1. The Great Gatsby Discussion

2. Discussion Items Characters Setting Plot Theme Mood/Structure Fictional Technique Historical Context F. Scott Fitzgerald’s biography Your Point of View

3. Geography/Setting Midwest vs. East West Egg - where Nick and Gatsby live, represents new money East Egg - where Daisy lives, the more fashionable area, represents old money The City - New York City, where the characters escape to for work and play The Valley of Ashes- between the City and West Egg, site of Wilson’s gas station

4. Midwest versus East The East is corrupt. The West is innocent. Nick muses that this story is a story of the West even though it has taken place entirely on the East Coast. Nick, Jordan, Tom, and Daisy are all from west of the Appalachians. Nick remembers life in the Midwest, full of snow, trains, and Christmas wreaths, and thinks that the East seems grotesque and distorted by comparison.

5. Queens and Long Island The Valley of the Ashes is modeled on the city dump Fitzgerald passed many times, traveling between Manhattan and Great Neck. The huge fading eyes of T. J. Eckleburg convert a commonplace eyesore into a vast metaphor of modern desolation and futility. Great Neck is refashioned into West Egg. Manhasset is turned into East Egg (where the sun rises).

6. NYC In Manhattan: action takes place in specific locations. Tom's love nest is on west 158th Street. Nick first encounters Meyer Wolfshiem in a cellar restaurant on Forty-second Street. Nick dines at the Yale Club and often strolls afterward "down Madison Avenue past the old Murray Hill Hotel, and over Thirty-third Street to the Pennsylvania Station" (61). Wolfshiem's office is on frenzied Broadway. The main characters assemble at the Plaza Hotel, which Tom specifies as being on the south side of Central Park.

7. Classwork Find quotations that describe settings. Look for contrasts between east and west, night and day, rain and sun. Notice the sensory details and the language that SFS uses to develop these settings. Then…

8. Classwork Choose your favorite quotation. Do a LIP Analysis: – Literal translation: rewrite the text in Nutley English – Interpret: explain how the setting conveys a specific message or theme – Personal connection: make it yours. Draw a map or a diagram Write a description of the setting in modern day.