsby first kiss with Daisy. Until he kisses her everything is possible - "he could suck on the pap of life, gulp down the incomparable milk of wonder" - and yet "when kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God." Until Gatsby gives Daisy that first kiss his world is open and boundless. When he kissed her - she the siren - his life dream is Daisy. She is the only "green light" that remains for him.
"Three O'Clock in the Morning" plays as the party is breaking up. Here is another reference to time.
Monday 7 March 2016
#5
Chapter 5 notes
“Two o’clock and the whole corner of the peninsula was
blazing with light, which fell unreal on the shrubbery and made thin elongating
glints upon the roadside wires. Turning
a corner, I saw that it was Gatsby’s house, lit from tower to cellar.”
Light = Gatsby (or Gatsby’s dream?)
Nick says that Gatsby’s place looks like the World’s Fair
(why World’s Fair – there is a connection to amusement parks, as in people’s
behavior at Gatsby’s parties, but also some more refined here)
Nick tells Gatsby that he going to have Daisy over.
When Daisy shows up Gatsby is really nervous.
“For half a minute there wasn’t a sound. Then from the living-room I heard a sort of
choking murmur and part of a laugh, followed by Daisy’s voice on a clear artificial
note:” …. (like a clock ticking – time has started again)
“I certainly am awfully glad to see you again.” She says.
Gatsby’s head knocks a defunct mantelpiece clock over and he
catches. Ah, he has caught time? The clock is a symbol. Something is starting again.
“We haven’t met for many years” said Daisy.
“Five years next November.”
- Gatsby has the exact date. Tick
tick.
Nick leaves and goes outside to give them privacy. When he returns Daisy is crying (joyfully)
and Gatsby glows.
“It’s stopped raining” Daisy says (symbolism)
There were twinkle-bells of sunshine (time) in the room
“He had been full of the idea so long, dreamed it right
through to the end, waited with his teeth set, so to speak, at an inconceivable
pitch of intensity. Now in the reaction,
he was running down like an overwound clock.”
(clock and time reference – symbolism)
Daisy cries over Gatsby’s shirts. The shirts represent something. She really isn’t just crying over his shirts.
“Possibly it had occurred to him that the colossal
significance of that light had now vanished forever. Compared to the great distance that had
separated him from Daisy it had seemed very near to her, almost touching her. It had seemed as close as a star to the
moon. Now it was again a green light on
a dock. His count of enchanted objects
was diminished by one.”
Dreams are such wonderful things while they are dreams, but
once they become real the weight of the world can dull them.
The chapter ends with Daisy’s voice: “I think that voice
held him most, with it fluctuating, feverish warmth, because it couldn’t be
over-dreamed—that voice was a deathless song.”
Daisy is a siren.
Friday 4 March 2016
chapter 4 notes
Rumor #4 - "He's bootlegger"
Rumor #5 - "One time he killed a man who had found out that he was nephew to Von Hindenburg and second cousin to the devil."
Nick has a timetable effective July 5th 1922. It is an old timetable now, but on it he had written all the names of people that came to Gatsby's parties. Within the list are tales of drunks (and fights), names of history (Stonewall Jackson Abrams, Mrs. Ulysses Swett), and people from the movies. Mrs. Ulysses S. Swett's automoblie runs over Ripley Snells hand (another automobile accident).
There is also Klipspringer. Known as "the boarder" because he is at Gatsby's house so often.
One morning in late July, Gatsby comes to ask Nick to lunch. There's a big description of Gatsby's car: "a rich cream color, bright with nickel, swollen here and there in its monstrous length with triumphant hat-boxes...terraced with a labyrinth of wind-shields that mirrored a dozen suns." (this is important)
On the way to town, Gatsby tells Nick his back story: 1) Gatsby went to Oxford. "It's a family tradition." 2) His family is from the mid-West and all died. 3) He lived in all the capitals of Europe as a young man. 4) He was a 1st lieutenant in the war and in the Argonne Forest took "two machine-gun detachments so far forward that there was a half-mile gap on either side of us..." He became a war hero and won a medal from Montenegro. (Question: how much of this is truth?)
On the way to town, the police stop him and Gatsby waves a Christmas card from the Police Commissioner. The cop apologizes and Gatsby continues.
At lunch Nick meets Mr. Wolfsheim. Mr. Wolfsheim relates the murder at the old Metropole (allusion) and talks about how he made Gatsby (that is after Gatsby takes a phone call). Wolfsheim has cuff buttons made from human molars. After Wolfsheim leaves, Gatsby explains to Nick that Wolfsheim is a gambler, the man who fixed the 1919 World Series (allusion to Arnold Rothstein).
Gatsby wants Nick to talk to Jordan about something he'd like Nick to do for him.
Later, Jordan tells Nick the back story of Gatsby and Daisy. We learn that Daisy's maiden name is Fay. (Fay is a fairy. Think of Daisy's voice. It can also be the female version of faith. Gatsby faith in his dream. Both work here).
Daisy, like a lot of young girls, entertain men heading off for war. She meets Gatsby who is nearby at Camp Taylor and the two fall for each other. She's even found to be "packing her bag...to go to New York to say good-by to a soldier who was going overseas" (Gatsby). After the Armistice, she had her debut (or coming out party - a Southern tradition) and was soon engaged to Tom Buchanan of Chicago. Tom gave Daisy a string of pearls valued at $350,000 (in 1919). Compare this necklace to the dog collar of Myrtle. Similar thing going on, but one is worth more.
She received a letter from Gatsby the night of the marriage and gets "drunk as a monkey". She tells Jordan to take the necklace "down-stairs and give 'em back to whoever they belong to. Tell 'em Daisy's change her mind."
Daisy gets married the next day to Tom anyway.
For a while everything is fine, until in Santa Barbara "Tom ran into a wagon on the Ventura road one night, and ripped a front wheel off his car. The girl who was with him got into the papers, too, because her arm was broken - she was one of the chambermaids in the Santa Barbara Hotel." (Two things here 1) This is one of Tom's other affairs; and 2) Another car wreck).
After this wreck, Daisy has her daughter.
Gatsby, after he returned from the War, searched for Daisy until he brought "that house so that Daisy would be just across the bay." He threw parties in hope that Daisy would come to one, and then began asking around if anyone knew Daisy. Ironically Jordan is the first person that knew anything about Daisy. Gatsby would like Nick (this is the favor) to ask Daisy to his small house for tea so that Gatsby can later so off his "big mansion".
Nick states, Gatsby "came alive to me, delivered suddenly from the womb of his purposeless splendor". Ah - womb = eggs = dreams. Purposeless splendor is an oxymoron. Gatsby does have purpose: a single force driving purpose, Daisy.
Jordan tells Nick that Daisy "should have something in her life."
And Nick ends the chapter by kissing Jordan.
Rumor #5 - "One time he killed a man who had found out that he was nephew to Von Hindenburg and second cousin to the devil."
Nick has a timetable effective July 5th 1922. It is an old timetable now, but on it he had written all the names of people that came to Gatsby's parties. Within the list are tales of drunks (and fights), names of history (Stonewall Jackson Abrams, Mrs. Ulysses Swett), and people from the movies. Mrs. Ulysses S. Swett's automoblie runs over Ripley Snells hand (another automobile accident).
There is also Klipspringer. Known as "the boarder" because he is at Gatsby's house so often.
One morning in late July, Gatsby comes to ask Nick to lunch. There's a big description of Gatsby's car: "a rich cream color, bright with nickel, swollen here and there in its monstrous length with triumphant hat-boxes...terraced with a labyrinth of wind-shields that mirrored a dozen suns." (this is important)
On the way to town, Gatsby tells Nick his back story: 1) Gatsby went to Oxford. "It's a family tradition." 2) His family is from the mid-West and all died. 3) He lived in all the capitals of Europe as a young man. 4) He was a 1st lieutenant in the war and in the Argonne Forest took "two machine-gun detachments so far forward that there was a half-mile gap on either side of us..." He became a war hero and won a medal from Montenegro. (Question: how much of this is truth?)
On the way to town, the police stop him and Gatsby waves a Christmas card from the Police Commissioner. The cop apologizes and Gatsby continues.
At lunch Nick meets Mr. Wolfsheim. Mr. Wolfsheim relates the murder at the old Metropole (allusion) and talks about how he made Gatsby (that is after Gatsby takes a phone call). Wolfsheim has cuff buttons made from human molars. After Wolfsheim leaves, Gatsby explains to Nick that Wolfsheim is a gambler, the man who fixed the 1919 World Series (allusion to Arnold Rothstein).
Gatsby wants Nick to talk to Jordan about something he'd like Nick to do for him.
Later, Jordan tells Nick the back story of Gatsby and Daisy. We learn that Daisy's maiden name is Fay. (Fay is a fairy. Think of Daisy's voice. It can also be the female version of faith. Gatsby faith in his dream. Both work here).
Daisy, like a lot of young girls, entertain men heading off for war. She meets Gatsby who is nearby at Camp Taylor and the two fall for each other. She's even found to be "packing her bag...to go to New York to say good-by to a soldier who was going overseas" (Gatsby). After the Armistice, she had her debut (or coming out party - a Southern tradition) and was soon engaged to Tom Buchanan of Chicago. Tom gave Daisy a string of pearls valued at $350,000 (in 1919). Compare this necklace to the dog collar of Myrtle. Similar thing going on, but one is worth more.
She received a letter from Gatsby the night of the marriage and gets "drunk as a monkey". She tells Jordan to take the necklace "down-stairs and give 'em back to whoever they belong to. Tell 'em Daisy's change her mind."
Daisy gets married the next day to Tom anyway.
For a while everything is fine, until in Santa Barbara "Tom ran into a wagon on the Ventura road one night, and ripped a front wheel off his car. The girl who was with him got into the papers, too, because her arm was broken - she was one of the chambermaids in the Santa Barbara Hotel." (Two things here 1) This is one of Tom's other affairs; and 2) Another car wreck).
After this wreck, Daisy has her daughter.
Gatsby, after he returned from the War, searched for Daisy until he brought "that house so that Daisy would be just across the bay." He threw parties in hope that Daisy would come to one, and then began asking around if anyone knew Daisy. Ironically Jordan is the first person that knew anything about Daisy. Gatsby would like Nick (this is the favor) to ask Daisy to his small house for tea so that Gatsby can later so off his "big mansion".
Nick states, Gatsby "came alive to me, delivered suddenly from the womb of his purposeless splendor". Ah - womb = eggs = dreams. Purposeless splendor is an oxymoron. Gatsby does have purpose: a single force driving purpose, Daisy.
Jordan tells Nick that Daisy "should have something in her life."
And Nick ends the chapter by kissing Jordan.
Thursday 3 March 2016
Notes from Chapter 3
Gatsby's Party
Nick Carraway is invited to his party, but he claims to be one of the few. People at Gatsby's party's at "according to the rules of behavior associated with amusement parks." A chauffeur in a "uniform of robin's egg blue" (is this important?) brings Nick the invitation.
Gilda Gray - Follies (allusion -Ziegfield Follies). Lots of mentions of automobiles in this chapter.
Nick quickly runs into Jordan Baker at the party. Jordan is with a younger man who is still in college (there is a reason for this - he is "a persistent undergraduate given to violent innuendo"). Nick and Jordan sit with a few girls who share some gossip:
1) One rip her dress at a former party and Gatsby sent her a new one worth $265 - because "He doesn't want any trouble with anybody"
2) Rumor #2 - Gatsby had "killed a man once." Gatsby's name = BY GATs
3) "He was a German spy during the war". Rumor #3
The three girls are all with girls named "Mr. Mumbles" (this is a joke).
Jordan and Nick go to Gatsby's library where they meet OWL EYES (think of the name). Owl Eyes tells them that Gatsby's library is full of real books, but the pages are uncut.
Owl Eyes is in the library because he's "been drunk for about a week" and he "thought it might sober" him up "to sit in the library." Mrs. Claud Roosevelt brought him. Allusion.
Nick later accidentally meets Gatsby. Gatsby recognizes him from the war and uses the phrase "Old Sport" a lot.
Gatsby's smile "was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance". The butler comes and tells Gatsby that Chicago is on the line.
Jordan than tells Nick - Rumor #4 - that Gatsby claims to be an Oxford man. She doesn't believe him.
Mr. Tostoff's "Jazz History of the World" plays out in the Gardens (allusion - think Jazz Age and famous musicians).
There are a bunch of "drunken" fights as husbands tried to get there wives to leave. Nick then witnesses a car crash with someone so drunk that they don't even know that they crashed and the wheel of the car is no longer connected. (1st mention of car crashes)
Nick and Jordan after a while begin dating. He says, "I felt a sort of tender curiosity." At a house-party in Warwick, Nick reports, Jordan borrowed a car and left it in the rain with its top down and then lied about it (not a car wreck - but close and due to someone being careless. This is also Jordan's 1st "lie" that the reader becomes aware of). Nick quickly remembers what "eluded me that night at Daisy's. At her first big golf tournament there was a row that nearly reached the newspapers --a suggestion that she had moved her ball from a bad lie in the semi-final round." The caddy withdrew his statements and it was dropped, but there it was. According to Nick, "Jordan instinctively avoided clever, shrewd men" (ah - so back to the undergrad). "She was incurable dishonest...and wasn't able to endure being at a disadvantage."
Then - Jordan drove so close to a workman that the fender flicked a button on the man's coat. Nick tells her that she is a rotten driver and should be more careful. Jordan responds that it takes two to make an accident (love is a car wreck metaphor).
Nick: "Suppose you met somebody just as careless as yourself."
Jordan: I hope I never will. I hate careless people. That's why I like you."
Nick claims at the end of the chapter that he is one of few honest people that he has known. (interesting statement. He says it after admitting he needs to break it off with some girl back West who he has been writing letters and signing them "Love Nick".
Nick Carraway is invited to his party, but he claims to be one of the few. People at Gatsby's party's at "according to the rules of behavior associated with amusement parks." A chauffeur in a "uniform of robin's egg blue" (is this important?) brings Nick the invitation.
Gilda Gray - Follies (allusion -Ziegfield Follies). Lots of mentions of automobiles in this chapter.
Nick quickly runs into Jordan Baker at the party. Jordan is with a younger man who is still in college (there is a reason for this - he is "a persistent undergraduate given to violent innuendo"). Nick and Jordan sit with a few girls who share some gossip:
1) One rip her dress at a former party and Gatsby sent her a new one worth $265 - because "He doesn't want any trouble with anybody"
2) Rumor #2 - Gatsby had "killed a man once." Gatsby's name = BY GATs
3) "He was a German spy during the war". Rumor #3
The three girls are all with girls named "Mr. Mumbles" (this is a joke).
Jordan and Nick go to Gatsby's library where they meet OWL EYES (think of the name). Owl Eyes tells them that Gatsby's library is full of real books, but the pages are uncut.
Owl Eyes is in the library because he's "been drunk for about a week" and he "thought it might sober" him up "to sit in the library." Mrs. Claud Roosevelt brought him. Allusion.
Nick later accidentally meets Gatsby. Gatsby recognizes him from the war and uses the phrase "Old Sport" a lot.
Gatsby's smile "was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance". The butler comes and tells Gatsby that Chicago is on the line.
Jordan than tells Nick - Rumor #4 - that Gatsby claims to be an Oxford man. She doesn't believe him.
Mr. Tostoff's "Jazz History of the World" plays out in the Gardens (allusion - think Jazz Age and famous musicians).
There are a bunch of "drunken" fights as husbands tried to get there wives to leave. Nick then witnesses a car crash with someone so drunk that they don't even know that they crashed and the wheel of the car is no longer connected. (1st mention of car crashes)
Nick and Jordan after a while begin dating. He says, "I felt a sort of tender curiosity." At a house-party in Warwick, Nick reports, Jordan borrowed a car and left it in the rain with its top down and then lied about it (not a car wreck - but close and due to someone being careless. This is also Jordan's 1st "lie" that the reader becomes aware of). Nick quickly remembers what "eluded me that night at Daisy's. At her first big golf tournament there was a row that nearly reached the newspapers --a suggestion that she had moved her ball from a bad lie in the semi-final round." The caddy withdrew his statements and it was dropped, but there it was. According to Nick, "Jordan instinctively avoided clever, shrewd men" (ah - so back to the undergrad). "She was incurable dishonest...and wasn't able to endure being at a disadvantage."
Then - Jordan drove so close to a workman that the fender flicked a button on the man's coat. Nick tells her that she is a rotten driver and should be more careful. Jordan responds that it takes two to make an accident (love is a car wreck metaphor).
Nick: "Suppose you met somebody just as careless as yourself."
Jordan: I hope I never will. I hate careless people. That's why I like you."
Nick claims at the end of the chapter that he is one of few honest people that he has known. (interesting statement. He says it after admitting he needs to break it off with some girl back West who he has been writing letters and signing them "Love Nick".
Wednesday 2 March 2016
Notes
Chapter 2
Settings: Valley of Ashes and New York City
Valley of Ashes is both an allusion (to T.S. Eliot’s The
Waste Land – a poem that refers back to World War I, and turns London into a
city of the dead, spiritually dead) and a symbol. The Valley of Ashes is were “dreams” die and
the spiritually dead live.
In the Valley of Ashes another symbol resides: The eyes of
Doctor T. J. Eckleburg. A symbol to eyes
of God (though God is dead).
In the Valley of Ashes live George and Myrtle Wilson.
George Wilson is a sick, anemic man. He is of the working class and he has failed
in life. He owns a poor little gas
station. He hopes – or dreams – of
buying Tom’s car so that he can sell it for a profit and move west. As one point in this chapter, Myrtle “smiled
slowly and, walking through her husband as if he were a ghost, shook hands with
Tom…”
Myrtle Wilson is Tom’s “girl”. Tom is using her for a fling. Tom has rented Myrtle an apartment in
Manhattan (New York) and in this apartment Myrtle dreams. Her dream is to escape her working class life
and become wealthy and live like the wealthy.
On the way to the apartment, Tom buys Myrtle a dog. This “dog” will be an allusion (keep this in
mind for the end of the novel). Myrtle
in reality is Tom’s dog. There’s a
reference about a dog collar later in the chapter. Who is this collar for?
At Myrtles (or Tom’s) apartment a party happens. Myrtle invited up the Mckees and her sister
Catherine.
Mr. McKee is a photographer – a poor photographer.
Catherine is around thirty, slender, and “worldly”
(not). She’s a gossip.
Catherine gives the first rumor about Gatsby – “he’s a
nephew or a cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm’s.”
Catherine also presents a lie about Tom and Daisy’s
marriage: “Neither of them can stand the person they’re married to” (this in
reference to Tom and Myrtle). “It’s
really his wife that’s keeping them apart.
She’s a Catholic and they don’t believe in divorce.”
Myrtle, of course, challenges (after an afternoon of drinks)
Tom’s marriage by yelling “Daisy Daisy Daisy” over and over. Tom, showing her that Myrtle is beneath Daisy
and that his marriage isn’t to be question, breaks her nose.
New York City is the place in this book where dreams run
into reality.
Versailles (what happens there) is mentioned a few times in
this chapter as is Town Tattle and Simon Called Peter
The Great Gatsby Chapter 2
Today - I want you to post two dialectical journals from chapter 2 on your blog. I also want you to read chapter 3 and watch the following video. I will be posting notes on chapter 2 later.
Tuesday 1 March 2016
Gatsby Notes
Nick Carraway –
(narrator), claims to be non-judgmental and this has made him “privy to the
secret griefs of wild, unknown men.”
Is from the West and moved to the East. His family is in the hardware business. He claims that he is descended from the “Dukes
of Buccleuch” (look this up).
He is descended or claims to be descended from
aristocracy. His family is probably
upper-middle class. He works for a
living.
Was in World War I (The Great War). Graduate from YALE (New Haven). He works selling bonds.
Nick seems to be a reliable narrator but he does have
moments.
“Midas, Morgan, and Maecenas”
(page 4) – allusion (look up).
Eggs – West Egg and East Egg
(these are in the Long Island Sound).
There is the egg in the Columbus Story (Columbus story).
Birth – the idea of infinite
possibilities, dreams. Before the egg is
hatched anything can happen.
Setting: East and West Egg; June 7th 1922.
Tom: Yale –
extremely rich (he inherited). Played
football – “one of the most powerful ends that ever played football at New
Haven – a national figure in a way, one of those men who reach such an acute
limited excellence at twenty-one that everything afterward savors of
anticlimax.”
“They had spent a year in France for no particular reason
and then drifted here and there unrestfully wherever people played polo and
were rich together.”
“I felt that Tom
would drift on forever seeking, a little wistfully, for the dramatic turbulence
of some irrecoverable football game.”
Tom Buchanan –
has a girl in New York (she’ll be important) and is a racist.
Daisy “Fay” Buchanan
– “there was an excitement in her voice that men who had cared for her found
difficult to forget: a singing compulsion, a whispered “Listen,” a promise that
she had done gay, exciting things just a while since and that there were gay,
exciting things hovering in the next hour.”
From Louisville, the South.
She is from a rich aristocracy (a south family that probably owed a
plantation).
Jordan Baker –
golf player. From Louisville. Single – symbol of the “new” woman of the
1920s. Has a male name. Foreshadow: Nick remembers a “critical,
unpleasant story” about Jordan that he heard somewhere.
Jay Gatsby – at
the end reaching out his had for the green light.
“No—Gatsby turned out all right at the end; it is what
preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that
temporarily closed out my interested in the abortive sorrows and short-winded
elations of men.”
The Great Gatsby
Today we are going to take notes on chapter 1. I'm going to show you what I do when I read. We are also going to talk about dialectical journals and begin chapter 2.
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