The Great Gatsby Ch. 9 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 9 (pp. 163-180)

Summary:

Nick talks about the days after Gatsby’s death and all the ridiculous rumors from reporters and people that circulated about Gatsby.  He “talked” to Gatsby who told him that he didn’t want to be alone so Nick contacted all Gatsby’s old friends and no one can attend the funeral.  Henry Gatz, Gatsby’s father, comes from Minnesota for the funeral and is extremely proud of Gatsby’s accomplishments and aspirations.  Owl Eyes also showed up to the funeral but none of his other friends did.  Nick believes that since he, Gatsby, Daisy, Jordan are from the West, they were unable to adapt correctly to the East all along so he decides to move back home.  Before leaving, Nick bumps into Tom on Fifth Avenue in New York City and refuses to shake his hand believing that Tom is the reason George Wilson discovered Gatsby as the owner of the car and therefore led him to believe he killed Myrtle.  On his last night back East, Nick goes to Gasby’s mansion then to his beach and thinks about America’s green land being like Daisy’s green light on the dock for many people and that Gatsby hadn’t realized that the dream had ended long before.

Henry C. Gatz:

“It was a photograph of the house, cracked in the corners and dirty with many hands…. He had shown it so often that I think it was more real to him than the house itself.” (p. 172)

Henry Gatz is Gatsby’s father who is extremely proud of his son’s accomplishments.  He shows Nick Gatsby’s set of goals from when he was younger and that he always had aspirations and goals set for himself.  Henry is convinced that his son was meant to do great things for the country and had a very bright future ahead of him.  Henry’s been relying on the picture of Gatsby’s house to channel all his pride and hope for his son and now, seeing his son’s wealth in person is overwhelming.  Henry Gatz has an important role as Gatsby’s father and as the only person who knew the real Jay Gatsby, James Gatz, and his potential before it was robbed from his obsession with Daisy.

Significant Quote:

“He had a big future before him, you know.  He was only a young man, but he had a lot of brain power here… If he’d lived, he’d be a great man… He’d of helped build up the country” (p. 168)

This quote comes from Henry Gatz, reflecting on the Jay Gatsby he knew.  He said Gatsby would have been a great man “if he’d lived,” probably meaning literally living but I think that it can stem to mean that if James Gatz had lived and had not been taken over by James Gatsby and his one, destructive and impossible dream, he could have done something great with his life.  But, Gatsby through all the potential he had away for an illusion and lost any possibility of a bright future with it.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 8 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 8 (pp. 147-162)

Summary:

The next morning, Nick goes over to Gatsby’s house and learns that Gatsby stayed outside the Buchanans house until four in the morning and Tom never tried to hurt Daisy.  Nick wants Gatsby to forget about Daisy and leave town but Gatsby refuses until he know what her decision is even though we already know she chose Tom.  He talks about how he fell in love with her and felt as if he were married to her, she promised to wait for him until he came back from the war but she married Tom while he was away.  When Nick leaves, he tells Gatsby he is worth more than the Buchanans and everyone else put together.  Nick basically ends his relationship with Jordan over the phone, then describes what happened with George Wilson the night before.  Wilson talked about confronting Myrtle and pointing to Dr. Eckleburg and saying that God sees everything, he later draws to the conclusion that the person who killed her was her lover and that it was murder.  Wilson connects the car to Gatsby and goes to his house when Gatsby is lounging in the pool, shoots Gatsby, then shoots himself.  Nick finds Gatsby and imagines his last moments.

Jay Gatsby:

“ ‘They’re a rotten crowd,’ I shouted across the lawn. ‘You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.’” (p. 154)

Jay Gatsby is a man created by James Gatz who was intended to live a rich, extravagant, and perfect life, according to a 17 year old.  He is completely in love and obsessed with Daisy Buchanan and devotes every ounce of time and effort into making his dream of being with her a reality.  It’s admirable that he can pinpoint what he wants in life and do everything he can to achieve it but it is also this that leads to his downfall and the destruction of his dream.  He completely transforms himself into a 17 year old’s idea and chases after an unreachable perfection of a glorified person, Daisy, it was “the following of a grail” (p. 149).  When his dream of having Daisy died, so did everything he used to try to get her; his house is musty and empty, the world around him has transformed along with himself.

Significant Quote:

“I have an idea that Gatsby himself didn’t believe it would come, and perhaps he no longer cared.  If that was true he must have felt that he had lost the old warm world, paid a high price for living too long with a single dream.  He must have looked up at an unfamiliar sky through frightening leaves and shivered as he found what a grotesque thing a rose is and how raw the sunlight was upon the scarcely created grass” (p. 161)

This quote shows Gatsby’s state of mind at the end of his life.  Nick talks about how Gatbsy ended up alright in the end.  In the end, he is released from his dreams and aspirations of being with Daisy and faces reality.  By this time, when he is laying in the pool, the illusion of the “Great” Gatsby had already died and all his illusions with it.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 7 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 7 (pp. 113-145)

Summary:

Nick has not seen any parties at Gatsby’s house so he goes over and finds Tom, Daisy, and Jordan there.  Nick meets Daisy’s daughter Pammy who Daisy practically ignores.  Tom grows slightly suspicious of Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship and they all decide to head down to New York in Gatsby’s cars.  On the way down, they stop for gas at George Wilson’s place where they discover he knows about Myrtle’s affair but not who it’s with, and is planning to move West.  Tom and Gatsby have an argument about Gatsby’s past and over Daisy, as they fight, Daisy in a way chooses Tom over Gatsby.  Tom no longer feels threatened by Gatsby and sends Daisy in the car with him back from New York.  On the way back they discover that Myrtle was killed by a hit and run yellow car.  It turns out that the car is Gatsby’s and Daisy was driving but Gatsby is planning on taking the blame for the accident.  Gatsby waits behind a bush at Tom’s house to see that Tom doesn’t harm Daisy but Nick sees that Tom and Daisy are calmly talking and eating fried chicken.

George Wilson:

“Generally he was one of these worn-out men: when he wasn’t working, he sat on a chair in the doorway and stared at the people and the cars that passed along the road.  When any one spoke to him he invariably laughed in an agreeable colorless way.  He was his wife’s man and not his own.” (p. 136)

George Wilson is a hard working, shy garage owner near the valley of ashes.  He loved his wife Myrtle and did everything for her; he was like Gatsby is with Daisy in this respect.  He remained obvlivious to his wife Myrtle’s affair for a long time until in this chapter he finds out and becomes physically ill, locked her in the house, and plans to move because of it.  Wilson can be related to Gatsby in his obsession over a woman and his sense of betrayal and abandonment that he goes through because of her.  George’s depression and death of spirit is encompassed by the valley of ashes that he lives in.

Significant Quote:

“They weren’t happy… yet they weren’t unhappy either.  There was an unmistakable air of natural intimacy about the picture, and anybody would have said that they were conspiring together…. So I walked away and left him standing there in the moonlight—watching over nothing.”

This quote stuck out to me because it brought about a range of emotions to each character.  I felt pity and sadness for Gatsby who is crouched behind the bushes, ready to take the blame for Myrtle’s death, and crazily worried for Daisy’s wellbeing.  And while he’s outside Tom and Daisy, both adulterers, are sitting comfortably with eachother sheltered indoors eating fried chicken and having a chat.  This really pissed me off how Daisy just had Gatsby in the back of her mind as an option and then over one day just choose Tom and she’s comfortable and safe, while Gatsby has devoted his entire life to her and can be thrown to the curb so easily.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 6 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 6 (pp. 97-111)

Summary:

Nick started off the chapter by telling us about Gatsby’s real past, something he doesn’t learn until later in the story but he wanted to settle the rumors.  Gatsby’s real name is James Gatz and he was born on a farm in North Dakota; Gatsby “sprang from his Platonic conception of himself,” (p. 98).  Dan Cody, Gatsby’s dead best friend, was a very rich man from the Nevada silver fields.  One day when Cody went out on his yacht and Gatz went after him in a rowboat to warn him about the wind, Cody asked him to be his steward for the next 5 years; from that day on Gatz called himself Jay Gatsby.  After not having seen Gatsby for weeks, Nick goes over to Gatsby’s house where he finds Tom Buchanan who came for a drink with the Sloanes.  That Saturday, Tom and Daisy go to Gatsby’s party at which Nick is looking at through Daisy’s eyes and not enjoying what he sees.  Daisy is not enjoying herself but is defending Gatsby and the party to Tom who is criticizing West Eggers and the newly rich.  At the end, Gatsby is depressed because Daisy didn’t like the party and is going crazy insisting that he can recreate the past.

Dan Cody:

“The transactions in Montana copper that made him many times a millionaire found him physically robust but on the verge of soft-mindedness, and, suspecting this, an infinite number of women tried to separate him from his money.” (p. 99)

Dan Cody was very rich man who made his money from metal transactions.  We first see Dan Cody in a giant portrait hanging in Gatsby’s bedroom so we knew he was important from the start.  Cody asked Gatsby years ago to be a steward on his yacht and they circled the continent 3 times over 5 years.  When Dan Cody died he left $25,000 to Gatsby of which he got nothing because Ella Kaye took it all, leaving Gatsby to gain wealth on his own.  Gatsby was very much influenced by Cody in that he learned from the effects that alcohol took on Cody not to drink as heavily as he.  He also got used to luxury and wealth from being with Dan Cody.  Cody’s “yacht represented all the beauty and glamour in the world” and Cody himself represented the absolute wealth and extravagance that Gatsby devoted the rest of his life to strive for, (p. 100).

Significant Quote:

“He knew thatt when he kissed this girl… his mind would never romp again like the mind of God… Then he kissed her.  At his lips’ touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.” (p. 111)

The moment Gatsby and Daisy first kissed was the moment Gatsby stopped living his life for his own purpose or to accomplish things for himself in the image of God.  He began devoting all his time, energy, and life to Daisy.  James Gatz completely and permanently became the Jay Gatsby.  It represented the full incarnation of Jay Gatsby and the full incarnation of his fairytale image of Daisy.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 5 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 5 (pp. 81-96)

Summary:

One night, Nick is arriving at his house when he sees Gatsby’s house glowing really brightly, Gatsby then comes over and Nick confirms he will invite Daisy over.  The day Daisy came over was very rainy and Gatsby was a complete wreck; he hadn’t slept, he was removed, confused, and very nervous.  The two were waiting in Nick’s house when Daisy arrived.  Gatsby had disappeared and later knocked on Nick’s door soaking wet.  Gatsby and Daisy remembered each other but were very awkward and embarrassed with each other, Nick stepped out of the room for half an hour and when he returned Gatsby was glowing and Daisy was crying tears of joy.  Their love seemed to have been revived by the time Gatsby took them on a tour through his house, he and Daisy soon forgot Nick was there so Nick quietly left so they could be alone.

Daisy Buchanan:

“Her throat, full of aching, grieving beauty, told only of her unexpected joy.” (p. 89)

Daisy Buchanan is Nick Carraway’s cousin and Tom Buchanan’s wife.  She is extremely beautiful and a voice “with its fluctuating, feverish warmth… it couldn’t be over-dreamed—that voice was a deathless song,” (p. 96).  She knows about her husband Tom’s affair yet stays with him and acts like nothing is happening in front of other people.  We find out that she and Jay Gatsby had a relationship in the past and Gatsby is still completely and madly in love with her.  In this chapter, after they meet again at Nick’s house after five years apart, they are both very nervous and embarrassed at first.  Daisy shows us pure emotions of joy that we’ve never seen from her before.  Her role in this novel varies from character to character that she interacts with.  She acts in binary opposition to Tom and, at times Jordan.  She is Gatsby’s love interest and entire reason for connecting with Nick, Jordan, and West Egg in the first place.  Without Daisy, there would be no story.

Significant Quote:

“Possibly it occurred to him that the colossal significance of that light had now vanished forever… Now it was again a green light on a dock.  His count of enchanted objects had diminished by one.” (p. 93)

The green light has always represented Gatsby’s desire for Daisy.  He has dreamed of meeting her again for five years and that green light on the dock was the closest he’d come to her.  Now that he had been so close to her and knows what it feels like to physically be around her, he can’t possibly settle for that light again; it is too far.  He’s had a taste of what he desires and he can never see the same meaning in the green light that he had before.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 4 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 4 (pp. 61-80)

Summary:

At the beginning of this chapter, Nick describes every person that went to Gatsby’s house for parties during the summer, most of whom had very unlucky or bad experiences soon after.  Nick goes out to lunch in New York with Gatsby in his nice car where he meets Meyer Wolfsheim, who supposedly fixed the 1919 World Series.  Gatsby tells Nick about his past as the son of a well-off family, an Oxford graduate, and receiving medals in World War I, which Nick only believes after seeing one of Gatsby’s metals and a picture of him at Oxford.  When Nick meets Jordan for tea later in the day, she tells him a long story about Daisy and Gatsby meeting when he was a lieutenant, Gatsby buying his house in order to be across the bay from Daisy, and his request that Nick invite Daisy to his house so Gatsby can see her.

Meyer Wolfsheim:

“Meyer Wolfsheim?  No, he’s a gambler… He’s the man who fixed the World’s Series back in 1919.” (p. 73)

Wolfsheim is “a small, flat-nosed Jew” with a “large head…with two fine growths of hair which luxuriated in either nostril,” (p.69).  When Nick first saw him he “discovered his tiny eyes in the half-darkness,” (p. 69).  This could mean Meyer has an obsucured, small vision of morality and the fact that he’s a gambler doesn’t help.  He hasn’t been caught for fixing the World Series because “he’s a smart man,” (p. 73).  Gatsby, having associated himself with Wolfsheim, causes Nick to doubt his honesty even more and leads us to wonder what kind of business Gatsby would be doing with this guy.

Significant Quote:

“I saw them in Santa Barabara when they came back, and I thought I’d never seen a girl so mad about her husband.  If he left the room for a minute she’d look around uneasily, and say: ‘Where’s Tom gone?” (p. 77)

This quote caught my eye because at first glance, and as Jordan interpreted it, it appears that Daisy’s constant worry about Tom is because she is so madly in love with him.  But when taking into consideration Daisy’s drunken second thoughts the night of her bridal dinner, it seems strange that she would make such a stark change in behavior.  Her concern for Tom is more that he is being unfaithful, and as later proved with the chambermaid from the Santa Barbara Hotel, even right after their honeymoon.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 3 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 3 (pp. 39-59)

Summary:

The first page of the chapter is used to describe the huge lavish parties that Gatsby has at his house weekly, and, for the first time, Nick has been personally invited to one.  When Nick arrives at the party, he is overwhelmed by the scene and decides to drink the night away when he sees Jordan Baker, with whom he spends most of the night with at the party.  He later strikes up a conversation with a man about not having met the host and later realizes he is talking to Gatsby himself, but he is extremely comforted by Gatsby’s smile and is not too sorry for the confusion anymore.  Gatsby pulled Jordan aside for an hour or two in his library and she refused to discuss what happened.  Nick is one of the last party-goers to leave but feels special because of Gatsby’s farewell to him, meanwhile, a man Nick had met earlier at  the party in the library was involved in a car accident.  The narrator takes a break from the story to describe his daily work in the bond business, and his growing attraction to Jordan who is dishonest but he is fine with it.

Jordan Baker:

“She was incurably dishonest.  She wasn’t able to endure being at a disadvantage and, given this unwillingness, I suppose she had begun dealing in subterfuges when she was very young in order to keep that cool, insolent smile turned to the world and yet satisfy the demannds of her hard, jaunty body.” (p. 58)

When we first meet Jordan Baker in the first chapter, she comes across as snobby, independent, and unhappy.  Nick believes there is more to her: “I wasn’t actually in love, but I felt a sort of tender curiosity.  The bored haughty face that she turned to the world concealed something…” (p. 57).  In this chapter, we find out more about her; she is extremely dishonest and careless, yet Nick seems to like or dismiss these qualities. She is a well-known, successful athlete and doesn’t need a man to make something of herself.  She likes to gossip and doesn’t worry about her appearance: “I noticed that she wore her evening-dress…like sports clothes—there was a jauntiness about her movements as if she had first learned to walk upon golf courses…” (p. 50).  She seems to take a liking in Nick so her role in the novel may be Nick’s romantic interest.  Also, she represnents a new breed of women in those times and she strongly differs from the other female characters in the book.

Significant Quote:

“It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it….It faced…the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor.  It understood you…as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey.” (p. 48)

This quote caught my eye because I was surprised how much Nick took away from Gatsby’s character from a simple smile that probably only lasted a second.  It demostrates Gatsby’s unbelievable way of addressing other people so that they feel good about themselves.  He seems to have more respect and hope for other people than they do in themselves.

The Great Gatsby Ch. 2 Reading Journal

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 2 (pp. 23-38)

Chapter 2 begins with Nick describing a desolate area between the East and West Eggs he calls the valley of the ashes, which is the dump holding all of New York City’s waste.  One day, Tom insists on Nick going to meet his mistress, Myrtle Wilson, whose auto-mechanic husband, George Wilson, apparently does not know about their affair.  They meet up with Myrtle later at Tom’s cramped New York appartment where they decide to throw a party with Myrtle’s sister, Catherine, and their neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. McKee.  Nick gets drunk and wants to leave out of disgust of their conversations but is fascinated and is pulled to stay.  Tom and Myrtle begin to have a fight over whether it is appropriate for Myrtle to speak of Daisy; Myrtle begins repeating Daisy’s name in spite of Tom and he hits her in the face and breaks her nose.

Myrtle Wilson:

“She was in her middle thirties, and faintly stout, but she carried her surplus flesh sensuously… there was an immediately perceptible vitality about her as if the nerves of her body were continually smoldering.” (p. 25)

Myrtle Wilson is a selfish, materialistic, and fake adulterer.  One thing about her character that could be seen as positive is her “immediately perceptible vitality” but, as Nick describes later, around other people “the intense vitality that had been so remarkable in the garage was converted into impressive hauteur,” (p. 30).  She doesn’t love her husband George and says she only married him because she “thought he was a gentleman” and “thought he knew something about breeding…” (p. 34).  Catherine says “Tom’s the first sweetie she ever had,” which is ironic because his racist and violent manorisms don’t portray as much of a “sweetie,” (p. 35).  Her purpose in the novel is to show a contrast with Daisy and her own husband and to show her compatibility with Tom.

Significant Quote:

“Evidently some wild wag of an oculist set them there to fatten his practice in the borough of Queens, and then sank down himself into eternal blindness, or forgot them and moved away.  But his eyes, dimmed a little by  many paintless days under sun and rain, brood over the solemn dumping ground.” (p. 24)

This quote stuck out to me because it addressed two major symbols in the book: the valley of ashes and Doctor Eckleburg’s eyes.  The valley of ashes is the dumping ground of the city; it is the waste that is left over by its inhabitants.  A large figure is overlooking the dump through spectacles.  Doctor Eckleburg represents some greater God-like figure looking down on the results of the New York society.  When it talks about sinking into “eternal blindness” and “dimmed” eyes, it is like saying that God has lost hope and has given up on the human race he is watching over.

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