The Great Gatsby Is it Overrated?

[cacian]

I admit as far as the story goes the plot does not inspire me.
the setting however is interesting.


how about you?

[Poetaster]

I love it.

[cacian]

I love it.

hi Poe nice to see you around.:)
what is it that you most love about it?

[PeterL]

I admit as far as the story goes the plot does not inspire me.
the setting however is interesting.


how about you?

I agree. It is O.K., but it is not great literature, and some features of it are sophomoric, at best. The writing was middling; FItzgerald should have done more showing instead of telling. The plot was decent, but it wasn't emphasized as much as it could have been. The characters were interesting, and without them played so heavily there wouldn't have been a story at all.

I remember discussing the book with a German woman who was doing a year in the U.S. She didn't like the characters and wondered why they all seemed like rotters. When I explained that they seemed like that because they were, she was rather surprised. The idea that Nick was the most honest character also surprised her, because he seemed as rotten as the rest. Some days later she had finished reading it and she agreed with me but still could see a value in it. And I agreed with her that it had no value as a work of literature.

[Marbles]

Yes, overrated. A decent novel but nothing great about it. A big reason it is so lauded because it's supposed to be depict in all its honesty, corruption, and pomp and show the Jazz Age America. Its characters are well done and leave an impression on the reader, the setting too, as cacian said, is interesting. What it goes to tell about the people making the story is very basic stuff.

[free]

I think that the film made on the basis of the novel has done the most to make it so popular. And masterly acting and beauty of Robert Redford, of course.

[Marbles]

I think that the film made on the basis of the novel has done the most to make it so popular. And masterly acting and beauty of Robert Redford, of course.

The novel is part of the Western canon for a long time and has been popular among the reading community for many decades, long before the film was made out of it. But of course the film helped to popularise it among younger generation.

[Lykren]

When I read it in high school (both for a class and after that) I really enjoyed the flamboyant writing style. I'm not sure whether I still would now, and the thematics of the novel seem to me now, when I try to recall, a little thin, certainly poignant, but lacking the tragic richness of a Melville or a Tolstoy or even a Hardy. I do still feel this thread is a little too harsh on it, though, but that may be for sentimental reasons. I would like to re-read the novel at least one more time, it won't take more than a day or two.


I still remember and enjoy this passage:

“At the grey tea hour there were always rooms that throbbed incessantly with this low sweet fever, while fresh faces drifted here and there like rose petals blown by the sad horns around the floor.”

On a close reading the imagery seems a little inexact perhaps (say, compared to Pound's In A Station at the Metro), but certainly not the rhythm. Which is the point of the meaning of the sentence, actually.

[Lykren]

she agreed with me but still could see a value in it. And I agreed with her that it had no value as a work of literature.

What? You've contradicted yourself. She saw value in it, and you agreed with her that it had no value?

[PeterL]

What? You've contradicted yourself. She saw value in it, and you agreed with her that it had no value?

I don't think that I asserted that it was absolutely without value; it was an image of its time, but that's all. It didn't make timeless statements about humanity.

[Pierre Menard]

"Timeless statements about humanity" seems far too vague a notion to decide quality to me. It would seem particularly hard to define I feel.


As for the novel, I really enjoyed it, and I have little time for the notions of overrated/underrated. It's written beautifully, with sharply defined characters, and Fitzgerald handles the trajectory of the tragic story with great skill. It's not in my top 5 personal fave novels, but I still think it's a very fine book.

[Lykren]

"Timeless statements about humanity" seems far too vague a notion to decide quality to me. It would seem particularly hard to define I feel.


As for the novel, I really enjoyed it, and I have little time for the notions of overrated/underrated. It's written beautifully, with sharply defined characters, and Fitzgerald handles the trajectory of the tragic story with great skill. It's not in my top 5 personal fave novels, but I still think it's a very fine book.

Agreed, 'timeless statements about humanity' is a grandiose phrase that doesn't do a lot to describe whatever it's trying to talk about.

[morizon]

hello Mr\Miss cacian, i'm sincerely sorry for my immature intrusion, as i'm new here plus i'm not familiar with the rules yet, please allow me to state my mediocre opinion concerning FITZGERALD's novel The Great Gatsby; i find it very silly of my part not to agree with your statement, however, if you only take the trouble to scrutinize the text from a socio-historcal approach (hedonistic society of that era) you would be fascinated to find out that FITZGERALD was aware of the slumber of his own society ( he was awke among the dreamers. please accept my sincerest apology

[Marbles]

As readers, we are easily coerced into admiring writers whose reputation parades in front of our eyes before we can actually read their work. Take for instance Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. Both are fine novels in their own right but they are at best mediocre works. They enjoy the reputation they do, appearing on every major contemporary book list, for non-literary, non-artistic reasons. It's all right to like these books and to enjoy reading them but I shake my head in disbelief when people go ecstatic talking about them. I also shook my head when Haruki Murakami waxed poetic in praise of The Great Gatsby.

[PeterL]

As readers, we are easily coerced into admiring writers whose reputation parades in front of our eyes before we can actually read their work. Take for instance Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. Both are fine novels in their own right but they are at best mediocre works. They enjoy the reputation they do, appearing on every major contemporary book list, for non-literary, non-artistic reasons. It's all right to like these books and to enjoy reading them but I shake my head in disbelief when people go ecstatic talking about them. I also shook my head when Haruki Murakami waxed poetic in praise of The Great Gatsby.

I agree. And, in addition, we sometimes think lowly about works that have not been blessed with a great reputation.

[Emil Miller]

I also shook my head when Haruki Murakami waxed poetic in praise of The Great Gatsby.


It might be that Murakami saw something in The Great Gatsby that you and some other contributors to this thread have missed.

[Ecurb]

"To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Catcher in the Rye" are both children's novels. I happen to like "Mockingbird" -- I read it first as a 10-year-old -- but it's reasonable to say it isn't sophisticated enough to rank among the very best novels. In addition, I have no idea what Marbles means when he writes, "Both are fine novels in their own right but they are at best mediocre works." Huh? How can a "fine novel" be a "mediocre work"?

"The Great Gatsby", on the other hand, is nothing if not ambitious. It would be more reasonable to criticize it for being overblown than for being unsophisticated. It reaches for that which is perhaps a little too far off to grasp, the poetic and profound.



Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter — to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther. . . . And one fine morning ——

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

[Jancarlo]

Well I enjoyed Gatsby when I first read it years ago but that's about it, it didn't do anything special for me personally. However I did finish To Kill A Mockingbird today and loved it, I can certainly understand why it would be rank'd with the best.

[Ecurb]

The Great Gatsby has long been controversial. Lionel Trilling liked it, but thought it wouldn't last; Bob Dylan disparaged it in "Ballad of a Thin Man". On the other hand, Malcolm Cowly and T.S. Eliot admired it. Those who have publicly announced their distaste for the novel in this thread have been unpersuasive: they've announced their opinion, but remained silent about their reasons for it. It seems to me that the novel is beautifully written -- certain scenes, like Gatsby staring at the green light across the water, are haunting. However, Gatsby lacks, perhaps, the expert characterization one might expect of a great novel. Gatsby and Daisy's relationship is symbolic and nostalgic, and the characters seem like symbols of a forgotten American Dream rather than complex humans.

By the way, I like children's novels, and when I call "Mockingbird" a children's novel I am not disparaging it. As a child, I liked spaghetti and pizza, and hated Bleu cheese and wine. I've learned to like Bleu Cheese and wine, but I love spaghetti and pizza as much as ever.

[Emil Miller]

However, Gatsby lacks, perhaps, the expert characterization one might expect of a great novel.



I think that this is what Fitzgerald intended. Gatsby has an aura of mystery about him that would preclude a detailed exposition of his character.
It's worth recalling that the book is remarkable in its brevity but speaks volumes about the human condition. JBI once commented on Litnet that the book is very short but it has the weight of a 500 page novel.

On a personal level it remains 'THE great American novel'.

[Marbles]

It might be that Murakami saw something in The Great Gatsby that you and some other contributors to this thread have missed.

Yes that's possible. If he saw something that I and others did not, I'd like to be shown that special thing. The only criteria being literary value not some other benchmark such as being great snapshot of the American society at that time or other such thing.


"To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Catcher in the Rye" are both children's novels. I happen to like "Mockingbird" -- I read it first as a 10-year-old -- but it's reasonable to say it isn't sophisticated enough to rank among the very best novels. In addition, I have no idea what Marbles means when he writes, "Both are fine novels in their own right but they are at best mediocre works." Huh? How can a "fine novel" be a "mediocre work"?

Sorry for being ambiguous. A novel may be of great interest to a particular people in a particular time period, impregnated with meaningful ideas and dealing with the most contentious issues, but has little value outside of those confines. If we judge novels according to the said criteria, I'd say both Mockingbird and Catcher have value (In fact, on strict comparison, I like Catcher's narrative style better than Mockingbird's, half of which might have been one story and the other half another). But judged for literary merit, there is not much there to laud, so I consider them, at best, mediocre.

[Marbles]

On a personal level it remains 'THE great American novel'.

I read this after I posted my previous reply. I think this is what I'm getting at when I mentioned limited/special appeal. It's a problem if Gatsby's greatness must be aided by the crutches of the adjective emboldened above.

Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy was called the great Indian novel, the great Indian epic. Nothing became of it. Achebe's Things Fall Apart has had big influence on African studies. It's dubbed the great postcolonial novel, the great African novel etc., but it crumbles into pieces when you remove the 'postcolonial' from it. (Note that both were written originally in English so the language - not translation - is central to my conclusions).

Anyway, I don't want to disparage GG as this is not my intention. It's definitely true its brevity is remarkable for its scope and I remember beautiful lines releasing in my head a feeling of elation, and I also like the character of Gatsby. As I conceded earlier, it's a good novel albeit an ordinary entry in the list of canonised literature; but I remain an unconvinced sceptic when discussions about its greatness kick in. Just my opinion.

[Ecurb]

I'll grant, Marbles, that it sometimes seems The Great Gatsby reflects how Europeans see America as much as it depicts how America really was. The obsession with "class" seems more European than American -- and Fitzgerald was living in Paris when he wrote the book. It may be "overrated" in that it isn't (I think) quintessentially "American". It's a very good novel, though.

[cacian]

I think that this is what Fitzgerald intended. Gatsby has an aura of mystery about him that would preclude a detailed exposition of his character.
It's worth recalling that the book is remarkable in its brevity but speaks volumes about the human condition. JBI once commented on Litnet that the book is very short but it has the weight of a 500 page novel.

On a personal level it remains 'THE great American novel'.


.
Gatsby was flamboyant
the reasoning behind the plot is not.
there is no romance as far as Gastby is concerned but just deprived titillation because the female character was already married to someone else.
to me Gatsby is just a prolific affair that should not have happened in the same way that the great prohibition should not have.
prohibition and Gatsby could be compared to be similar in that they are both abundant in corruption and deprivation.
what Gatsby lacks is emancipation or freedom of statement.

[Emil Miller]

I'll grant, Marbles, that it sometimes seems The Great Gatsby reflects how Europeans see America as much as it depicts how America really was. The obsession with "class" seems more European than American -- and Fitzgerald was living in Paris when he wrote the book. It may be "overrated" in that it isn't (I think) quintessentially "American". It's a very good novel, though.

It isn't quintessentially an 'American novel' but it is American by virtue of the author's nationality.
I don't think the novel is obsessed with class; it's more about money: the contrast between the worlds of Tom Buchanan and Wilson being just one example.
As with other great novels, Gatsby deals with universal themes of love, greed, wealth, poverty, ambiton, death etc., but whereas literary giants such as Tolstoy, Hugo, Dickens et al wrote hefty tomes, Fitzgerald encapsulates the human condition within 150pp.
The Great Gatsby is no more a European view of America than Anna Karenina is an American view of Russia, universality being the touchstone of great writing.

[cacian]

It isn't quintessentially an 'American novel' but it is American by virtue of the author's nationality.
I don't think the novel is obsessed with class; it's more about money: the contrast between the worlds of Tom Buchanan and Wilson being just one example.
As with other great novels, Gatsby deals with universal themes of love, greed, wealth, poverty, ambiton, death etc., but whereas literary giants such as Tolstoy, Hugo, Dickens et al wrote hefty tomes, Fitzgerald encapsulates the human condition within 150pp.
The Great Gatsby is no more a European view of America than Anna Karenina is an American view of Russia, universality being the touchstone of great writing.
Is love wanting someone's else wife/husband?
surely love is more then that if not better.

[Ecurb]

It seems to me that Gatsby's love for Daisy represents his desire for acceptance in the upper crust of society, as does his propensity for throwing money around. The supposed "American Dream" is symbolized in the tragic affair. I'm no expert, though. I haven't read the book in a couple of decades, except to look at some of my favorite passages.

To Cacian: Uncertainty is the essence of romance, if not love. That's why romantic novels end at marriage, unless they involve illicit love affairs. Marriage may be loving, but it isn't romantic.

[cacian]

It seems to me that Gatsby's love for Daisy represents his desire for acceptance in the upper crust of society, as does his propensity for throwing money around. The supposed "American Dream" is symbolized in the tragic affair. I'm no expert, though. I haven't read the book in a couple of decades, except to look at some of my favorite passages.

To Cacian: Uncertainty is the essence of romance, if not love. That's why romantic novels end at marriage, unless they involve illicit love affairs. Marriage may be loving, but it isn't romantic.

are you really?
romance affairs and mistresses and all that are related??
i am flabbergasted and disappointed to read this.
call me old skool but romance for me is freedom of expression and feelings and above all respect.uncertainty is wild and unforgiving there is no feeling but a trade of fear and emotional distraught. in other words something is definitely not right.
i dont get how romance can even get a look in.

so the Great Gatsby for me is rather sad.
the whole idea that love is centered around a married woman is rather hopeless for a reader seeking love for a first time .
it offers a dim reality on what love and life is about.
in fact it is depressing when i think about it.

[Marbles]

It isn't quintessentially an 'American novel' but it is American by virtue of the author's nationality.

As with other great novels, Gatsby deals with universal themes of love, greed, wealth, poverty, ambiton, death etc., but whereas literary giants such as Tolstoy, Hugo, Dickens et al wrote hefty tomes, Fitzgerald encapsulates the human condition within 150pp.
The Great Gatsby is no more a European view of America than Anna Karenina is an American view of Russia, universality being the touchstone of great writing.

Like everything else in our world literature is also categorised under authors' nationalities but when GG is called The American novel, what is being referred to is merely the simple fact of the writer's nationality or something more? It's all right to call GG an American novel because, after all, it is a novel set in America authored by an American that tells the story of a group of Americans of the Jazz Age. But I think calling it The American novel means much more, which makes me ask: if the adjective were to change to some other nationality, say Hungary, and if it remained unchanged in its exposition of the human condition, would then it still get the same plaudits about its greatness or would it be relegated to some back shelf of special interest novels from a minor country? It is in answering this question only that we can judge the supposed universality of GG. Again, I say this with all due respect to FitzGerald; even if he were some Hungarian writing the same thing, it'd still be a novel worth reading, because every novel produced anywhere in the world deals with universal themes of love, greed, wealth, poverty, ambition, death etc.

If a novel needs a descriptive helper it is probably covering its weakness. Dickens is great but none of his novels are great English/British novels. Marquez's Solitude is a great piece of art but no one calls it the great Colombain novel. Great novels don't need their nationalities. This is why, in my humble opinion, if GG is a great novel, calling it the great American novel only does it disservice.

[Eiseabhal]

Neither TKaM nor Catcher are children's novels. The former is very good, the latter ok.

[Eiseabhal]

PS I should have said Gatsby is certainly more artistic than either but I prefer TKaM

[Ecurb]

are you really?
romance affairs and mistresses and all that are related??
i am flabbergasted and disappointed to read this.
call me old skool but romance for me is freedom of expression and feelings and above all respect.uncertainty is wild and unforgiving there is no feeling but a trade of fear and emotional distraught. in other words something is definitely not right.



Romance, like uncertainty, is "wild and unforgiving". In literature, a "Romance" is an "adventure". Adventures are traumatic and emotionally stressful. It is the uncertainty of a love affair that makes it "romantic" -- although we need not believe that "romance" is superior to other, more stable, forms of love.

To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel about children, it's narrator is a child, and it is easily read and appreciated by children. I'm not disparaging it by calling it a children's novel; I love children's novels, and in my list of 25 favorites, half were children's novels.

[Eiseabhal]

There are numerous novels with children playing a central role: A High Wind in Jamaica, Spies by Frayn, The Lord of the Flies, The Go-Between etc. They may be read by children. It may be possible for a child of ten to fourteen to get something out of these books but they were not written for children. I too enjoy books written for children and I think the actual distinction between books for adults and books for children is bit like the distinction between my shirts in the wardrobe: they're all shirts. Treasure Island, Alice's Adventures and Huck Finn are definitely children's books as they were written for children but they can be enjoyed as much or more by an adult. I accept that you were not intending to be disparaging.

[cacian]

Romance, like uncertainty, is "wild and unforgiving". In literature, a "Romance" is an "adventure". Adventures are traumatic and emotionally stressful. It is the uncertainty of a love affair that makes it "romantic" -- although we need not believe that "romance" is superior to other, more stable, forms of love.

I see.
where do you place cheating then?
in romance too?

[ennison]

Hmm . He sounds to me like fellow backtracking E. It was definitely meant to be a bit disparaging. But never mind, it is not a children's book. The narrative method would not be grasped by the average child reader. No doubt an able child would "get" the didactic bit fairly well but lots of the jokes would go whoosh right over their heads. There are two features at least of the novel that are seldom found in children's novels: a large amount of historical detail, real and fictional, and a continual Un-American irony. Lee had no great style in her use of language but so what it's stle is appropriate to its purpose.

Ah stle! Speaking of it, The Great Gatsby is a stylish text by comparison with Lee's book. Indeed the style is integral to the reader's enjoyment and understanding of the text. I read The Catcher in the Rye a long time ago. I found Holden a bit of a prat then and I doubt if he will have improved with age - my age I mean!

[Ecurb]

Some cheating is romantic, some is not. Cheating is not romantic ipso facto, but it undoubtedly can be romantic. Why couldn't it be? Wasn't Camille's affair with Armand "romantic"? And wasn't she cheating on the Baron at the start of it? How about Lancelot and Guineviere? Tristan and Isolde? Abelard and Heloise? Surely you can't suggest that extra-marital love CAN'T be romantic.

[Ecurb]

Hmm . He sounds to me like fellow backtracking E. It was definitely meant to be a bit disparaging. But never mind, it is not a children's book. The narrative method would not be grasped by the average child reader. No doubt an able child would "get" the didactic bit fairly well but lots of the jokes would go whoosh right over their heads. There are two features at least of the novel that are seldom found in children's novels: a large amount of historical detail, real and fictional, and a continual Un-American irony. Lee had no great style in her use of language but so what it's stle is appropriate to its purpose.

!

I read "To Kill a Mockingbird" when I was about ten, and liked it. Since when is "historical detail" inappropriate for children's novels? Have you ever read "Kidnapped"? How about "Little House in the Big Woods" or "Little Women" or "Anne of Green Gables" or "The Bronze Bow" or "Wolves of Willoughby Chase"? Historical fiction is one of the most common genres for children's novels.

[ennison]

Maybe you should re-read Lee's book to see what I meant by historical detail. Kidnapped is definitely a historical novel but it has far less historical detail than Lee's novel. Lee's is not a historical novel since she was writing of her own times. The historical details in Lee's book are there for her big canvas, they ain't there like say G A Henty who wrote lots of swashbuckling adventures with pretty accurate history but it was only there for the exotic feel of the yarn. Let's see if I can remember something from memory... "Simon Finch who had forgotten his mentor's dictum ... purchased three slaves and with them established a homestead..." When I said bits would go over the child reader's head that is just one example. Scout sees, hears, witnesses but does not understand but a part of it all. How can she, she's a child. A precocious child but a child. I'm quite willing to believe you too were precocious. The tone of the novel is very adult. The word "dictum" is not on their lips and they would be unlikely to know who the mentor was. They would probably "get" that his forgetting suggested he did something wrong.

[ennison]

PS I did not say inappropriate, I said "seldom found" There's a good reason for that. Children like action and plot and tend to get easily bored by the sort of dense detail that many adult readers relish.

[Ecurb]

Tolstoy called such detail as that to which you refer "interestingness', which he considered a form of false art. Here's Tolstoy on "interestingness":


,,,In a novel, interestingness might consist in a description of Egyptian or Roman life, the life of miners, etc.... The reader becomes interested and mistakes this interest for an artistic impression.... It is often said that a work of art is very good because it is poetic, or realistic, or striking, or interesting; whereas (not only do none of these) attributes supply a standard of excellence in art, but they have not even anything in common with art.

I disagree with you that children dislike "interestingness" -- historical novels are popular among children in part because children are "interested" in historical details about which most adults are already aware. In addition, Tolstoy is a controversial critic and philosopher of art -- most people disagree with him.

I do think children like many of the same things that adults like in novels. That is, they like a "mood" the novels create. The historical details are not important in and of themselves, but they can often add to the scene that creates the mood. Pirates (as in "Treasure Island") are important to the novel not merely because they move the plot and put the hero in dangers from which he must extract himself. They are also important because they are "piratical" -- lawless men who nonetheless have their own sacred codes. Their lawless and violent life has left them without a leg, or without eyes, but no other dangerous one-legged or blind men will quite do. They must be piratical -- not because the historical details of piracy are "interesting", but because they infuse the novel with a piratical "mood".

Look at the famous last sentence of "Treasure Island", and how it recaptures the piratical mood of the book:


The bar silver and the arms still lie, for all that I know, where Flint buried them; and certainly they shall lie there for me. Oxen and wain-ropes would not bring me back again to that accursed island; and the worst dreams that ever I have are when I hear the surf booming about its coasts or start upright in bed with the sharp voice of Captain Flint still ringing in my ears: "Pieces of eight! Pieces of eight!"

I can hear the parrot now!

[Ecurb]

By the way, the "mood" created by the historical details in "Mockingbird" is a key to the novel's quality. The mood is at once nostalgic and terrifying, because we all remember childhood as a time of both the security of family and home, and terrors, both real and imagined, emerging from the strange and unknown. Boo Radley is both comforting and scary; unusual and a next-door neighbor. The reason the novel can reasonably be called a "children's novel" is children can identify even better than adults with this kind of worldview.

[Clopin]

Tolstoy was an awful critic of literature, art and everything else.

[ennison]

Hmm so Tolstoy is being roped in. No doubt he wouldn't like Hugo or Melville or Boyd or Pynchon or others of that kind with their "false art" of interestingness. Although some adults do not like that very few children would find these details other than boring as they slow down the plot. It's on such a basic understanding of the child reader that abridged classics and graphic classics have been successful. Lee's is not an historical novel. Oh Treasure Island is a fantastic book but it contains very little by way of background either real or fictional. RLS wanted a yarn to "fetch em" and was too astute to use adult irony or to slow the plot down by filing in the corners like a portrait. Lee's novel does that. It is highly unlikely that the average child reader would get for example the reference to Maycomb having "recently been told it had nothing to fear but fear itself". Nope. It's a book written for adults and belongs in the company of those I note are listed above

[Clopin]

War and Peace is full of 'interestingness' itself Tolstoy you sob. Though I think he disliked his own
novels later on actually.

[ennison]

Tolstoy you sob! I say young fellow you're sounding like me in my crabbit old man mode. But you speak the truth there. He did take a turn against his earlier writing.

[Ecurb]

Tolstoy was a very good critic, although one with idiosyncratic tastes. He disliked Shakespeare and Beethoven, for example. I doubt he read Melville, and I forget what he thought of Hugo, although it's irrelevant to his quality as a critic. Good criticism need not be that which mirrors our own taste. Instead, good criticism is criticism which is fun, or enlightening, or stimulating, or educational. Tolstoy qualifies on all four counts. Just out of curiosity, have either of you ever read "What is Art" or some of Tolstoy's other critiques? If not, on what grounds do you call him an "awful critic"? If you have read "Art", didn't you find it an interesting, enlightening, fun and educational book, however much you might disagree with some of the conclusions?

Returning to "Treasure Island", the piratical mood of the book is enhanced by piratical customs and superstitions. I don't actually know if they are based on history or if Stevenson made them up: The Black Spot; Captain Flint's ghost; etc. They are both "interesting" (I happen to like "interestingness"). and artistically important in infecting the reader with the piratical mood that is essential to the novel's artistic merit.

[Jancarlo]

Well I didn't get into it because I sensed Ecurb meant no harm in calling Mockingbird a children's novels but since we're discussing it... It seemed to me that even though it was narrated by a child you could only get a full understanding as a grown up. For example aside from the historical references already mentioned, the whole Tom Robinson case involves inequity, and openly discusses rape which Scout doesn't really understand at the time but I doubt parents would like to buy their kids a book which as a consequence has them asking about rape at the end of the day...

[Clopin]

Tolstoy was a very good critic, although one with idiosyncratic tastes. He disliked Shakespeare and Beethoven, for example. I doubt he read Melville, and I forget what he thought of Hugo, although it's irrelevant to his quality as a critic. Good criticism need not be that which mirrors our own taste. Instead, good criticism is criticism which is fun, or enlightening, or stimulating, or educational. Tolstoy qualifies on all four counts. Just out of curiosity, have either of you ever read "What is Art" or some of Tolstoy's other critiques? If not, on what grounds do you call him an "awful critic"? If you have read "Art", didn't you find it an interesting, enlightening, fun and educational book, however much you might disagree with some of the conclusions?

Returning to "Treasure Island", the piratical mood of the book is enhanced by piratical customs and superstitions. I don't actually know if they are based on history or if Stevenson made them up: The Black Spot; Captain Flint's ghost; etc. They are both "interesting" (I happen to like "interestingness"). and artistically important in infecting the reader with the piratical mood that is essential to the novel's artistic merit.

He liked Les Miserables at least. I've only read excerpts from What is Art, but his idea that 'good' art has to supply some sort of moral edification strikes me as pretty stupid. I love Tolstoy the author, but Tolstoy the man was a bit of a jackass, at least from the accounts I've read.

I actually liked Kingdom of God and Resurrection though...

[Marbles]

Going through the first few pages of Mockingbird is enough to tell us that the book is not meant primarily for children but due to its child narrator and simple prose style children can also read and enjoy it. And someone made a good point about attempted rape and its unsuitability for children.

Flannery O'Connor called it a children's novel. I don't think she meant that in a kind way.

It may be interesting to find out if Harper Lee herself said anything about intended audience? Or anything by the early reviewers?

[Emil Miller]

Like everything else in our world literature is also categorised under authors' nationalities but when GG is called The American novel, what is being referred to is merely the simple fact of the writer's nationality or something more? It's all right to call GG an American novel because, after all, it is a novel set in America authored by an American that tells the story of a group of Americans of the Jazz Age. But I think calling it The American novel means much more, which makes me ask: if the adjective were to change to some other nationality, say Hungary, and if it remained unchanged in its exposition of the human condition, would then it still get the same plaudits about its greatness or would it be relegated to some back shelf of special interest novels from a minor country? It is in answering this question only that we can judge the supposed universality of GG. Again, I say this with all due respect to FitzGerald; even if he were some Hungarian writing the same thing, it'd still be a novel worth reading, because every novel produced anywhere in the world deals with universal themes of love, greed, wealth, poverty, ambition, death etc.

If a novel needs a descriptive helper it is probably covering its weakness. Dickens is great but none of his novels are great English/British novels. Marquez's Solitude is a great piece of art but no one calls it the great Colombain novel. Great novels don't need their nationalities. This is why, in my humble opinion, if GG is a great novel, calling it t
he great American novel only does it disservice.

This thread has unfortunately veered off into discussion about children's books and I don't want to get into a casuistic discussion on authorial nationality. Having read quite a bit of American writing, I reiterate that I consider Gatsby to be a great novel. As I have already mentioned, it is a personal favourite and one that I have read six times. I don't think in saying it is the best American novel I have read that I'm doing the book a disservice.

[Marbles]

I don't think in saying it is the best American novel I have read that I'm doing the book a disservice.

No, that's fine, Emil. I'm not criticising your calling it your favourite American novel; it's a matter of individual taste and that's not my province to enter.

In its exposition of universal human condition, I'm commenting on GG's advertised American-ness, which is thought to make it something special than it would be if it was not American. This might be so but this view goes against the claim of universality of a novel.

[Ecurb]

"Gatsby" somehow avoids mention in "The Great American Novel" by Phillip Roth. A fictional Earnest Hemingway disparages the claims of Huckleberry Finn, Moby Dick, The Scarlet Letter, and The Ambassadors, but says nothing about TGG. "The Great American Novel", by the way, is hilarious (although some of the funniest parts are clearly derived from another excellent baseball book, "The Glory of their Times").

It seems to me that Gatsby is an excellent, but flawed, novel. It tries a little too hard to envision (and disparage) the American Dream, and the plot is a little too contrived for my taste. How is it that Daisy managed to kill Myrtle Wilson? It doesn't seem reasonable -- in fact, it seems like an unnatural plot device. (I admit, though, that it's been a couple of decades since I read the book.)

[Emil Miller]

"Gatsby" somehow avoids mention in "The Great American Novel" by Phillip Roth. A fictional Earnest Hemingway disparages the claims of Huckleberry Finn, Moby Dick, The Scarlet Letter, and The Ambassadors, but says nothing about TGG. "The Great American Novel", by the way, is hilarious (although some of the funniest parts are clearly derived from another excellent baseball book, "The Glory of their Times").

It seems to me that Gatsby is an excellent, but flawed, novel. It tries a little too hard to envision (and disparage) the American Dream, and the plot is a little too contrived for my taste. How is it that Daisy managed to kill Myrtle Wilson? It doesn't seem reasonable -- in fact, it seems like an unnatural plot device. (I admit, though, that it's been a couple of decades since I read the book.)

It was an accident. Myrtle Wilson had been locked inside by her suspicious husband but she managed to break out when he started to beat her and ran into the road just as the car being driven by Daisy was passing. It seems quite plausible to me and I don't regard it as a plot device but a natural occurence given the events that preceded it. If you haven't read the book in a couple of decades, it might repay re-reading.

[Ecurb]

Yes, I know it was an accident, which just seemed too coincidental to be believable. It's a relatively minor point, and you're right -- I should read it again.

[Clopin]

It's statistically very unlikely that a coincidence like that would happen, but whatever, character in books are always running into each other in cities with sometimes millions of inhabitants, I don't find it jarring. Most literature isn't trying to be all that realistic anyways.

[Emil Miller]

It's statistically very unlikely that a coincidence like that would happen, but whatever, character in books are always running into each other in cities with sometimes millions of inhabitants, I don't find it jarring. Most literature isn't trying to be all that realistic anyways.

In the novel, Wilson's garage is situated in an isolated spot about 10 miles from New York's metropolitan area. People driving from West Egg to Manhattan, for example, would have to pass Wilson's garage on what was then a minor road. Therefore, there were relatively few cars passing at any given time. As the Buchanans' lived at the wealthy northern part of Long Island, it is not particularly coincidental that it was Daisy who was driving the car that killed Myrtle Wilson.

[Marbles]

It's statistically very unlikely that a coincidence like that would happen, but whatever, character in books are always running into each other in cities with sometimes millions of inhabitants, I don't find it jarring. Most literature isn't trying to be all that realistic anyways.

I think a lot that happens in fiction (even in the most realist fiction), especially how the chain of plotted events unfolds, is unlikely to happen in the real world. Yet we accept that and don't find it contrived, forced or unnatural. I liken real life to a raw gemstone with its impurities, and the end product of good fiction to a polished stone so we see its colour, many hues, and appreciate its essence. A polished gemstone is not a 'real' thing; it's a treated product isn't it?

Now, the sequence of events unfolding in a novel is quite different from coincidence, which is almost always a weak point in the plot. Nabokov says, “A certain man once lost a diamond cuff-link in the wide blue sea, and twenty years later, on the exact day, a Friday apparently, he was eating a large fish - but there was no diamond inside. That’s what I like about coincidence.”

So I am with Ecurb on Myrtle's accident. Sure, the writer prepares us for the accident and we can see it coming but Myrtle could as easily have avoided being hit. It's an easy way out, and a trick played on the reader, if a plot relies so heavily on coincidence to move forward.

[Emil Miller]

I think a lot that happens in fiction (even in the most realist fiction), especially how the chain of plotted events unfolds, is unlikely to happen in the real world. Yet we accept that and don't find it contrived, forced or unnatural. I liken real life to a raw gemstone with its impurities, and the end product of good fiction to a polished stone so we see its colour, many hues, and appreciate its essence. A polished gemstone is not a 'real' thing; it's a treated product isn't it?

Now, the sequence of events unfolding in a novel is quite different from coincidence, which is almost always a weak point in the plot. Nabokov says, “A certain man once lost a diamond cuff-link in the wide blue sea, and twenty years later, on the exact day, a Friday apparently, he was eating a large fish - but there was no diamond inside. That’s what I like about coincidence.”

So I am with Ecurb on Myrtle's accident. Sure, the writer prepares us for the accident and we can see it coming but Myrtle could as easily have avoided being hit. It's an easy way out, and a trick played on the reader, if a plot relies so heavily on coincidence to move forward.

Nabokov was dead by the time this incident was reported in a national newspaper in England but he might have had second thoughts about coincidence had he read it: An Englishman was on holiday in Australia when, walking along a beach, he saw an object in the sand. He stopped and picked up what he discovered to be a spectacle case. He opened it and saw a pair of spectacles beneath which was a label bearing the name and address of the owner who had obviously mislaid them. To the man's astonishment, the address was a London location two streets away from where he himself lived. On his return to England, he returned the spectacles to the owner who was absolutely staggered by the coincidence.

As for the accident in which Myrtle Wilson is killed, the car was travelling between 50 and 60 miles per hour and Daisy swerved to avoid another car that was coming towards her, Gatsby tried to pull the car out of the swerve but it was too late: there was no way in which the accident could have been avoided.

[Marbles]

As for the accident in which Myrtle Wilson is killed, the car was travelling between 50 and 60 miles per hour and Daisy swerved to avoid another car that was coming towards her, Gatsby tried to pull the car out of the swerve but it was too late: there was no way in which the accident could have been avoided.

The immediate details surrounding the accident are not relevant to my point. The accident to which Myrtle succumbed is not coincidence itself; what is coincidence is that it was our main character Daisy, of all people, who hit the escaping Myrtle. This coincidence advances the story and determines what comes next and in my view is an example of weak plotting.

Suppose if Myrtle Wilson had been hit and killed by someone unknown but somehow Daisy had got implicated....that would have been much more interesting.

When I said that she could have avoided getting hit I meant the writer could have used other, better plot device to advance the story.


Nabokov was dead by the time this incident was reported in a national newspaper in England but he might have had second thoughts about coincidence had he read it: An Englishman was on holiday in Australia when, walking along a beach, he saw an object in the sand. He stopped and picked up what he discovered to be a spectacle case. He opened it and saw a pair of spectacles beneath which was a label bearing the name and address of the owner who had obviously mislaid them. To the man's astonishment, the address was a London location two streets away from where he himself lived. On his return to England, he returned the spectacles to the owner who was absolutely staggered by the coincidence.

Wow fascinating stuff! This is so rare it is almost unbelievable!

[Clopin]

Take Les Miserables, are we to assume it's a poor work because of how frequently people run into Javert?

[Marbles]

Take Les Miserables, are we to assume it's a poor work because of how frequently people run into Javert?

This is not how I would put it. Coincidence represents a weak point in the plot but that doesn't necessarily make it a poor work in toto. I think it depends to what extent it is allowed to influence the story. I'm not saying it's forbidden to use a chance occurrence as plot device but it should be used parsimoniously, carefully and cleverly...because you must have noticed that more often than not it's a trick to advance the story when the writer is running low on imagination...

That said, take Candide. It's full of absolutely improbable events; acquaintances randomly run into each other in far-off continents, adversaries who were killed survive 'miraculously'; on every step some major disaster strikes the protagonist etc, but it's a fantastic satire and well-liked for what it is: a frame story to advance, inter alia, a philosophical debate about the chain of causation. I think coincidental occurrences are more common in humorous or satirical works and feel out of place in realist and serious works like the GG.

It was a popular plot device in the 18th and 19th century but it fell into disrepute later on, and for the right reasons. Police car runs out of fuel during a criminal chase; mobile phone battery goes kaput mid call on which depends someone's life; a lucky private jet crash kills the evil dictator who was going to nuke the enemy etc -- coincidences are only found today in lowbrow stuff not in serious literature.

By the way, I have not read Les Miserables but I have watched its musical adaptation, so I think I have an idea of Javert.

[Clopin]

But Javert is a representation of a few aspects of society, an unjust legal system persues Jean Valjean doggedly for his entire life. That's an over simplification of the character but I think the coincidences are intentional and relevant to the allegorical nature of Javert.

How this is relevant to Daisy running over Myrtle I have no idea, but I guess I just don't care about realism in literature. And is GG a work of realism? I haven't read it in years but my understanding was that it's supposed to be some sort of statement on American culture in the jazz age.

In Dostoyevsky for example the strangest coincidences will occur to drive forward the plot, in Tolstoy this won't happen. It's just a difference in style.

[Emil Miller]

The immediate details surrounding the accident are not relevant to my point. The accident to which Myrtle succumbed is not coincidence itself; what is coincidence is that it was our main character Daisy, of all people, who hit the escaping Myrtle. This coincidence advances the story and determines what comes next and in my view is an example of weak plotting.

Suppose if Myrtle Wilson had been hit and killed by someone unknown but somehow Daisy had got implicated....that would have been much more interesting.

When I said that she could have avoided getting hit I meant the writer could have used other, better plot device to advance the story.



Wow fascinating stuff! This is so rare it is almost unbelievable!


Fitzgerald had a better 'plot device'. It was Gatsby's car that Daisy was driving and Wilson killed Gatsby thinking he had been the driver.

The coincidence I have given isn't so rare, as there are other recorded instances that tend to nullify Nabokov's contention.

[Clopin]

No it's definitely extremely rare, let's not be silly.

[Emil Miller]

No it's definitely extremely rare, let's not be silly.

Well I was replying to Marbles somewhat sarcastic assertion that it wasn't. There are in fact numerous barely credible coincidences on record. In Arthur Koestler's book The Roots of Coincidence, he seeks to show that there is a connection between them as Carl Jung had sought to demonstrate through his theory of 'synchronicity'. Whether one accepts this theory, is a personal predilection but in the case of Myrtle Wilson's death, the causality is not so incredible as the example I have given vis-à-vis the missing spectacles.

[Clopin]

Well I think Nabokov is right about coincidences but I don't think they harm the work, or are a weak plot device because I don't think literature or plots need to conform to realism. I know Nabokov disliked Dostoyevsky and venerated (some of) Tolstoy, but I haven't read any of his criticism so I don't know if the unrealistic coincidences and what not that permeate Dostoyevsky's work were something that bothered him especially.

[Emil Miller]

Because coincidence is something that many people experience, it's appearance in fiction is hardly surprising, even though the type of coincidence may vary from person to person or from novel to novel. It may be used as a method of enabling a storyline to continue but the fact that it's something that is experienced by people in their everyday existence, no matter how rarely, doesn't necessarily indicate a failing on the part of an author but rather the utilisation of an effect that many readers will identify with.

[Clopin]

Coincidences are literally notable for occuring infrequently, if they occur repeatedly in a piece of writing it becomes less realistic. Having one main character hit the other with a car in the circumstances of The Great Gatsby is wildly coincidental and I suspect the number of people fatally hit by say, their old high school sweetheart or their first college professor, or their long estranged father make up a very very small percentage of all road fatalities.

[AuntShecky]

Fitzgerald's esteem somehow waxes and wanes with each new literary critical "movement," but the fact remains that from a thematic point of view, Fitzgerald is one of the most important American novelists of the first half of the twentieth century.
In all of his writing, he explores the uniquely American trait of aspiration, along with a view of money quite different from the rest of the civilized world. He questions the notion of "class," not from a political but rather a social point of view. Some of his passages might be among the most emotionally moving as ever one is likely to read.

(Bear in mind, I'm speaking of the novel The Great Gatsby itself, not the film versions. The first with Robert Redford was okay, but the most recent Di Caprio vehicle was atrocious. If you want to study film anarchronisms, that's where you should start.)

[Scheherazade]

I haven't read a Fitzgerald book that I haven't found compelling and captivating. Love his writing style and his characters. I am not familiar with the "class" he is talking about in general but his people all the same familiar, among us.

[Emil Miller]

Coincidences are literally notable for occuring infrequently, if they occur repeatedly in a piece of writing it becomes less realistic. Having one main character hit the other with a car in the circumstances of The Great Gatsby is wildly coincidental and I suspect the number of people fatally hit by say, their old high school sweetheart or their first college professor, or their long estranged father make up a very very small percentage of all road fatalities.

I agree, but in Fitzgerald's book Daisy Buchanan had never met Myrtle Wilson and neither had Gatsby: all three were strangers. On the day of her death, Tom Buchanan had driven into New York with Jordan Baker, having borrowed Gatsby's car. He stopped at Wilson's garage for petrol and Myrtle ,who had been locked in her room by her husband, saw Tom from her window and thought that Jordan was Tom's wife. Madly jealous , she broke free from the garage later that day and suddenly saw Gatsby's car coming along the road and, thinking that Tom was still the driver, she ran into the road in an attempt to stop the vehicle and was unavoidably killed: so it's not quite so coincidental as it might appear.

[kev67]

I read the Great Gatsby. I think it it one of those books which has a superficial meaning and a load of deeper meanings. A bit like The Heart of Darkness, or any of Jane Austen's books, there is a ton of subtext to uncover, interpret and enjoy. I watched a YouTube video recently in which a lecturer of English literature argued that Jane Austen was both very, very simple and very, very complicated. A 13-year-old girl could enjoy it, and so cold a 50-year-old professor reading it for a 20th time. The problem with The Great Gatsby for me was that I did not enjoy it enough on even a superficial first reading, and I cannot be bothered to read it enough to decode all the secret meanings embedded in the text, or to read the academic papers that decode all the meanings of the book. If I really liked the book, I would probably do that, but I don't.

[Emil Miller]

I read the Great Gatsby. I think it it one of those books which has a superficial meaning and a load of deeper meanings. A bit like The Heart of Darkness, or any of Jane Austen's books, there is a ton of subtext to uncover, interpret and enjoy. I watched a YouTube video recently in which a lecturer of English literature argued that Jane Austen was both very, very simple and very, very complicated. A 13-year-old girl could enjoy it, and so cold a 50-year-old professor reading it for a 20th time. The problem with The Great Gatsby for me was that I did not enjoy it enough on even a superficial first reading, and I cannot be bothered to read it enough to decode all the secret meanings embedded in the text, or to read the academic papers that decode all the meanings of the book. If I really liked the book, I would probably do that, but I don't.

I doubt that any book is universally liked. We all have our reasons for identifying with a given novel, but if we acknowledge that it is greater than the sum of it's parts, that surely places it in a category that belongs to the very best writing.

In writing about Gatsby, Fitzgerald wrote: 'I want to write something new ' - something extraordinary and beautiful and simple + intricately patterned.'
It's in the synthesizing of these disparate elements that I believe Gatsby to be a great novel.

[ennison]

We are all struck by co-incidence when it occurs because the event is rare but rarity is not something to make a work unrealistic unless it is used too often as Clopin says.

[cacian]

I haven't read a Fitzgerald book that I haven't found compelling and captivating. Love his writing style and his characters. I am not familiar with the "class" he is talking about in general but his people all the same familiar, among us.

Scher i am loving your avatar stunning.
I agree about familiarity he certainly shares it well.

[Emil Miller]

We are all struck by co-incidence when it occurs because the event is rare but rarity is not something to make a work unrealistic unless it is used too often as Clopin says.

It depends on the period over which the coincidences occur. I have written a novel in which a series of events over a period of seventy plus years are related by coincidence and drive a man, who may or may not be delusional, to commit suicide. I hope to publish the novel some time next year.

[Jacob Mosiniak]

For me, I think that the Great Gatsby is not overrated, nor underrated. I feel like it is in the right spot in the sense of how people view the book. Yes, the book may sometimes be portrayed to be overrated, but for me, I think the story is great. I can see how some people may see the Great Gatsby as being overrated probably because of the movie. I think that before the movie, the Great Gatsby was a wonderful read, a literary classic, perhaps. I think it is now in the same boat as the Harry Potter books in the way that they were good books to begin with, then the movie came out and everybody watched the movie and then read the books and thought they knew what was coming. Then, people came to find out that the books had a lot more details with a better storyline and that they should have read the books before going to see the movie.

[Marbles]

For me, I think that the Great Gatsby is not overrated, nor underrated. I feel like it is in the right spot in the sense of how people view the book. Yes, the book may sometimes be portrayed to be overrated, but for me, I think the story is great. I can see how some people may see the Great Gatsby as being overrated probably because of the movie. I think that before the movie, the Great Gatsby was a wonderful read, a literary classic, perhaps. I think it is now in the same boat as the Harry Potter books in the way that they were good books to begin with, then the movie came out and everybody watched the movie and then read the books and thought they knew what was coming. Then, people came to find out that the books had a lot more details with a better storyline and that they should have read the books before going to see the movie.

I think it is naive to base judgement of a novel on its cinematic adaption. Although it's good entertainment and I have nothing against making films based on books - in fact I enjoy them - but a film almost always caricatures the book it is based on; sometimes it makes the novel appear more profound than it is but usually it strips it of its vastness and richness. I hear the film based on GG is terrible. I was so put off by the reviews that I did not bother to watch it. But maybe I will give it a try when there's nothing better to see and when I'm in the mood to be bored.

[easy75]

I enjoyed Gatsby. I think though, growing up in America and hearing the name relentlessly touted as possibly "The Greatest American Novel", it is almost impossible not to be underwhelmed when you get around to reading it. This is absolutely no reflection on the book. Some people read it and they buy into it, some furiously criticize it (sometimes unfairly). For me it was a good novel with some problems. I read it directly after reading Faulkner for the first time, which may have hindered my ability to evaluate it fairly.

[Emil Miller]

Recently there has been some discussion elsewhere on the forum about a tailing off of input to threads. This thread tempted me to go back to one that I introduced in 2008 that elicited the kind of response that was not particularly uncommon in those times and I thought it might be of interest to those who have taken part in the current discussion of The Great Gatsby.


http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?40056-Wuthering-Heights-and-The-Great-Gatsby