The Great Gatsby
9/10
A beautiful masterpiece of literature.
It had been many years since I read this novel originally and when I saw it on the list, I jumped at the chance to enjoy it again with fresh and more refined eyes. In fact, the introduction to my version of the book, Scribner UK (2018), spoke about how readers notice different aspects of the story and writing at different times in their life. Though I really enjoyed the writing, I did think it was inconsistent in places. This is a minor criticism when you have descriptions like the following. “She was in the middle thirties, and faintly stout, but she carried her surplus flesh sensuously as some women can. Her face, above a spotted dress of dark blue crêpe-de-chine, contained no facet or gleam of beauty, but there was an immediately perceptible vitality about her as if the nerves of her body were continually smouldering.” There was one part of the book that was a little dull. It was naming the people who attended Gatsby’s parties and probably means nothing to any reader not familiar with the 1922 social scene. Another passage that I singled out was this, where Tom and Wilson are dealing with identical issues with unfaithful wives. “He had discovered that Myrtle had some sort of life apart from him in another world, and the shock had made him physically sick. I stared at him and then at Tom, who had made a parallel discovery less than an hour before—and it occurred to me that there was no difference between men, in intelligence or race, so profound as the difference between the sick and the well.” I’m not sure if that’s inspired writing or a little too ‘on the nose’ and explanatory for attentive readers. Poor Gatsby has the worst case of one-itis that I’ve ever seen. “It had gone beyond her, beyond everything. He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion, adding to it all the time, decking it out with every bright feather that drifted his way. No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart.” This places enormous constraints on how he lives his life, blind to change, and in pursuit of a single goal. Even when Gatsby sees that Daisy has a child from another relationship, he doesn’t relent in his singular ambition. I would have run a mile. I really appreciated and resonated with the ‘general resolves’, written by Gatsby as a boy, that Mr Gatz shows to Nick. This includes the routine of ‘rising from bed at 6’ and using his non-work hours in productive ways, “No wasting time at Shafters or [a id, indecipherable] No more smokeing or chewing. Bath every other day Read one improving book or magazine per week Save $5.00 [crossed out] $3.00 per week Be better to parents”. His ambition of self-improvement for its own sake, before it became corrupted, was admirable. I viewed Tom as quite a comedic character on this reading and I found his bigotry and racism amusing. “’Civilization’s going to pieces,’ broke out Tom violently. ‘I’ve gotten to be a terrible pessimist about things. Have you read ‘The Rise of the Coloured Empires’ by this man Goddard?’… The idea is if we don’t look out the white race will be—will be utterly submerged. It’s all scientific stuff; it’s been proved… I suppose the latest thing is to sit back and let Mr. Nobody from Nowhere make love to your wife. Well, if that’s the idea you can count me out. . . . 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.’” Thank goodness Tom isn’t around today when traditional institutions are under attack. Imagine what he’d think of gay marriage, trannys, polyamory, gender fluidity, etc.
