The Great Gatsby Essay Questions
Prescribed question: Question 5: How does the text conform to, or deviate from, the conventions of a particular genre, and for what purpose?
Text of analysis: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Part of course: Part 4 Critical Study
Key points:
• Different uses of vision used by Fitzgerald
• The concept of all-seeing and all-knowing characters
• Narration and its use
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, published in 1925, is a tragic love story, a mystery and an insight into the roaring 20’s. On the first page of the novel, our narrator, Nick, realizes that there is “some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon;” As soon as the novel begins, Fitzgerald is already referring to vision, he is saying …show more content…
In the book, Nick is our eye. Gatsby, the main protagonist, is not the one telling the story. It is in fact a secondary character that narrates, Nick. Gatsby is a successful, self-made man who is living the American Dream in a large estate in West Egg on Long Island. People gather at his mansion to attend his exciting, astonishing and romantic parties. Everyone admires Gatsby, though no one at the party actually knows him. In fact, according to a young lady, rumor has it that “He’s a bootlegger. One time he killed a man who had found out that he was the nephew to Von Hindenburg and second cousin to the devil.” (60). Gatsby’s neighbor, Nick, sees all of this and has serious doubts about Gatsby’s made-up lifestyle. While Nick is learning more about Gatsby’s background during a car ride to lunch, he notices little things Gatsby says. Gatsby claims to have been educated at Oxford but when he tells Nick this; our narrator says that he “Hurried the phrase ‘educated at oxford’”. (64). Only a few sentences later, Nick inquires about what part of the Middle-West Gatsby’s parents are from to which Gatsby answers: “San Francisco” (64). Nick quickly realizes that Gatsby believes his own lies as he controls his “incredulous laughter”
Text of analysis: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Part of course: Part 4 Critical Study
Key points:
• Different uses of vision used by Fitzgerald
• The concept of all-seeing and all-knowing characters
• Narration and its use
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, published in 1925, is a tragic love story, a mystery and an insight into the roaring 20’s. On the first page of the novel, our narrator, Nick, realizes that there is “some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon;” As soon as the novel begins, Fitzgerald is already referring to vision, he is saying …show more content…
In the book, Nick is our eye. Gatsby, the main protagonist, is not the one telling the story. It is in fact a secondary character that narrates, Nick. Gatsby is a successful, self-made man who is living the American Dream in a large estate in West Egg on Long Island. People gather at his mansion to attend his exciting, astonishing and romantic parties. Everyone admires Gatsby, though no one at the party actually knows him. In fact, according to a young lady, rumor has it that “He’s a bootlegger. One time he killed a man who had found out that he was the nephew to Von Hindenburg and second cousin to the devil.” (60). Gatsby’s neighbor, Nick, sees all of this and has serious doubts about Gatsby’s made-up lifestyle. While Nick is learning more about Gatsby’s background during a car ride to lunch, he notices little things Gatsby says. Gatsby claims to have been educated at Oxford but when he tells Nick this; our narrator says that he “Hurried the phrase ‘educated at oxford’”. (64). Only a few sentences later, Nick inquires about what part of the Middle-West Gatsby’s parents are from to which Gatsby answers: “San Francisco” (64). Nick quickly realizes that Gatsby believes his own lies as he controls his “incredulous laughter”