#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. 

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. 

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". 

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.

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 7^th 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.” 

Myrtle Wilson (Tom’s girl).

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.