#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.