The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Great Gatsby
Book Review: A great story that works on so many levels
Summary: 5 Stars
_The Great Gatsby_ has a lot to offer: high society parties, lost love, infedelity, murder and suicide written in an elegant, flowing prose. The story revolves around a summer spent in a resort community outside of NYC, and the lavish lifestyle of the title character. While the characters have few redeeming qualities and Fitzgerald's stinging critque of the upper classes is off-putting to some, it remains a classic for a reason: like it or not, admit it or not, we are all to some extent like Jay Gatsby: inventions and reinventions of ourselves.
On a more superficial level, Fitzgerald does a tremendous job of recreating a picture in time and, for a brief moment, allowing us to visit that time and place. Highly recommended.
Book Review: A masterpiece uncomfortably stuck between generations
Summary: 5 Stars
"The Great Gatsby" is a strange book because it seems that every American is forced to read it in high school, and yet its lessons are most meaningful and appropriate for people who are much, much older. Fitzgerald's main message seems to be that those individuals who think big and dream big will eventually be crushed by their headstrong romantic ambitions, and that golden memories from the past--no matter how achingly seductive and promising in retrospect--can never be recaptured.
How depressing! What high schooler wants to be exposed to these dreadful (if true) life lessons, especially so early in life?
Therein lies the rub. "The Great Gatsby" is a benchmark work of American literature that is primarily read by youngsters who are too young to appreciate it, and it is ignored by oldsters who might truly connect with it because they, in their old age, dismiss the novel as some sort of stale required reading for adolescents.
But let's now look at what the two groups might like, and then dislike, about this fascinating 1925 novel.
LIKES OF THE HIGH-SCHOOL CAFETERIA CROWD:
1.) It's a short read.
2.) It's a famous work written by a famous author.
3.) It's a clear, clean, tidy read.
4.) It offers little complexity or contradiction (at least on a superficial level).
5.) Nick Carroway is cool, and Jay Gatsby is REALLY cool.
6.) Fitzgerald's gifts of description are amazing, especially those of the Gatsby mansion and its parties.
6.) The book's mini-lessons are tidy, potted plants: (a.) money is bad; (b.) it sucks being the outsider; (c.) pay attention while driving, lest you mow down a mistress; (d.) don't bother Googling your ex-girlfriend and buying a big house across the bay from her big house.
DISLIKES OF THE HIGH-SCHOOL CAFETERIA CROWD:
1.) Nick Carroway's narration is a little too suavé and complex for its own good.
2.) The last quarter of the text, sort of a crime novel spelled out, doesn't match the epic grandeur of the first three-quarters of the book.
3.) Except for a few parties, one DUI, and one murder/suicide, nothing happens over nearly 200 pages of text.
LIKES OF THE RETIREMENT-COMMUNITY CAFETERIA CROWD:
1.) It's a short read.
2.) Nick Carroway's narration is agreeably suavé and complex.
3.) Scores and scores of textual passages in "The Great Gatsby" are arrestingly beautiful in their imagery, simplicity, and lyricism.
4.) The oldsters know good-hearted, hard-charging successful people who eventually crashed and burned, just like Gatsby did.
5.) The oldsters like looking back gauzily and wistfully on the splendor and health of their youth, no matter how things actually turned out.
6.) The bastards win out at the end of "The Great Gatsby," just like in real life.
DISLIKES OF THE RETIREMENT-COMMUNITY CAFETERIA CROWD:
1.) The last quarter of the text, sort of a crime novel spelled out, doesn't match the epic grandeur of the first three-quarters of the book.
2.) The pivotal automobile accident is just a tiny bit forced and convenient. (See for example p. 151 of the 1995 Scribner paperback edition--how can Daisy swerve to pass an ONCOMING car on a two-lane street? If the approaching car is ONCOMING, there is no need to swerve--just to keep driving straight.)
3.) Why did Gatsby let himself be killed by the raving George Wilson? Wouldn't Gatsby, who purposely ordered his car with the damaged fender to be entombed in his estate's garage, get the hell out of Dodge? (Tom and Daisy did.) Are we meant to believe he gave up on life because, after one bad afternoon and a car accident caused by Daisy, he would give up on five years' worth of empire-building and let himself be assassinated?
4.) Overall, the book doesn't quite fit together seamlessly. It fails to be perfectly harmonious, internally and thematically.
In sum, this is a masterpiece stuck uncomfortably between two places: the hearts and minds of the young, who have not yet lived long enough to endorse the timeless truths of the novel's grim central message, and the hearts and minds of the old, who might indeed recognize the value of its teachings, but skip over the text because they consider it to be fodder for juvenile minds.
The text's tragic inability to succeed in one or the other camp reminds us of two similar and heartbreaking failures: of Jay Gatsby, who had all the material goods and all the street cred, but still died young, broken, and alone; and of F. Scott Fitzgerald, who was perhaps the most naturally gifted author America ever produced, but still died young, broken, and alone.
Book Review: A mild soap opera and no masterpiece
Summary: 2 Stars
Hmm, looks like the literary critics got it wrong again when they pushed this book into the university reading lists. This is nothing more than an adequately written soap opera of a love triangle that ends in tragedy. I expected great writing; I found the author's writing to be merely adequate and the characters to be wooden. The story is of the lowest common denominator type: a sleazy romance that would have been equally at home in the Harlequin Romance series. The supposedly brilliant portrayal of the Jazz Age was anything but. I am a big twenties fan and know a good deal about the period and Fitzgerald certainly did not capture the feeling of the period for me. The twenties were about Jazz in New Orleans and Chicago, movies in Hollywood, hustle and bustle in Manhattan, not about some spoiled and bored people in Long Island who don't know what to do with themselves (how could anyone have been bored in the 1920's ???!!! There was a good reason why they called it the Jazz Age; it was exciting - to everyone but the clueless numbskulls in this novel). Daisy is supposedly irresistable; she comes across as the twenties version of a valley girl. Any grown man moronic enough to fall for her deserves what he gets. Gatsby is as wooden as any toy soldier.
Why, oh why, do academics go crazy over these novels? I think it is because they spend so much time in academia that they have no sense of life outside of universities. I bet there really are professors out there who think that this is a daring, explosive novel. The rest of us, living less rarified lives, respond with a big yawn.
Book Review: A modern classic!
Summary: 5 Stars
I had read The Great Gatsby for the first time in high school, and if I didn't have to read it again in college, I would've said: it's over-rated, it's boring..blah blah, I didn't know how to read literature! I strongly believe that everyone who rated this classic novel below a 3 stars didn't fully grasp the symbolism in the characters, the location (East/West Egg, Dr. T's Eyes), the green light or the meaning of any of the relationships. It's a really quick read, 180 pages, you can do it in one day...but read with much concentration! Go back to your college days and remember that legendary authors, such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, crafts his work so that NOTHING is written by mistake. The setting, the colors, the dialogue, they all have an underlying meaning.
I would also recommend reading a little biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald before reading "The Great Gatsby," because then you'll know that it's somewhat autobiographical, being that he is from the Midwest and he was a solider.
Overall, reading The Great Gatsby requires immense concentration and an understanding of literature/symbolism. If you do some prior research, then you'll realize WHY it is a classic.
And don't just skip the book and watch the movie (with Robert Redford), because the book is MUCH MUCH better.
Book Review: A must
Summary: 5 Stars
This is another one of those American classics that you just have to read at some point. I would definitely place it in my top 100. Great story, interesting and complicated characters, and beautiful writing. At this price, you really don't have an excuse for not reading it.