Wednesday 16 June 2021

Thinking Activity:The Great Gatsby

 Welcome!

This blog is about the novel ' The Great Gatesby' and it's film adaptation.



The Great Gatsby, third novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, published in 1925 by Charles Scribner’s Sons. Set in Jazz Age New York, the novel tells the tragic story of Jay Gatsby, a self-made millionaire, and his pursuit of Daisy Buchanan, a wealthy young woman whom he loved in his youth. Unsuccessful upon publication, the book is now considered a classic of American fiction and has often been called the Great American Novel.

1) How did the film capture the Jazz Age - the Roaring Twenties of the America in 1920s?





In Fitzgerald's most popular novel, The Great Gatsby, jazz appears as constant background music. In the contemporary phenomenon of “Gatsby parties”—festivities intended to capture the air of the titular Jay Gatsby's famously lavish, bacchanalian parties—jazz is de rigueur to evoke the 1920s.08-May-2019


2) How did the film help in understanding the characters of the novel?

The film give a very proper idea about every character. It's help us to usestand every character very properly. For example character of jay Gatsby. Jay Gatsby is a rags to riches story; he is a millionaire having risen from a humble background. A son of unsuccessful small farmers, Gatsby could not remain satisfied with his fate. His desire for more took him on a path he had not reckoned for himself. It was his poverty that he could not win Daisy.


3) How did the film help in understanding the symbolic significance of 'The Valley of Ashes', 'The Eyes of Dr. T J Eckleberg' and 'The Green Light'?

The Green Light


Situated at the end of Daisy’s East Egg dock and barely visible from Gatsby’s West Egg lawn, the green light represents Gatsby’s hopes and dreams for the future. Gatsby associates it with Daisy, he reaches toward it in the darkness as a guiding light to lead him to his goal. Because Gatsby’s quest for Daisy is broadly associated with the American dream, the green light also symbolizes that more generalized ideal. In Chapter 9, Nick compares the green light to how America, rising out of the ocean, must have looked to early settlers of the new nation.

The Valley of Asheh 

 The valley of ashes between West Egg and New York City consists of a long stretch of desolate land created by the dumping of industrial ashes. It represents the moral and social decay that results from the uninhibited pursuit of wealth, as the rich indulge themselves with regard for nothing but their own pleasure. The valley of ashes also symbolizes the plight of the poor, like George Wilson, who live among the dirty ashes and lose their vitality as a result.


The Eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg


The eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg are a pair of fading, bespectacled eyes painted on an old advertising billboard over the valley of ashes. They may represent God staring down upon and judging American society as a moral wasteland, though the novel never makes this point explicitly. Instead, throughout the novel, Fitzgerald suggests that symbols only have meaning because characters instill them with meaning. The connection between the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg and God exists only in George Wilson’s grief-stricken mind. This lack of concrete significance contributes to the unsettling nature of the image. Thus, the eyes also come to represent the essential meaninglessness of the world and the arbitrariness of the mental process by which people invest objects with meaning. Nick explores these ideas in Chapter 8, when he imagines Gatsby’s final thoughts as a depressed consideration of the emptiness of symbols and dreams.


4) How did the film capture the theme of racism and sexism?




5) Watch the video on Nick Carraway and discuss him as a narrator.




Nick Carraway’s role in The Great Gatsby is more than just that of a narrator. He is the narrator of the well orchestrated Gatsby Drama but also an active character. He participates  actively in its events and action.  A wise and cultured young gentleman, Nick is also conscientious. He lends company to the readers throughout the novel, judging the events as they happen from his own unique perspective. His conscience and sense of morality differentiate him from the others.


Nick stands alone in the crowd. He feels somewhat lonely but much better than the filthily rich around him. He is a young man from Minnesota and a graduate from Yale who fought in the World War I. Then, he came to New York to indulge himself in bond business. He is generally quite reserved and honest. Nick is a confidant to Jay Gatsby, the central and most mysterious character of the novel who is full of troubling secrets. Being a friend of Gatsby, Nick gets a chance to peep into his soul and understand his love. Jay Gatsby is one of the newly rich living at Long Island and it does not take Nick very long to get to be friends with him. The important status in the novel that Nick enjoys is because of his closeness to Gatsby. However, He has got a more serious temperament as compared to Jay Gatsby.


1 comment:

  1. Good that you have put screen shots of film streaming session.

    ReplyDelete

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