When I read this novel for the first time during my sophomore year of high school, I hated it. Hated it! I was a pretty straight-edged teen, and I couldn't understand how I was supposed to take anything of value from a plot in which the main characters spent an entire summer aimlessly drinking, partying, and nothing that seemed particularly edifying. What a silly book!
It wasn't until I read one of Fitzgerald's other novels in college, The Love of the Last Tycoon, and thouroughly enjoyed it, that I told myself that I'd give The Great Gatsby another chance. And, as I breezed through it the second time around, I felt like I was reading a different, more engrossing novel. I'm not quite sure what happened, but I suspect my age and life experience allowed me to understand Nick's, Gatsby's, and Daisy's perspectives and actions.
For those of you who haven't read The Great Gatsby, here's the basic premise: our 20-something narrator, Nick, moves to New York from the mid-west to work with bonds. He lives at West Egg, which is close in proximity to New York City, and happens to live next to Jay Gatsby, a wealthy man who throws elaborate and expensive parties every weekend. Gatsby throws these parties in the hopes that it may draw an old flame of his, a woman named Daisy Buchanan (who happens to be Nick's cousin), back into his life. However, Daisy is married, although her husband is having his own affair with another woman.
Essentially, Gatsby's affectionate exclamation that "[Daisy's] voice is full of money" speaks to the shallowness that often accompanied those living the fast life in the twenties. The siren call of wealth and riches is attractive to our main characters, but eventually leads to despair and tragedy. It's a novel that speaks not only to that decade, but also to today's superficial high life society where anything and everything can be purchased.
Have you read The Great Gatsby yet? If you read it first in high school, did you like it or did you have the same reaction as I did? I'm incredibly interested in your experience with the novel.
(PS-- isn't this version of the book awesome? It's very old and only cost $1.25 back when it was sold!)
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