In college and still haven't read Gatsby...

If you're a student in the states you might find that odd. I've not talked to a single person yet from high school that hadn't read the Great Gatsby. For some reason I wasn't assigned it in HS and since then never got around to it, even as everyone raves of it.

I'm starting it immediately (finally)- what do you all think of the book? Is it a masterpiece for the ages or simply of its time? Is it a romantic work? A cynical, a naturalistic? Just trying to inspire some feedback on what has such a hype about this book.

Thanks for reading and for any feedback.

It was one of my three selections that I could choose from in my AP Literature class. The other two were To Kill A Mockingbird and 1984. I choose To Kill A Mockingbird and still haven't got around to reading Gatsby! I bought the book a few years back and it has been on my list. (I read 1984 a while ago)

I'm also a college student and feel a little guilty having a literature major without reading it.

It's an amazing book. Very evocative and lots of colour imagery (green light, yellow car...). It's only 150 pages, and a sudden catalyst happens that captivates you for the rest of the book.

For me The Great Gatsby is the quintessential American novel. Over the years I have read it six times and it never palls.
I have been interested in American writing for some time and although the US has produced some wonderful stories, I have to say that Gatsby is top of the heap.
It is the story of a man who refused let an illusion die and died because of it.
As I have indicated, American writers like Mark Twain, Sinclair Lewis, Theodore Dreiser, Stephen Crane, Frank Norris etc. etc. have written great novels but Scott Fitzgerald`s book is in a class of its own.

I'm a sophomore right now and I'm currently writing an essay on the Great Gatsby.

And I can't STAND the book.

Mainly because of the lack of extensive detail and Fitzgerald is always trying to force symbolism down your throat.

It's not just my opinion most, if not all, of my class hated the book.

But then again it's probably just best for you to make these judgments on your own instead of listen to others opinions because it might alter yours.

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Originally Posted by Gif

I'm a sophomore right now and I'm currently writing an essay on the Great Gatsby.

And I can't STAND the book.

Mainly because of the lack of extensive detail and Fitzgerald is always trying to force symbolism down your throat.

It's not just my opinion most, if not all, of my class hated the book.

But then again it's probably just best for you to make these judgments on your own instead of listen to others opinions because it might alter yours.

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I was interested to read you views on `Gatsby` and while books, like music, are subjective things, I don`t see that the author actually forces symbolism on the reader. The symbolism is very skillfully woven into the fabric of the story to the extent that a casual reader might hardly notice it at all. Actually, you and your classmates are not alone in disliking the novel, because the famous literary critic H.L. Mencken said the story was fundamentally trivial when it was first published.
However, in her book The Great Gatsby: A Critical Study, Kathleen Parkinson has this to say...`Mencken misjudged the novel when he termed it trivial, for it is a bitter, savage satire on the moral failure of the Jazz Age which is placed within a perspective of American images of success and American history.`

As an example of Scott Fitzgerald`s style there is a scene where Gatsby is finally able to show Daisy around his house and he mentions the green light, and Nick surmises:

... he seemed absorbed in what he had just said. Possibly it had occurred to him that the colossal significance of that light was now vanished forever. Compared to the great distance that had seperated him from Daisy it had seemed very near to her, almost touching her. It had seemed as close as a star to the moon. Now it was again a green light on a dock. His count of enchanted objects had diminished by one.


By any standards that has to be great writing.

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Originally Posted by Brian Bean

For me The Great Gatsby is the quintessential American novel. Over the years I have read it six times and it never palls.

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I completely agree. I have read it four or five times and it never palls.

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Originally Posted by waryan

I
I'm starting it immediately (finally)- what do you all think of the book? Is it a masterpiece for the ages or simply of its time? Is it a romantic work? A cynical, a naturalistic? Just trying to inspire some feedback on what has such a hype about this book.
.

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I read it once, young, found it pleasant but superficial, and forgot about it. Then I came back to it to study or translate it, a first time, and a second time, and now and then excerpts, and every time I find it deeper and richer, I think because I get to understand it a little better with each re-reading.
It's got a sort of champagne quality for me: light and bubbly, but with a taste that endures - it reminds me of Chopin because of this - a seemingly frivolous tightrope walk over an abyss.
Cynical, yes, but not overly so because Nick never grows altogether embittered, I find. For me the conclusion of the book is that we strive to attain illusions, like Gatsby, but human desire and struggles are not altogether pitiful - on the contrary, they possess a certain beauty, maybe because they're doomed to failure, and that is almost more important. I suppose that's Romantic...

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Originally Posted by Brian Bean

It is the story of a man who refused let an illusion die and died because of it.

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It's also about the facade that is "The American Dream."

I loved this book from the moment I first read it. The symbolism makes it one of the best social commentaries I've ever had the pleasure of reading.