The True Value of Monopoly Money

Capitalism tends towards monopoly.

No capitalist welcomes a competitor or rival. Having attained wealth, the desire is to retain it, not to concede it; to increase it, not to share it.

A competitor is perceived as a threat, and will be treated like a virus invading an otherwise healthy, but vulnerable, body.

The Great American Dream

"The Great Gatsby" is often described as a paean to the Great American Dream.

This Dream supposedly sustains the average American. It offers the opportunity to achieve success, prosperity and happiness, regardless of class, status, background or wealth.

It contains a promise of upward social mobility, a reward that will be ours if we work hard enough.

We all have an equal opportunity to transcend our current circumstances.

Implicitly, if we fail to transcend, we have only ourselves to blame. We didn't take sufficient advantage of our opportunity. Everybody is responsible for their own failure.

The Great American Dream isn't far from the Objectivist Philosophy of Ayn Rand.

n  n

Stars and stripes and silhouettes and shadows.

Jay Gatsby

Most readers think of Jay Gatsby as someone who took advantage of his opportunity, and made it.

In that sense, he's the epitome of the Great American Dream.

He has amassed enormous business wealth. He owns a colossal mansion on West Egg, Long Island. Every week, he holds a lavish party attended by all and sundry. The parties are the ultimate in Jazz Age glamour.

Gatsby has achieved everything material an American could want. He has realised the Long Island real estate mantra, "Vocation, Location, Ovation".

The Green Light

So what's Gatsby's problem?

Every night, Gatsby looks across the sound to a green light on a porch, where Daisy lives in her more prestigious East Egg mansion with her husband, Tom Buchanan.

Daisy is the one thing for which Gatsby yearns. She is the one thing he has sought after since he met and fell in love with her five years earlier at age 25.

"The Great Gatsby" revers that small green light. What we never see is what Gatsby's mansion looked like from Daisy's perspective at home. We aren't expressly offered a vision of Gatsby's fully-lit mansion as a counterpoint to Tom's, but that is what it is.

The point is Gatsby's achievement of the Great American Dream was not the end, as it is with most Americans, it was the means to an end, and that end was winning the hand in marriage of Daisy.

The most important thing about Gatsby's mansion, from Gatsby's point of view, is what it would look like to one woman across the sound.

Love's Labours Retrieved

Gatsby has already lost Daisy once, in 1917, when as a destitute young officer during the war, he was unable to marry her, because he could not offer her a financial security that was acceptable to her wealthy mid-west family.

Since then, he has acquired wealth, by whatever means necessary, to win her away from Tom and marry her.

The wealth was nothing to him, the parties were grotesque bonfires of vanity, designed with one thing in mind: to attract Daisy's attention and bring her, curious, within his reach.

Then, having got her within his sphere of influence, he could win her back.

"The Great Gatsby" is really about the love a man had for a woman, how he lost it and what he did to regain it.

At one point, Gatsby talks about repeating the past. I don't see him as repeating it, so much as regaining it, making up for lost time, retrieving what he felt should have been his.

"The Great Gatsby" is not so much about repetition, as it is about retrieval; not so much a remembrance of things past, as a resumption of a journey from a point in the past when the journey was broken.



Carey Mulligan as Daisy (Courtesy: The Telegraph)

The Pursuit of Another Man's Wife

At its heart, Gatsby engages in adultery with Daisy, with a view to convincing her to divorce Tom and marry him.

Many might find his conduct objectionable, except that he is young, elegant, good-looking, fabulously wealthy and, most importantly, in love with the slender Daisy.

In contrast, Tom is a brute of a man, he is an ex-champion footballer, hard and cruel. Most importantly, he has cheated on Daisy many times and now has a mistress, the stout, but sensuous, Myrtle Wilson.

Tom comes from an extremely wealthy mid-western family. Money is no object to him. Daisy might have the voice of money, but Tom has the demeanour and arrogance of not just money, but old money.

When Tom learns of Daisy's infidelity and Gatsby's takeover bid, he goes into typical capitalist mode in order to defend his wife, his asset, his marital property.

He researches Gatsby's past and theorises about how he has made his new money. He plans his counter-attack.

The narrator, Nick Carraway, watches on, not just witness to a battle between Good and Evil, but in reality a battle between two degrees of bad.



Black and white portrait of Isla Fisher as Myrtle Wilson

Tom's Defence Strategy

In the realm of love, as between two rival men, there can be no such thing as a friendly takeover bid.

There is no suggestion that Tom can allow Gatsby to have Daisy, so that he can settle for Myrtle. The latter is just a plaything, something he spends time on, because she is available and he can have her without effort.

All Myrtle ever wanted from her own husband was a gentleman with breeding. He turns out to be a mere mechanic and car salesman. He doesn't have the right status. Equally, although he is content to have her as his mistress, Tom doesn't see Myrtle as having the right status for marriage either.

Ultimately, the role of marriage is not to perpetuate love and happiness. Tom's task is to bond together two wealthy establishment families and their riches. A merger of two capitalist families moves them that much closer to monopolistic power, in the same way that the intermarriage of royal families once cemented international power.

Tom's goal is so important that it can accommodate his cruelty and infidelities, at least in his eyes.

Moreover, it allows Tom to prevail over Gatsby, who, despite his war record, his partly-completed Oxford education, his wealth, his glamour, and his apparent achievement of the Great American Dream, is not "one of us".

Ultimately, coincidence, accident and fate intervene on behalf of Tom, almost comically if it was not so sad, and he resists Gatsby's takeover bid.

Nick, the observer, the witness, the audience of this tragedy, is left disgusted.



Elizabeth Debicki as Jordan Baker

The Great American Paradox

"The Great Gatsby" is a short novel. At times, there is more telling than showing. At times, the description is too adjectival or adverbial for the dictates of current style manuals.

Take away the mansion, the parties and the glamour, and what remains comes close to the dimensions of film noir like "Double Indemnity".

While the novel is perceived as hailing the Great American Dream, the paradox is that it highlights how great are the forces that are lined up to resist the efforts of a man who aspires to the Dream, especially if that man is a trespasser who covets another man's wife, even if he loves her and she loves him.

There are flaws in Fitzgerald's writing, but they are tolerable. The story is magificent, even if, when laid out methodically, it might appear cliched. The characters, while realistic, are detailed and larger than life, certainly detailed enough to withstand the scrutiny when they are projected onto the silver screen. They are portrayed acting out their emotions in exactly the same way that we might in the same circumstances.

However, in the long run, what makes "The Great Gatsby" great is Fitzgerald's ability to both adulate and perpetuate the Great American Dream, while simultaneously subverting it.

n  n
This is one of the best novels I read about the American dream. The prose is perfect in every way, and this novel's ending is one of the best endings I have ever read.

I first read Fitzgerald's masterpiece when I was a young teenager. After I finished reading it, I simply hated it. I had no clue why the people were so much obsessed with it. After many years I decided to give this novel another try when I started to hear my friends frequently discussing it.

It took me almost ten years after the initial read to understand the beauty of this book. The manner in which the author wrote it can't be compared to any other literary creation. The symbolism in it makes it a true masterpiece that no one should miss.

n  n   

“He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it.”

n  n

I don't know if my appreciation of this should be tempered by the fact I was about three quarters of the way through before I realised I'd read it before (though I think it was many years ago)!

Plot

It is (mostly) set in Long Island in summer of 1922, amongst the young, idle, amoral rich, playing fast and loose with their own lives and indeed, those of others. All very glamorous, self-centred, and shallow, but the possibility of darker things lurking holds interest and tension.

Characters

Even if you like celebrity parties, there are no good, pleasant characters; it may start off glamourising such lives, but things are very different by the end.
“They were careless people... they smashed up things and creations and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness... and let other people clean up the mess they had made."
Tragically, this even applies to children: only one is ever mentioned, she appears briefly, but is then oddly forgotten, perhaps reflecting that she is irrelevant to everyone, and to the story.

Nick, the narrator, is the odd one out in that he actually has to work for a living. Also, perhaps because he nurses a secret is he in love with Gatsby, or merely dazzled by him?


Image: Gatsby glamour and excess, from Baz Luhrmann’s 2013 film (Source)

Nick is also the most honest and honourable one (or perhaps the least dishonest and dishonourable, though the fact he explicitly mentions his reputation for honesty (more than once) does bring Lady Macbeth to mind). He reconnects with his cousin, Daisy, who is married to Tom, and dips his toe in their social set. Always the outsider, yet somehow inside, and thus surely culpable for things that happen, at least to some extent.

Daisy is perhaps the most significant character, though more words are written about others. Her name is unlikely to be a coincidence: daisies are robust and wild; they don't need or want hothouse pampering - despite appearances to the contrary.

The host with the most is the mysterious Jay Gatsby, who throws lavish parties for people he barely knows (albeit with an ulterior motive). Like all the main characters, he is a westerner who moved east. Nick (and therefore Fitzgerald) seems to think this is significant, though as a Brit, it is somewhat lost on me.

Artifice

Some people see through the artifice:
“She was appalled by West Egg [the village], this unprecedented 'place' that Broadway had begotten upon a Long Island fishing village - appalled by its raw vigour that chafed under the old euphemisms and by the too obtrusive fate that herded its inhabitants along a short-cut from nothing to nothing.”


Image: Gatsby grime, from Baz Luhrmann’s 2013 film (Source)

Relevance today

Americans often have strong feelings about this book because of the way it explores (and, initially at least, admires) The American Dream. However, as a modern Brit, with no emotional attachment to the concept, it still feels relevant.

The message is about the power - and danger - of chasing dreams, without giving thought to the wider ramifications. Extravagance and superficiality lose their lustre after a while. Perhaps the "celebrities" who currently fill the pages of glossy magazines such as Hello and OK should take note: there are many similarities.

Or maybe it's about the overwhelming force of love - its costs and consequences - and the pain that hope bestows. Especially secret, forbidden love.

Can you be true to yourself, or one you love, if you are dishonest in other realms?

Quotes

There are some wonderful descriptions and images:

* One such couple "drifted here and there unrestfully wherever people played polo and were rich together".
* At times, it is almost Wildean, "I drove... to see two old friends whom I scarcely knew at all" and "I like large parties. they're so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy."
* "It was the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again."
* Chat that "was as cool as their white dresses and their impersonal eyes in the absence of all desire".
* "The last sunshine fell with romantic affection upon her glowing face... then the glow faded, each light deserting her with a lingering regret, like children leaving a pleasant street at dusk."
* "Her eyebrows had been plucked and then drawn on again at a more rakish angle, but the efforts of nature toward the restoration of the old alignment gave a blurred air to her face."
* "trousers of a nebulous hue"
* "the moon soaked with wet light his tangled clothes upon the floor"
* "Drowsiness closed down upon some vivid scene with an oblivious embrace... these reveries... were a satisfactory hint of the unreality of reality, a promise that the rock of the world was founded securely on a fairy's wing."
* Regarding a college, "dismayed at its ferocious indifference to the drums of his destiny".
* "his eyes leaking isolated and unpunctual tears"

There were also a couple of startlingly awkward phrases, one on the first page. No one is perfect, but given how much Fitzgerald is lauded for the perfection of his writing, they surprised me:

* "just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had."
* "A sudden emptiness seemed to flow now from the windows and the great doors, endowing with complete isolation the figure of the host, who stood on the porch, his hand up in an informal gesture of farewell."

Also, is "the day... was pouring rain" (not "with rain") common in American English?

See also - similar but different

Six years after this, Fitzgerald published a short story, Babylon Revisited. The characters are from a similar social set, but the child is the centre of the story, and where Gatsby is a tragedy, Babylon might not be. See my review HERE.

The Great Gatsby is your neighbor you're best friends with until you find out he's a drug dealer. It charms you with some of the most elegant English prose ever published, making it difficult to discuss the novel without the urge to stammer awestruck about its beauty. It would be evidence enough to argue that F. Scott Fitzgerald was superhuman, if it wasn't for the fact that we know he also wrote This Side of Paradise.

But despite its magic, the rhetoric is just that, and it is a cruel facade. Behind the stunning glitter lies a story with all the discontent and intensity of the early Metallica albums. At its heart, The Great Gatsby throws the very nature of our desires into a harsh, shocking light. There may never be a character who so epitomizes tragically misplaced devotion as Jay Gatsby, and Daisy, his devotee, plays her part with perfect, innocent malevolence. Gatsby's competition, Tom Buchanan, stands aside watching, taunting and provoking with piercing vocal jabs and the constant boast of his enviable physique. The three jostle for position in an epic love triangle that lays waste to countless innocent victims, as well as both Eggs of Long Island. Every jab, hook, and uppercut is relayed by the instantly likable narrator Nick Carraway, seemingly the only voice of reason amongst all the chaos. But when those boats are finally borne back ceaselessly by the current, no one is left afloat. It is an ethical massacre, and Fitzgerald spares no lives; there is perhaps not a single character of any significance worthy even of a Sportsmanship Award from the Boys and Girls Club.

In a word, The Great Gatsby is about deception; Fitzgerald tints our glasses rosy with gorgeous prose and a narrator you want so much to trust, but leaves the lenses just translucent enough for us to see that Gatsby is getting the same treatment. And if Gatsby represents the truth of the American Dream, it means trouble for us all. Consider it the most pleasant insult you'll ever receive.

If I were to write about Gatsby, I would definitely use the word "soft." This is where I differ from Fitzgerald. Our focus is quite different, but it also shows my lack of confidence in society, and consequently, in myself, which makes me lose sight of the word "great."

The first time I read The Great Gatsby, when I was much younger, I couldn't truly empathize with it. I forgot many details, didn't even grasp the main plot, and the much - discussed ending left no impression on me. I only remembered Fitzgerald’s frequent and nagging comments and the dialogues that I couldn't understand, especially the "iceberg" parts I couldn't see at all. So, I gave the novel 3 stars for its realism, 3 stars for the thoughts and writing style in the commentary and scenery descriptions, averaging 3 stars. As for the story, I found it boring.

Unexpectedly, this book became clearer as my life progressed, emerging from the fog. When I saw Leonardo starring in the movie, I was shocked by the immense splendor depicted and understood many things.

First, I underestimated the allure of wealth and glory to the poor; second, I overestimated the ability of individuals to cross class boundaries. I thought Gatsby's tragedy stemmed from avoidable obsession and greed, just his own doing. However, even today's situation in my country makes it clear to me that for those from the lower class to enter the aristocracy, the whole process is inevitably accompanied by self-alienation, cruelty, and indifference. In this sense, discarding past naive fantasies is so easy that one can accept the present's exploitation of the past, transforming from a lowly position to despising one's past self as long as one can decisively discard past fantasies - of course, they would define their past dreams as naive. This is not merely self - inflicted but a conflict under the powerful societal class divide.

Gatsby stands out because, while raising his social status, he also tries to retain his old dreams. When he had nothing, love and wealth were both distant from him. He gained love first, making it the motive for pursuing wealth. These 2 were inseparably combined, and Gatsby regarded love as part of his self - achievement, an absolute loyalty to the past. His half - hidden introduction of his experiences reflects his struggle between the inferiority he feels within the upper class and his pride in himself. Compared to those who shake off the past, his behavior towards Daisy shows hesitation, contrasted sharply with his ruthless handling of business and political affairs, which earned him a bad reputation in high society.

Think about it, Tom, born into nobility, only needs to inherit wealth and engage in sports to maintain his social status and moral reputation. Gatsby, born into poverty, must go through bloody primitive accumulation to join high society. Both commoners and nobles have mixed feelings about Gatsby's achievements: commoners envy his wealth while cursing his ruthlessness; nobles want to use his connections while doubting his unknown origins. Both loathe this moral infamy. This makes Gatsby unable to truly integrate into the noble social circles while alienating himself from his origins. Undoubtedly, this is a scenario every commoner striving to ascend through their efforts will encounter.

Gatsby shows remarkable resilience in this dilemma, straightforwardly advancing in any initial intention. From a young age, he aimed to escape poverty, learning all the necessary business skills and strict self-interest principles, breaking away from an ignorant, mediocre traditional family, climbing all possible social connections to achieve ultimate wealth, colluding with politicians and gangsters, engaging in illegal trade, and more. Any of these endeavors was extremely dangerous, and a single misstep could ruin him. What kept him going? I don't think it's mere greed. Greed alone couldn't drive him to such lengths - it's just a facade of material society's encouragement of wealth accumulation, seen by short-sighted, weak-willed individuals as enough motivation. Although greed played a part, it couldn't match his achievements. His perseverance exceeded greed's limits, and his pursuit transcended wealth's satisfaction, leaving him feeling a sense of lonely emptiness.

Undoubtedly, Daisy had long become a symbol of his pursuit. By setting his goal in the past, wealth accumulation only led him astray. She had entered the noble circle and couldn't leave this stable, perfect social class to follow the precarious Gatsby. Their divergence wasn't just a personal love tragedy but a result of the rigid class barriers, making their life paths impossible to intersect. Gatsby's uncompromising stance against these barriers made him more determined to seize the unreachable. Another symbol was poverty - Gatsby's inherent repulsion led to limitless pursuit of wealth, constantly acquiring, seeking, and flaunting to escape fear, full of guilt over his wealth and sadness for the past. This guilt distinguished him from contented nobles like Tom, making him sensitive to insults, but also one reason Nick considered him "great": old nobles, self-righteous in their morality, were selfish, while new nobles, seeking moral recognition, genuinely embodied tolerance and loyalty.

The decay of old nobility and the rise of new aristocracy is a cyclical societal process. Wealth is an eternal theme in capitalist society, a fact and tendency no scholar can deny. Fitzgerald holds deep sympathy for someone like Gatsby with the "American Dream" - neither envy nor hatred - a literary function. The duality in Gatsby makes him a Promethean tragic figure in capitalist society, possessing noble wisdom, perseverance, tolerance, and compassion, yet punished by fate for his actions. Wisdom and perseverance made Gatsby's tough, ruthless side; tolerance and compassion made his hesitant, self - doubting side. Toughness towards oneself meant cruelty towards others; compassion towards oneself meant hesitation towards others. Gatsby aimed to balance this, constantly extending his reach to avoid becoming a prisoner of any class, opposing all classes, becoming a stranger to societal classes.

Can we understand that an individual's excessive pursuit of self - ability eventually leads to societal rejection? For himself, he seeks social recognition while never being satisfied. For society, it praises wealth and ruthlessly punishes rule - breakers. If one possesses both extraordinary wealth and unyielding persistence, they will feel eternal loneliness and sorrow, ultimately facing destruction under society's indifferent gaze. In this scenario, one's only motivation must come from within, not bestowed. Gatsby sought to grasp Daisy, she abandoned him, but he refused to abandon himself. Inevitably, Gatsby became a sacrificial victim of class conflict, yet his heart approached eternity before death.

I think naming the book "Brave Gatsby" would also be fitting. "Brave Gatsby" and "Soft Gatsby" constitute the "Great Gatsby." From my perspective, I can only highlight one side, as many writers, especially comforting the poor with "chicken soup for the soul," do - either praising his perseverance or his love, all based on his success. The poor get solace from Gatsby; the nobles see him as a topic, a significant clown, and a soothing agent for the poor, always an alienated, flattened character. Fitzgerald, as a novelist, saw Gatsby's fate and the immense conflict between individuals and societal barriers, beyond our reach.

4.8 / 5 stars

i love this book. yes, it is a story about vapid and shallow people who live selfish and hedonistic lives and treat other people like playthings, but there is an elegance, a restraint to the prose that manages to discuss, in the same tone, both doomed love and the breakdown of the american dream. and it is masterful. some may say the great american novel.

and so this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OULhla...

makes me want to tear my eyes out with my hands and stomp on them forever and ever.

yeah, you thought this was going to be a book review, didn't you? and maybe goodreads will choose to make this a "hidden" review under their new policies, but i don't care, because it makes me so angry that this is happening in this way that i have to scream about it, even if no one hears me, and there isn't enough room in a status update for me to vent my rage, and this is a book community, and i feel like you should all feel and share my outrage...

WHO THOUGHT LEONARDO DICAPRIO WOULD MAKE A GOOD GATSBY?? AND WHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE HE IS IN THE GAP WHEN HE IS FLINGING ALL THOSE CLOTHES AROUND???

it is unbelievable. i haven't read this book in years, but i know that it did not take place in some art deco-themed casino in vegas.

and i assume the commentary on over-the-top consumption is just as relevant to our times as fitzgerald's, and the makes-you-squint way it is shot and the soundtrack (what is that soundtrack all about???) is a modern-day reinterpretation of jazz-age glam; a reversal of the futuristic sci-fi films of the seventies, but it is making me puke and i want to stop puking, please.

this is not my american dream.

come to my blog!

I loved this book. I finished it in one day.

I wanted to dislike Gatsby but i did actually really liked him. I hated Tom. And really hated Daisy.

Like many people, I first read The Great Gatsby when I was too young to understand it. I appreciated the beauty of Fitzgerald's prose and his gift for describing scenes, but disliked quite a few of his characters and couldn't fathom why they inspired in each other the degree of devotion and obsession that they seemed to do. I also found the narrator a bit dull and the ending a huge let-down. In short, I was convinced Fitzgerald was a good writer (I actually went on to check out some of his short stories immediately afterwards), but couldn't see what all the Gatsby fuss was about.

I think I can see it now, having reread the book a couple of times since then. Yes, it's a novel about the American Dream -- a rags-to-riches story about a poor man who re-invents himself as a mysterious millionaire in hopes of winning the heart of the beautiful rich girl he has fancied ever since they were young. But it's also about the shallowness of that dream, and about the corruption inherent in it -- about the lengths to which people will go for success and acceptance, not necessarily in an admirable way. It's about the gap between dreams and reality, between reality and perception, and about how modern, status-obsessed America is increasingly on the perception side of the gap. It's an indictment of materialism, of the thin veneer of wealth which hides the moral decay underneath. And last but not least, it's a story about what makes us who we are. About how we are shaped by our pasts and backgrounds, and how, no matter how far we run and how hard we try to re-invent ourselves, we are what we are, what we always were. It's a depressing message for the would-be self-improvers among us, but a true one, I think.

Of course, the book also works on a shallower level. The Gatsby-Daisy romance is fascinating, even if both of its protagonists ultimately turn out to be rather vapid and deluded. And Gatsby's dream is nothing if not powerful. If it ends up failing, that's because it was based on wrong assumptions -- assumptions arising from ignorance and greed as well as hope. There's a lot of greed and ignorance in the book, and it makes for memorable (albeit heavily flawed) characters. (I actually believe Jordan Baker is the most interesting character in the book. I'd have loved to see a bit more of her, although I guess it's precisely her elusiveness which makes her so fascinating.) For his part, old-fashioned Nick proves to be an excellent narrator, whose 'provincial squeamishness' adds just the right kind of perspective to all the modern goings-on described in the book. Nick may be unspectacular and unreliable, but to my mind, he's one of the best narrators in the history of modern fiction. Now that I've learnt to appreciate the novel, his disappointment and disillusionment will stay with me for ever, as will his sad resignation. (If, in fact, that is what it is. One never knows with this endlessly subtle novel.)

I just spent three days being read to by Jake Gyllenhaal and it was absolutely wonderful! I took Jake with me for long Summer walks, to the grocery store, Trader Joe's, and let me not forget the ten minutes I spent driving around the parking lot of Target, not for a better parking space, but to listen to Jake read "The Great Gatsby" to me! My only regret is that this fabulous experience is over. Sigh...

I've read the book and watched both versions of the movie but this is by far my favorite experience with this novel!

Highly highly recommended!

once upon a time, i had a very long, very passionate review of this book uploaded, with very long, very passionate pages of comments, and generally it was one of my favorite reviews (and of one of my favorite books) with one of my favorite ensuing discussions.

today i realized goodreads deleted it!

Re-read update August 2020

My history with Gatsby

First read in high school: 1 star
Rethinking my rating a few years ago after watching movie and discussing book with my wife (see original review below) : 3 stars
Re-read rating in 2020: 5 stars

Interesting anecdote to accompany my re-read. I did it on audio this time, headed out to listen to it (double time) on a walk yesterday, and 8.6 miles later I had listened to the whole thing straight through!

So glad I gave this one another shot. It's pretty good - definitely worthy of 5 stars. If you remember it poorly because of a required reading experience, I think it is worth revisiting.

Here is my original review from January 8th, 2013:

When I first reviewed this on Goodreads, I gave it 1 star. I just did not remember enjoying it as required reading in High School.

Then I went through a phase a couple of years ago where I read a lot of Hemingway and about Hemingway (The Paris Wife), and with Hemingway you get a lot of Fitzgerald.

Shortly after that, the movie with Leonardo DiCaprio came out and my wife's book club read the book. We ended up discussing the book for hours and watched the movie. After that I had to change my rating.

I only brought it up to 3 because it is still not one of my favorites, but I get it more now (update August 2020 - now 5 stars!). There is a whole lot of interesting content packed into an under 200 page book (how they made a 2 1/2 hour movie, I'll never know - but they kept it pretty close to the source material). I also think this book is very representative of the time period and the type of writing you were seeing in the "Jazz Age". Because of this, it is an important piece of literature.

Over drinks, I’ve observed—like so many smart alecks—that much of The Great Gatsby’s popularity relies heavily on its shortness. At a sparse 180 pages, Fitzgerald’s masterpiece could be argued to be the “Great American novella.” Gatsby, like so many other short classics, is easily readable, re-readable, and assessable to everyone from the attention-deficient young to mothers juggling a kid, a career, and a long-held desire to catch up on all those books “they should have read but haven’t gotten around to yet”.

I’ve now read Gatsby three times, and I admit that on my first reading during (like handfuls of others) my senior year English class, I wasn’t particularly fond of the book; I believe I used the adjective “overrated” on numerous occasions. Daisy Buchanan seemed like a twit of a woman, and I found Jay Gatsby to be pathetically clawing in his attempt to attain her. Nick, my guide, only annoyed me further with his apparent hero-worshiping of a man I found one-dimensional and his adoration for the kind of woman I’ve seen other men purport to be goddesses, but in fact, are dim-witted simpletons with nice figures.

Over my two subsequent readings—pushed along by friends whose judgment I trusted and who swore the book was “so funny and ironic”—I discovered within Fitzgerald’s fable a sardonic social wit and a heavily layered critique of the American Dream: the poor, working (wo)man rising above his or her social situation to discover money conquers all.

Fitzgerald has a discerning ability for sharp critiques of the economically privileged and, like Jane Austin, has an ear for realistic, bantering dialogue. Through Nick’s narration, we see a world that so many Americans dream of (its enviableness only further accentuated by our open disdain for it): a life of endless parties, delicious food, beautiful clothes, and Paris Hilton. Nick who’s paradoxically drawn to his cousin, Daisy’s, and her husband, Tom’s, lifestyle with gloating contempt echoes the contemporary American idolization of an elite lifestyle that none but a select few attain.

We watch Daisy with her voice that “sounds of money” flit about with uncompromising shallowness and vivacious school-girl frivolity, and through her, see so many of the inconsequential remarks and actions others (as well as ourselves) have made for the sheer sake of “having a good time”. In spite of her frivolity and weak disposition, we become, like Gatsby, “overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves, of the freshness of many clothes, and of Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor.”

Through Gatsby’s veneration of Daisy, we not only imagine what so many Americans desire (success), but also we see the goal and glittering fixation of all humanity: beauty. And like many Americans in the throes of Capitalism, Gatsby believes that money can buy beauty as well as love. Fitzgerald articulates this disillusion with haunting force, particularly voiced through Nick’s obsessive repulsion with the extravagant society his social status has allowed him and the sadness he finds while watching a “working man” attempt to enter it.

One critique of The Great Gatsby, which could also be argued as a positive, is the limited scope of action and themes Fitzgerald chooses to encapsulate. We only see the wealthy elite (or people wanting to be the wealthy elite), and only Nick really has any depth of characterization. Unlike a tome, such as War and Peace, Gatsby fails to have numerous interwoven plotlines within a grand historical context. Yes, the Jazz Age is the novel’s backdrop, but Fitzgerald fails to engage in any discussion beyond a summer among the wealthy youth partying into the wee hours of the night in the West Egg. Yet, the control with which Fitzgerald expresses his limited themes makes the novel’s lack of scope forgivable.

Gatsby is short and easily accessible, and I have no doubt these aspects of the novel do lend to its everlasting popularity. At the same time, it should never diminish its truly admirable ability to tease apart some of the most confounding qualities American culture values: money, beauty, youth, hard work, and the ever effusive, love.