1. Fitzgerald’s Writing Style
…to help you with Monday’s creative
writing assignment

2. In regards to Our Assignment…
I had some people tell me they are worried about this assignment:
“I’m not creative!”
“How am I supposed to write like Fitzgerald?!”
“This is impossible Keller!”
“Keller, you’re such an inspirational teacher, your salary should be doubled!”
“You really should consider doing modeling work over the summer!”
So I wondered how I could help Here are some tips and info.

3. Stay True to the Story
Be aware of the first four chapters. Does your story make logical sense connecting it to what we’ve previously read (in terms of plot and characters)?
Write from Nick’s perspective and his voice/ observational style with his personality in mind. Use past tense (I think I said present tense yesterday – that’s wrong).
While this is somewhat of a prediction activity, your goal isn’t to perfectly match The Great Gatsby’s plot in the second half of the novel. The story could go in many different directions. You just have to pick a reasonable direction.

4. Fitzgerald’s Style
This is the hardest part of the assignment. You need to understand his writing style and make your story sound like FSF’s distinctive form.
So…how do you do that?
1) Look at the quotes from the response
sheet, those are great representations of his
style and how he controls the language.

5. Fitzgerald’s Style
I thought about FSF’s style and searched the internet for info. Here’s some more advice:
2) (from schmoop.com): “It seems to us that
F. Scott Fitzgerald loves winding sentences
that begin with one idea, person, or
location and end up somewhere else
entirely.”
See example on page six.

6. Fitzgerald’s Style
FSF uses flashbacks throughout Gatsby. He starts out the novel with Nick talking about the events out east that happened in the past and then in various chapters different characters discuss events that happened years before (think about this in regards to chapter four). You might want to consider using this writing trait in your project.

7. Fitzgerald’s Style
You probably inherently understand more about FSF’s writing style than you think. So let’s try something. I’ll put up a passage from a writer you have read this year. Tell me which writer is being shown and WHY you understand it to be the specific writer you choose.

8. Other Authors’ Style
“That's the thing about girls. Every time they do something pretty, even if they're not much to look at, or even if they're sort of stupid, you fall in love with them, and then you never know where the hell you are. Girls. Jesus Christ. They can drive you crazy. They really can.” 

9. Other Authors’ Style
“If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.” 

10. Other Authors’ Style
“All brown all around, we are safe. But watch us drive into a neighborhood of another color and our knees go shakity-shake and our car windows get rolled up tight and our eyes look straight.”

11. Other Authors’ Style
“He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of women, nor of great occurrences, nor of great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his wife. He only dreamed of places now and the lions on the beach. They played like young cats in the dusk and he loved them as he loved the boy. He never dreamed about the boy. He simply woke, looked out the open door at the moon and unrolled his trousers and put them on.”