A week ago today, I started reading The Great Gatsby, after finishing The Once and Future King, and it seemed to me as if people were more excited over the latter novel than they were the former; maybe because it is a classic and TOaFK is slightly unknown and obscure. I honestly did not know what to expect out of the book. One of my friends said it was great and that I would love it. My best friend proclaimed that it was a terrible book.
Wednesday night, shortly after ten o'clock in the evening, I logged off of my laptop with one thought in mind: Finish the book, even if you lose sleep. And that is just what I did. I finished the book, actually. I only lost about an hour of sleep if anyone cares to know, but that is just a minor detail. Back to the point of this post, now.
I promised a blog post on what my thoughts were in regards to The Great Gatsby. I am not sure whether I will contribute anything with this post, but it is worth a shot and I always like to share my opinions on the books that I read, as long as I have gotten something out of them. I most certainly did with this book, whether I want to admit it or not. There were many things I noticed and picked up on. It was an interesting book altogether and my fears concerning the book, that had been created by outside sources, did not come to pass.
My first thought after finishing the book was,"Well, I finished it. What do I do now?" I was tired and I just laid in my bed for about five minutes, the lights on, waiting for some kind of thought to enter my head that would be intelligent enough. I was hoping that I would think to turn the light off and get some sleep, but no. My second thought I had before I went to turn off the light, that kept me in my spot for a few more minutes, was that I had just read a book about greed. If you have ever read the novel, greed is definitely one of its central themes. I was incredibly proud of myself for picking up on that myself because I usually have a terrible time at picking up on theme. Either I read into this book incredibly well or it was just so blatantly obvious that I could not have missed it even if I had tried to.
The theme of greed weaves itself so intricately throughout entire plot line. Money is every characters motivation for their actions, perhaps save for Jordan Baker and Nick Carraway. Nearly every character is consumed with going to town, going to a party, drinking, and fine clothing. When Daisy Buchanan, one of the female characters in the book, goes to visit Jay Gatsby's home, she begins to cry when she sees all of the clothes that he has laid out on his bed. She claims that she has never seen something so colorful and beautiful, and she is saddened because of this (at least that is what I recall, you never know if I could be right. I read this book late at night and things are always distorted at night.) Another character, who has money as his prime motivation (see, the greed theme really is working its way throughout the novel), is Jay Gatsby. Jay Gatsby is the title character, and after reading the book I am not so sure as to why he is called great. He is an extremely greedy man, who like Daisy and her husband Tom, retreats into his wealth whenever there is trouble. His life has been centered around how he can survive and the best way to succeed in the world. His life seems to be full of lavish parties, mansions, and everyone around him is consumed by that and not the person behind everything. I picked up that this was a learned trait from his father. You can see that at the end of the novel. I will not give away any spoilers, because I know that there are many who have not read the book because many people are much like myself.
I feel as if I read it again I could pick up on more than just one theme, but that theme stuck out at me the most so I decided, why not analyze it? The book was a good book in general, possibly one that I would read again, but not as quickly as I would pick up one of Tolkien's books. F. Scott Fitzgerald is a classic author because he picks up on what society values the most and then makes the reader of his work realize how wrong they are. One of the biggest rules in writing is that you do not write unless it is going to mean something to someone. That rule, which I just stated, is why the classics have remained classics and other books have fallen to the wayside. They take the very fabric of society and twist it; they manipulate it; they claw at it until it shreds, until there is nothing left over save for the remnants of what used to be. The books that are considered classics make us realize our wrong doings (and perhaps good works, if we have any of those to proud of) and they make us look at ourselves.
In saying this, I am glad that I finally picked up The Great Gatsby. If I had not I would not be here writing this post then, would I? I think it is a valuable book that everyone should take the time to read. Sure, it ends oddly. Sure, it is sad at points, why would it not make you sad? That is what makes it a great book though and that is why it will last on through many generations to come. I can truthfully say, that if my children do not read it in high school, I will encourage them to read it on their own because they will take something from it, or at least hopefully they will.
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