Chapter 9 Close Readings

Text says…I say… About five o’clock our procession of three cars reached the cemetery and stopped in a thick drizzle beside the gate—first a motor hearse, horribly black and wet, then Mr. Gatz and the minister and I in the limousine, and a little later four or five servants and the postman from West Egg in Gatsby’s station wagon, all wet to the skin. As we started through the gate into the cemetery I heard a car stop and then the sound of someone splashing after us over the soggy ground. I looked around. It was the man with owl-eyed glasses whom I had found marvelling over Gatsby’s books in the library one night three months before. - Very few people attend - those that do are only his father, Nick, the servants and Owl Eyes - Significance of Owl Eyes: the same man who noticed Gatsby’s books were uncut (a façade) also makes clear with his presence that society is just as fake Conclusion: The attendees at Gatsby’s funeral signal the reality of Gatsby’s legacy: in his life, Gatsby had very few real friends. The people he surrounded himself with were empty, immoral and selfish – a fact made obvious in the realization that Daisy (his dream) is not even present at his funeral.

Text says…I say… I couldn’t forgive him or like him but I saw that what he had done was, to him, entirely justified. It was all very careless and confused. They were careless people, Tom and Daisy - they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made... I shook hands with him; it seemed silly not to, for I felt suddenly as though I were talking to a child. Then he went into the jewellery store to buy a pearl necklace - or perhaps only a pair of cuff buttons - rid of my provincial squeamishness forever. (188) Tom and Daisy leave a wake of destruction wherever they go - Tom commits adultery, ruins Wilson’s marriage - Daisy gives Gatsby false hope - They have a child who suffers in the process - When the circumstances become challenging they run off (Gatsby’ challenged her current lifestyle – asking her to be with him) (Myrtle wants all of Tom) (when they die, neither of them is anywhere to be found) - Patch up problems w material goods Conclusion: Nick’s comment on Daisy and Tom reaffirms his assertions from the start of the novel; society is rife with careless people who use their wealth and status as means to trample on innocent people and aviod dealing with the reality of their actions.

Text says…I say… Most of the big shore places were closed now and there were hardly any lights except the shadowy, moving glow of a ferryboat across the Sound. And as the moon rose higher the inessential houses began to melt away until gradually I became aware of the old island here that flowered once for Dutch sailors’ eyes—a fresh, green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby’s house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder. (189) - Nick looks out at NY (Manhattan) and sees the world through the explorers/original settlers’ eyes - Nick imagines the hopefulness they must have felt as they looked at the untouched land and dreamt up a new life for themselves, full of possibility Conclusion: By paralleling the explorers (sailors) to Gatsby, Nick is commenting on humankind’s propensity to dream; however, he says it is the ‘last time in history’ as an allusion to the idea that once man has disturbed the untouched land, it is forever corrupted in some way (as is Gatsby’s dream).

Text says…I say… And as I sat there brooding on the old, unknown world, I thought of Gatsby’s wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night. - Wonder = suggestion of hope (the possibility of the American Dream) - Green light – symbol of his dream – symbol of the proximity of it, how it seemed so easily attained - Distance between him and his dream is the problem of being realistic in one’s expectations Conclusion: Nick reflects on Gatsby’s ambition: the green light, symbolic of his dream, has always seemed so close and yet, it was never within Gatsby’s reach. Consider this in conjunction with the last lines of the novel…

Text says…I say… 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. (189) - The dream eluded Gatsby - But, society (now Nick is referring to “us”) will continue to reach for the unattainable dream – working harder, reaching farther Conclusion: Nick makes clear that it is not just Gatsby, but society in general, that struggles to attain the American dream (whatever that is for the individual); he concludes the novel with the image of the impossibility of grasping the dream..