Literature and Society Course - ENG712 - 2024 PDF

The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies Literature and Society ENG712 Professor Magda Haroun Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies Faculty of Arts – Ain Shams University Cairo - 2024 Li...

The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies Literature and Society ENG712 Professor Magda Haroun Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies Faculty of Arts – Ain Shams University Cairo - 2024 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Professor Magda Haroun Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies Faculty of Arts – Ain Shams University Professor Magda Haroun 1 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Table of Contents No Topics Pages Introduction 3-6 The Role of Literature in Ch. 1 Society 7-22 Literature as a Tool for Social Ch. 2 Commentary and Critique 23-97 Power and Ideology in Ch. 3 Fahrenheit 451 98-108 Literature and the Ch. 4 Environment 109-123 Works Cited 124 Professor Magda Haroun 2 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Introduction Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not. —Dr. Suess’ The Lorax Welcome to level seven of the Interdisciplinary English Studies Program. This course will provide you with an insight into the extant of how much literature forms an integral part of the heritage and culture of any society. On the other hand, society shapes literature through various influences, such as historical events, social changes, and cultural diffusion. The course seeks to underline the intertwined relationship between literature and society. Literature is a reflection of society and its issues; it represents the cultural norms, traditions, beliefs, and values of a society. In fact, literature could be described as ‘the Professor Magda Haroun 3 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 lighthouse’ of society’s culture. This course aims to provide students with multiple perspectives on the role of literature in society through the discussion of selected texts. Hence, the student is encouraged to practice critical thinking, through the application of critical theories in the analysis of literary works from different periods and cultural contexts. Participation in class activities and research work are required. Intended Learning Outcomes: 1. To develop an understanding of the ways in which literature reflects and shapes society. 2. To analyze and interpret literary texts with cultural and historical sensitivity. 3. To consider the politics of representation in literature, including issues of gender, race, class and Professor Magda Haroun 4 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 sexuality. 4. To assess the impact of literature on society, including literary works that have sparked social movements or challenged dominant ideologies. 5. To Develop critical thinking skills in analyzing and evaluating literary works and their relation to society. 6. To foster understanding of different perspectives and experiences through literary texts. 7. To enhance written and oral communication skills through analysis and discussion of literary texts. 8. To consider connections between literature and other forms of cultural expression, such as film and art. 9. To engage in scholarly research and writing on literature and society. Professor Magda Haroun 5 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 10. To develop an appreciation for the power of language and storytelling to shape our understanding of the world. The material provided in this electronic book is a compilation of sources and information mentioned in the works cited. Suggested References Attridge, Derek. 2004. The Singularity of Literature. Routledge. Luhmann, Niklas. 2000. Art as a Social System. Transl. Eva M. Knodt. Stanford University Press. Rockwell, Joan. 1974. Fact in Fiction: The uses of Literature in the systematic study of Society. Routledge. Professor Magda Haroun 6 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter 1 The Role of Literature in Society 1-1 The Impact of Literature 1-2 Literature within the Context of its Time Period 1-3 Exemplifications Professor Magda Haroun 7 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter 1 The Role of Literature in Society (1-1) The Impact of Literature. The relationship between literature and society is symbiotic. Literature possesses an unparalleled ability to capture the complexities of human emotions, relationships and cultural dynamics, providing an insightful commentary on societal issues. Conversely, society plays a crucial in influencing literary production through social changes and historical events. Literature serves as a medium for self- expression, social change, and social justice, and by doing so, provides a lens through which we can understand the sociopolitical forces that shape our lives. Professor Magda Haroun 8 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Literature provides a platform for society to examine its issues, values, and culture. It promotes imagination and critical skills, which are needed to deal with real world problems. Literature changes with time, reflecting the social changes and progress made over the years. New social movements often spur new literary genres and themes. For instance, the emergence of feminist literature reflects the social changes and reforms of the modern women’s rights movements. Literature is not just entertainment, but a tool for intellectual stimulation and emotional growth. It allows us to better develop our critical thinking skills and exposes us to diverse perspectives. Literature has the power to inspire social change and ignite empathy for those who are different from us. Professor Magda Haroun 9 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Literature is an essential part of culture and reflects the values, beliefs, and social norms of a society. It can serve as a means of escape from society, and as a tool for challenging dominant ideologies and critiquing systems of power, as well as, changing societal norms. Literature has the power to inspire and educate, providing readers with new perspectives and opening their minds to different experiences. Hence, it can help us better understand and navigate the complexities of the world we live in. It provides insights into history, politics, religion, and other subjects that are critical to understanding society and culture. Literature serves as a medium for the preservation and shaping of cultural identities and heritage. It is a reflection of a community's values, beliefs, and Professor Magda Haroun 10 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 practices. Through literature, we can understand the collective consciousness of a particular culture and how it has evolved over time. Literature is a medium that enables individuals to express themselves creatively and share their thoughts and emotions. It captures individual experiences and perceptions of society and fulfills a vital social function by providing an insightful commentary on societal issues. The social, economical, and political context of a particular period shape literature, making it a direct reflection of the society in which it is written. For instance, the African-American literary movement was a product of slavery and the African- American struggle for freedom and human rights. Furthermore, literature allows for the representation of diverse voices and perspectives. It Professor Magda Haroun 11 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 offers individuals from various backgrounds to share their life stories, struggles, and cultural heritage. By doing so, literature challenges dominant ideologies and sheds light on overlooked aspects of society. It fills in the gaps left behind by the mainstream media by presenting a more nuanced view of society that extends beyond stereotypes. Moreover, literature serves as a medium for social change. It has the power to expose societal flaws and prompt social change movements. Through the portrayal of social issues, literature can help initiate a dialogue on various issues and promote social justice. For instance, Charles Dickens' classic novel, Oliver Twist, throws light on social injustice and the plight of the poor in Victorian England, thus catalyzing social reform efforts. Professor Magda Haroun 12 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 (1-2) Literature within the Context of its Time Period Life is the raw material from which the creative imagination of great writers generates works of fiction that are truer than life—truer because they probe and reveal more deeply its real character. Historical events, cultural movements, and prevailing ideologies inform the themes and styles of literature, making it a historical artifact as much as an artistic endeavor. Writers could weave historical events into their story, where the very plot is based on these events. In Les Misérables, Victor Hugo devotes entire chapters to the Napoleonic Wars and the 1832 June Rebellion. Other writers describe historical and social movements more implicitly. In Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield, the Industrial Revolution and its impact on Britain form the backdrop of the protagonist David’s life. There are yet other writers whose works capture social changes Professor Magda Haroun 13 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 more subtly. For example, Jane Austen, whose books, as all great literature offer insights into human psychology with great subtlety. The influence of literature on society is felt directly or indirectly. One of the most powerful ways literature promotes social change is by giving voice to people who are marginalized and oppressed. Literature allows them to tell their stories, share their perspectives, and provide insights into their lived experiences. For example, the novel "The Color Purple" by Alice Walker tells the story of Celie, an African-American woman who faces racism, patriarchy, and oppression. The novel provides a first- person account of her struggle for identity, love, and independence, and highlights the intersection of race, gender, and class in oppression. Literature also raises awareness of social issues and injustices. Many books, poems, and plays have Professor Magda Haroun 14 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 tackled issues such as racism, sexism, poverty, and discrimination. "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, for instance, challenged racism and segregation in the American South, while Ken Saro-Wiwa's poetry exposed the environmental and social injustices perpetrated by multinational corporations in Nigeria. Books such as "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood explore the oppression of women and the dangers of totalitarianism. Such works raise consciousness of the problems that exist in our society, challenging readers to take action. Moreover, literature allows us to imagine alternatives to existing social systems. Utopian and dystopian fiction, for example, can inspire people to envision a better future or warn us about the consequences of inaction. Works such as "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley and "1984" by George Orwell, for example, offer a bleak view of what Professor Magda Haroun 15 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 society could look like if we continue on our current path. However, they also inspire readers to work towards preventing such a society from becoming a reality. Finally, literature can provide a platform for social and political activism. Poems, plays, and other forms of literature can serve as a means of protest against social injustices. Miss Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin' was directly responsible for a movement against slavery in literature and life in USA of those days. The novels of Charles Dickens had an indirect influence in motivating society to recognize the need for addressing social wrongs, and undertaking the necessary reforms. During the civil rights movement in the United States, for instance, writers such as Maya Angelou, Langston Hughes, and James Baldwin used their writings to express their political views. Often, their works reached wider audiences than Professor Magda Haroun 16 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 speeches or rallies and helped galvanize public opinion. Literature has always played a significant role in promoting human rights and raising awareness about issues related to social justice, freedom, equality, and individuality. Professor Magda Haroun 17 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 (1-3) Exemplifications. Throughout history, literature has often been used as a mirror to reflect society and the issues that affect it. In fact, literature is made out of the lore of life. No doubt, the realistic artist brings to a focus the oddities and cruder aspects of life overmuch. But to know life fully, not only the bright side but also the seamy and dark side of life is to be known. Here are few examples of how literature constitutes a significant tool in shaping cultural identity and preserving cultural heritage: 1. Chinua Achebe's "Things Fall Apart" - This novel explores the clash of cultures between the British colonizers and the traditional Igbo culture in Nigeria. Through the protagonist Okonkwo, the novel portrays the importance of preserving one's cultural heritage and identity, despite the pressures of colonization. Professor Magda Haroun 18 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 2. Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "One Hundred Years of Solitude" - This novel highlights the significance of storytelling in preserving cultural history. The novel's magical realism and non-linear narrative reflect the oral tradition of storytelling prevalent in Latin American culture. 3. Alice Walker's "The Color Purple" - This novel portrays the significance of cultural heritage in shaping identity and values. Set in rural Georgia, the novel explores the lives of African American women in the early 20th century and their struggle for self- expression and cultural preservation. 4. Toni Morrison's "Beloved" - This novel explores the impact of slavery on African American identity and cultural heritage. The protagonist, Sethe, is haunted by the memory of her daughter, Beloved, who represents the collective trauma of slavery that still shapes African American culture. Professor Magda Haroun 19 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 5. "Atonement" by Ian McEwan - a novel that tackles the impact of personal choices on individuals and society during World War II and beyond. 6. "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood - a dystopian novel that highlights the dangers of patriarchal societies and restrictive societal norms. This speculative fiction novel explores the subjugation of women and issues of reproductive rights, reflecting contemporary concerns about gender inequality and the erosion of civil liberties. 7. "The Cairo Trilogy" by Naguib Mahfouz - This trilogy follows the lives of a family in Cairo from the early 1900s to the 1950s, offering a panoramic portrait of Egyptian society and its evolution during the twentieth century. 8. "Death and the King's Horseman" by Wole Soyinka: Although written by a Nigerian author, this Professor Magda Haroun 20 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 play addresses themes of power, tradition, and colonialism that are relevant across the Arabic- speaking world. It shows how literature can provoke critical thinking and reflection on important social issues. 9. "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee - This classic novel explores issues of racism and injustice within the legal system, reflecting the deep-seated prejudices that existed in Southern society during the 1930s. 10. "Animal Farm" by George Orwell - This allegorical novella satirizes the Soviet Union and the rise of Communism, reflecting the political turmoil of the early 20th century. 11. "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald - This novel portrays the excesses of the 1920s Jazz Age and serves as a critique of the corrupting influence of Professor Magda Haroun 21 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 wealth and the superficiality of American society during that time. 12. Langston Hughes poems represent a powerful indictment of the injustice and inequality that black people faced, and a call for the establishment of a more just and equitable society. In the following chapters, there will be an analytical exploration of selected literary works that highlight the intersection of literature and social issues like class, power dynamics, technology, environment, and human rights. Professor Magda Haroun 22 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter 2 Literature as a Tool for Social Commentary and Critique 2-1 The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 2-2 List of Characters of The Great Gatsby 2-3 Synopsis and Analysis 2-4 Summary 2-5 Critical Review Professor Magda Haroun 23 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter 2 Literature as a Tool for Social Commentary (2-1) The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The Great Gatsby (1925) by F. Scott Fitzgerald reflects the society and literature of the 1920s. This novel explores the decadence and excess of the “Jazz Age” in America, a time when people were focused on pleasure, materialism, and social status. Firstly, the novel highlights the changes in American society post World War I. The war had led to disillusionment amongst the youth, who had witnessed the horrors of war. As a result, many of them rejected the social norms of their parents and looked for new ways to express themselves. This led to the emergence of the ‘Flapper Girl’, a new type of Professor Magda Haroun 24 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 female who smoked, drank, and showed off her sexuality openly. We see this reflected in the character of Jordan Baker, a professional golfer who is independent and self-assured. Secondly, The Great Gatsby explores the idea of the American Dream, a concept that suggests that anybody can achieve success and happiness through hard work and determination. Fitzgerald portrays this dream as hollow, corrupt, and probably unattainable. The character of Gatsby embodies this ideal, as he is a self-made man who has risen from poverty to become a millionaire. However, his wealth is built on illegal activities, and his obsession with Daisy leads to his downfall. Finally, The Great Gatsby also highlights the moral decay of America during the 1920s. The characters in the novel are focused on their own pleasures and desires, and they are willing to do Professor Magda Haroun 25 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 whatever it takes to achieve them. The atmosphere of hedonism, corruption, and moral decay is embodied in the parties held at Gatsby's mansion. The characters are constantly drunk, engaging in casual sex, and behaving recklessly. The Great Gatsby is a novel that reflects the society and literature of the 1920s. Through its portrayal of the decadence, excess, and moral decay of the “Jazz Age,” the novel provides a snapshot of a time when America was going through significant changes and grappling with new ideas and norms. Professor Magda Haroun 26 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 (2-2) List of Characters of The Great Gatsby. Nick Carraway narrates the story of The Great Gatsby as he recalls the events of the novel from two years afterward. After moving to West Egg to be out of New York but still close enough to work there as a money manager, he rents a house directly next door to Jay Gatsby. His perspective of the novel’s events is colored by his feelings of difference and absence in comparison to that of the rich characters as well as by the spectacle of Gatsby’s tragic quest for Daisy. Daisy Buchanan, Nick’s distant cousin, is married to Tom Buchanan. She is described variously as a socially adept but cynical woman, a smart but typical flapper, a girl with “a voice full of money.” Jay Gatsby met her once and began a romance, but the romance ebbed and Daisy married Tom Buchanan. Tom Buchanan, Daisy’s husband, is having an affair with Myrtle Wilson, the wife of a garage owner whose dingy shop is located in the “valley of ashes” between Manhattan and the fashionable communities of East and West Egg. Tom is described as cold, forceful, arrogant, and affluent. Professor Magda Haroun 27 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Myrtle Wilson loathes her mechanic husband, George. She has an affair with Tom Buchanan and is portrayed as thick and pompous. Ultimately, she is killed when Daisy, while driving Jay Gatsby’s car, accidentally hits her in the valley of ashes. George seeks out and kills Gatsby, thinking Gatsby Myrtle’s lover and murderer. Jordan Baker is a golf-pro who attends Gatsby’s parties and meets Nick at the Buchanans’ early in the novel. While living largely at the expense of the Buchanans, Jordan is frequently Nick’s guide through the labyrinths of excess that characterize Gatsby’s parties, and asks Nick to arrange for Gatsby to surprise Daisy. Jordan and Nick pursue a brief love affair. Jay Gatsby is the assumed name of the young affluent who owns the sprawling house on West Egg next to which Nick Carraway lives and to which hordes of Manhattan socialites flock each Friday night for over-the- top parties. Gatsby throws elaborate parties held solely to attract Daisy Buchanan to attend them. Gatsby’s hope is to rekindle a long lost romance with Daisy. Professor Magda Haroun 28 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 (2-3) Synopsis and Analysis. Over nine chapters, F. Scott Fitzgerald constructed a novel that he once confessed in a letter sounded almost like pulp when one simply wrote down the bones of the story. Jimmy Gatz falls in love with Daisy, a young woman from a wealthy family, but at the time lacks the financial resources and confidence in his past necessary to propose marriage. He leaves then, determined to make his fortune that he may return to marry her and support her in a manner reasonable for her expectations and her class. He changes his name to Jay Gatsby, earns his fortune through illicit means, bootlegging and organized gambling, and as he earns it so quickly, he is not in possession of the bearing and mores to handle wealth to which so many of Daisy’s suitors were born. His house, his clothing, his car—all scream of his “new” wealth, making his wealth less alluring than that of “old money.” Professor Magda Haroun 29 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 In the quest to lure Daisy to him, he purchases a home near hers and begins to throw enormous parties, solely meant to attract her interest, such that she would eventually stroll into his home during one of his parties, discover him, and fall in love all over again. Incidentally, Nick Carraway, Daisy’s second cousin, moves in next door. When Gatsby realizes the family relationship, he asks Nick to help him “accidentally” encounter Daisy again. When Nick does, Gatsby learns that Daisy is unhappily married to Tom Buchanan, a rich boor. Daisy is impressed with the things Gatsby has amassed. However, Daisy is also fickle, unpredictable, and more complicated than Jay Gatsby assumes. Moreover, her marriage to Tom provides her with benefits and comforts that Gatsby cannot match, and due to his limited experience, cannot understand. After Tom confronts Gatsby during a drunken lark in the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan, everyone leaves in Professor Magda Haroun 30 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 separate cars. Daisy and Gatsby race back in his car and, with Daisy driving, they strike down and kill a woman coming out to meet them, Myrtle Wilson, Tom’s vapid and déclassé mistress. Daisy and Gatsby drive away, not even stopping. Myrtle’s husband, George, is enraged and is intent on tracing the killer. Having seen the car earlier, and knowing Tom through his garage business, George finds out who owned the deadly car. George assumes that Gatsby was the driver and kills him. In the denouement, no one attends Gatsby’s funeral except his decrepit father, Nick, and a senile partygoer. Daisy and Tom travel abroad. George Wilson goes to jail. Nick moves on, with the realization that contorted dreams, such as Jay Gatsby’s, could drive us against the unknown world and hence be the cause of one’s ruin. Of course, the novel contains far more than the just- mentioned series of events. Fitzgerald himself wrote to Professor Magda Haroun 31 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Maxwell Perkins, his famous editor at Scribner’s, that it was his intent to write an intricately crafted novel along the lines of his heroes, Conrad and Thackeray, and one that would be wholly different than anything that had come before. Fitzgerald’s prose is often celebrated for its lyrical quality and vivid imagery. The novel’s critique of materialism and exploration of human aspiration continue to resonate with modern audiences, making it a timeless work. It serves as a mirror reflecting the aspirations and failures of American society while inviting readers to contemplate the broader implications of their own pursuits and dreams. Its artistic merit combined with its cultural critique secures its place as a cornerstone of American literature. Professor Magda Haroun 32 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 (2-4) Summary. Epigraph and Chapter One Though attributed to Thomas Parke D’Invilliers, Fitzgerald himself actually wrote the novel’s epigraph. As a statement fronting the book, it could have been instructions given to Jimmy Gatz on how to approach the one for which he pined: Then wear the gold hat, if that will move her; If you can bounce If you can bounce high, bounce for her too, Till she cry “Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover I must have In other words, do what you must, young Gatz. Earn gold, dance, what have you. If you do things she likes, she will be yours. (The epigraph is meant to draw Professor Magda Haroun 33 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 attention to the foolish intent of winning affection by flaunting wealth). By 1925, Fitzgerald had earned a reputation as a trustworthy first chronicler of the “flapper,” a young woman who chafed against the prohibitions of the period. Fitzgerald knew, while such feats as high- bouncing and wearing a gold hat might impress a young woman of the time, she was just as likely to leave a young man on his own at the end of the evening, or to kiss another man in the very next dance. So the advice comes from someone antiquated by comparison, some name that sounds neither “American” nor modern: Thomas Parke D’Invilliers, a name that sounds as though it belonged to a stuffed- shirt poet of the Victorian era—and certainly not a modern man, one who understands the industrial age and the changing face of everything when cast against Professor Magda Haroun 34 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 the great doubt and wasteland created in the aftermath of the Great War. Chapter One opens with Nick Carraway introducing the story to readers, while first introducing himself, and telling how he, a person of solid Midwestern upbringing, happened to fall in with a crowd of eastern decadents. He begins asserting that he is careful to criticize, and while he explains why, the explanation also provides a clue into why he is the perfect narrator for the story. He says, “I’m inclined to reserve all judgments, a habit that has opened up many curious natures to me.” As we see throughout the novel, Nick does inspire people to moments of candor, of confession, such that he is not only a witness, he is the only person privy to the real characters of the individuals he encounters. Nick’s explanation and constant qualification of how he came to be in the East (“my aunts and uncles talking Professor Magda Haroun 35 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 it over as if they were choosing a prep school for me, and finally said, ‘Why ye-es,’ with very grave, hesitant faces... the Middle West now seemed like the ragged edge of the universe—”) also serves to give readers a sense of the trauma to come. Nick’s foreboding narration gives immediate tension to the tale, particularly as much of the foreboding is centered on the first mention of Gatsby. For Fitzgerald, through the cipher of Nick Carraway, the perversion in this case was “what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out [Nick’s] interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men.” Fitzgerald does not have Nick tell the reader yet what it is; the answer is complicated, and requires the story. It is not simply affluence, nor is it moral decay in the face of fatalism. Neither is it aspiration; although, for Nick, Gatsby’s acquisitive zeal and corruptibility by Professor Magda Haroun 36 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 wealth and status turned him into a man “who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn,” the man himself still possessed “an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I will ever find again.” Unlike all the other characters Nick met, Gatsby had hope. Nick details the business circumstances that resulted in his being in West Egg, as opposed to the more fashionable East Egg. West Egg was the nouveau riche locale, and East Egg had old mansions of older money. Gatsby, of course, lived at West Egg. The Buchanans lived at East Egg. Nick rented one of the few remaining small houses left on West Egg. Outside the city, in the Long Island communities housing the social elite, Nick finds promise: “I had the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with summer.” Fitzgerald’s style mirrors Nick’s feeling through metaphor: “so Professor Magda Haroun 37 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 much fine health to be pulled down out of the young breath-giving air.” Nick describes Gatsby’s mansion, as an enormous anachronistic palace, gaudy even for the time, part of a late nineteenth-century revival of Gothic and Roman architecture. The description reveals its vulgarity: “factual imitation,” “a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy.” Nick, also, acquaints the reader with East Egg, and the “white palaces”— marking the beginning of Fitzgerald’s constant use of color, particularly white, to indicate status. White—as well as gold and silver—are almost exclusively used throughout The Great Gatsby to signal an ethereal affluence. Nick introduces Tom before he does Daisy, perhaps because Tom is an easier person for Nick to nail down in a few words. Tom is an athletic sort, at one time a famous football player at Yale. But his glory days have Professor Magda Haroun 38 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 passed; Nick says he was “one of those men who reached such an acute limited excellence at twenty-one that everything afterward savors of anticlimax.” In other words, Tom peaked early in life. But he is wealthy, enough to buy polo ponies, spend a year idling in France, do things which make Nick find it “hard to realize that a man in my own generation was wealthy enough to do.” Stylistic innovation and color both are very much at work in the first section: the house is red and white, the front yard features “burning gardens,” and Tom Buchanan stands, legs apart like a colossus, on the porch, surveying his domain as he awaits Nick. Tom is then described in a paragraph featuring such modifiers as “hard,” “supercilious,” “arrogant,” “dominance,” “aggressively,” “power,” and “cruel.” Tom’s strength is something of an act. Nick notes Tom’s need for approval, that Tom wanted Nick to like Professor Magda Haroun 39 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 him “with some harsh, defiant wistfulness” (another unusual grouping of words). Tom declares to Nick that he has a “nice place here,” rather than asking Nick’s opinion. Tom’s strength, his home, his rude superiority and his almost brittle need for approval combine to suggest the conflicts at work within him, conflicts with consequences for the plot of The Great Gatsby. Once the two men enter the house, a “rosy-colored space,” everything is in motion, a device used by Fitzgerald in many scenes involving the Buchanans and their friends. Nick’s attention is drawn to Daisy and Jordan, both in white. Jordan is described as someone attempting to balance an object on her chin, almost as though she were a statue. Daisy, on the other hand, is charming, playful and absurd, a spirit of contradiction from the first moment. As both the narrator as well as a participant, Nick’s role allows the reader to experience the story through Professor Magda Haroun 40 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 his perspective. With a character like Daisy, someone so adept at charming people, it is helpful and important (in this case) to have a narrator who can help the reader fathom out Daisy’s character. Thus, when Daisy greets Nick, holding his hand and “looking up into [his] face, promising there was no one in the world she so much wanted to see,” he can tell the reader, frankly, “That was a way she had.” In Nick and Gatsby’s eyes, Daisy represents a promise, an entirety of light and delight not fully attainable. She is also self-indulgent, flirtatious, and fragile. As she jokes with Nick about Chicago and how everyone misses her, she refers once to her child, a three-year-old daughter, and Tom breaks into the discussion only to compare vocations with Nick. When Tom hears that Nick works in bonds, he dismisses the narrator’s firm “decisively.” When Nick says that Tom will soon know Professor Magda Haroun 41 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 the firm if he stays in the East, Tom declares he’d be “a God damned fool to live anywhere else.” The scene moves on through a number of details that would seem frivolous, and immoral. The presence of booze throughout the book seem provocative. Tom curses and takes a drink as if “it were a drop in the bottom of a glass,” an important detail during Prohibition and amidst widespread temperance movements left over from the period after the Civil War. The amounts of money referred to would also have been exorbitant; in Chapter Two, Myrtle Wilson’s sister, Catherine, mentions losing $1,200 in two days while in Europe. Given that most Americans of typical means in 1925 had never left the state in which they lived, and they made scarcely more than $1,200 per year, both details would have revealed a world of privilege as alien as the surface of the moon. Jordan Professor Magda Haroun 42 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Baker complains of lounging the afternoon away on the couch, whereas most Americans at the time would have been working six or seven days a week, and leisure time would have been largely unheard of. Jordan is different from the Buchanans in that she is not a celebrity due to society or generations of wealth, and her demeanor and description supports it. She is a professional athlete, and so is still part of the society of affluence and leisure, but of a lesser level than the wealthy Buchanans. The conversation turns to Gatsby, but is cut short by dinner, through which Tom sulks and launches into a boorish conversation on race and supremacy which he instigates after taking umbrage at Daisy’s referring to him as a “brute of a man, a great, big, hulking physical specimen.” When Tom is called from the table to answer the phone, Jordan tells Nick, “Tom’s got some woman in New York.” Professor Magda Haroun 43 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 As the light leaves, so, too, does her attitude change. As the twilight moves in, and candles wink out, Daisy tells Nick, finally, “I’ve had a very bad time, Nick, and I’m pretty cynical about everything.” When she confesses her feelings of loneliness at the birth of her daughter, not knowing where Tom was, she tells Nick that she hoped her daughter would grow into a “fool— that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Daisy’s cynicism is also a bit fashionable, as she herself points out. However real the sense of disillusionment was amongst the generation that fought in and returned from World War I, many also adopted the fashionable and iconoclastic position of cynicism in the face of a burgeoning American economy based on the strong pseudo-secular zeal of the Protestant work ethic. Disaffection and cynicism were rampant among Professor Magda Haroun 44 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 the culturally elite. Daisy’s possible faddishness is revealed in her overwrought exclamation to Nick: “You see I think everything’s terrible anyhow,” she went on in a convinced way. “Everybody thinks so— the most advanced people. And I know. I’ve been everywhere and seen everything and done everything.” Her eyes flashed around her in a defiant way, rather like Tom’s, and she laughed with thrilling scorn. “Sophisticated—God, I’m sophisticated!” Daisy compares herself to Tom: she wants everyone to think her sophisticated in the same way Tom wants everyone to think him, rich and powerful. Daisy is, as Nick says, convinced in the way that the desperate are convinced: she has averred her own sophistication for so long that she has come to believe her own hype. Nick feels the “basic insincerity of what she had said.” At that moment, Nick feels quite forcefully the gap between himself and the Buchanans, and it is a Professor Magda Haroun 45 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 foreshadowing of the increasing isolation he will feel from everyone else in the novel. Daisy looks at Nick and he sees her assert “her membership in a rather distinguished secret society to which she and Tom belonged.” And one to which Nick most assuredly does not belong. When Nick returns home, he sees Gatsby for the first time. He mistakenly thinks his neighbor is looking at the stars. Gatsby’s posture impresses Nick, as he seems comfortable, sure, even graceful. Then, Gatsby does something surprising that arrests Nick’s attention: “he stretched his eyes toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling.” Nick only sees a green light, the light readers later learn shines from the end of the Buchanans’ dock. Chapter Two Professor Magda Haroun 46 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter Two depicts Nick’s foray into the city with Tom and his mistress and the drunken shenanigans that ensue. The first few paragraphs introduce readers to two of the most enduring symbols in The Great Gatsby: the valley of the ashes and the eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg. The valley of ashes is “that solemn dumping ground,” the industrial stretch between East and West Egg and Manhattan, where everything is gray. Nick says the ash forms “grotesque gardens,” taking shape as “houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of ash-gray men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.” It is a stylized depiction of the neighborhoods and blocks where working people—those who are not of Daisy and Tom’s “distinguished secret society,” or even of Nick’s own class—live. The bleakness and despondency of their lives and fates, as perceived by Professor Magda Haroun 47 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Nick and others, are the realities from which Gatsby himself had fled. The ordinary is thus conceived of as horrific, crumbling, hopeless—quotidian with fatal verve. Queens is, then, neither the ribald bustle of Manhattan nor the moneyed enclave of the Eggs. It is drudgery, where fire’s only evidence is the ash left after consumption. If there is any question as to the importance of the symbol to the novel, consider that one of Fitzgerald’s several working titles for the novel was “Among Ash Heaps and Millionaires.” The valley of ashes powders under the watchful eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg. Long ago erected by “some wild wag of an oculist” to “fatten his practice in the boroughs of Queens,” the eyes of the doctor “brood” like those of a despondent god. George Wilson later sees them almost literally as the eyes of God. They are also ever seeing, overseeing, never blinking, and take the role of conscience, witness, and judge. Professor Magda Haroun 48 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Because a “small foul river” borders the valley, the train into the city is often delayed at the drawbridge, making passengers “stare at the dismal scene for as long as half an hour.” That delay, Nick tells the reader, resulted in his meeting Tom Buchanan’s mistress. The two had been heading into New York when they hit the delay and, rather than waiting, Tom suddenly says, “I want you to meet my girl.” He “literally forced” Nick off the train and the two walk along “under Doctor Eckleburg’s persistent stare.” The stare comes after Tom’s brazen admission to a mistress, and watches Nick’s (however reluctant) complicity in going to meet the woman. They end up at George Wilson’s garage, described as “unprosperous and bare,” in stark contrast to the sumptuous animation of the Buchanan home. It is a “shadow of a garage,” another contrast to the light constantly surrounding Daisy and Tom. George Wilson Professor Magda Haroun 49 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 himself wipes his hand on “a piece of waste,” is a “spiritless man, anæmic,” and when he sees the two, “a damp gleam of hope sprang” into his eyes. Myrtle Wilson’s presence contrasts forcefully with Daisy Buchanan’s. She literally “blocks out the light,” carries “surplus flesh sensuously,” and her face “contained no facet or gleam of beauty.” But where Daisy is charm and illusion, lightness and façade, Myrtle Wilson has “an immediately perceptible vitality about her as if the nerves of her body were continually smouldering.” The reasons for Tom’s attraction are underscored by Fitzgerald’s use of fire imagery in the initial description of both characters. For Tom, it was the burning gardens. With Myrtle, it is her smoldering of vitality. She walks through “her husband as if he were a ghost” and orders him around, clearly dominating him. Professor Magda Haroun 50 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 As George moves to get chairs, Nick notes the “white ashen dust” covering his shoulders, linking the dust, perhaps, to the Buchanans and their ilk. The valley of ashes is covered in the ash drifting down from on high, from the fiery consumption of the elite. It veils everything, Nick notes. Nick and Tom leave after Tom tells Myrtle to get on a train, to meet him in the city. The use of color and characterization continues in the scene which follows, wherein Tom and Myrtle meet in New York. Myrtle wears a brown dress, picks up a copy of Town Tattler, a rough equivalent to today’s Star magazine, or Us Weekly, a tabloid that, in its day, followed the exploits of Broadway and the fledgling movie industry, then still centered in New York. She chatters about getting a dog for the apartment. In all aspects, she reveals her station as below that of the Buchanans. Professor Magda Haroun 51 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 In Tom and Myrtle’s apartment Nick notices a single picture, “an over-enlarged photograph, apparently a hen sitting on a blurred rock.” As he looks at it, readers learn it resembles a famous optical illusion—resonating with the illusory quality of Myrtle’s aspirations to culture. That the illusion is really Myrtle’s mother is yet another layer of revelation. The McKees arrive as well. He is a photographer, the one who took the photo of Myrtle’s mother, and is, like George, dominated by his carping wife. As the conversation progresses, Catherine asks Nick if he knows Gatsby. She tells him that people think Gatsby is a descendant of Kaiser Wilhelm, the ruler of Germany before and during World War I. It is the first of many rumors Nick will hear about his neighbour. Many critics have written about how Fitzgerald’s decision to delay the truth about Gatsby’s past Professor Magda Haroun 52 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 contributes to the novel’s tension and makes Gatsby the memorable character he becomes. As Catherine tells Nick about how neither Myrtle nor Tom could stand their spouses, Myrtle overhears and soon launches into a tirade about how George fooled her into marrying her. Chapter Three The chapter begins with one of the famous passages of the book: the first description of Gatsby’s Friday night parties. In it, Fitzgerald summarizes a list of delights and actions that go into the making of a Gatsby event, the particulars meant to lure Daisy Buchanan to his home. In this case, the list serves to highlight the magical quality of the parties and how they first impressed Nick and the many other partygoers. The sentences mix numerous poetic images: “In his blue gardens men and Professor Magda Haroun 53 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars.” As well, the unusual word pairings are also at work: turkeys are “bewitched to a dark gold,” motor boats “slit the water,” the hors- d’oeuvre are “glistening,” the orchestra plays “yellow cocktail music,” and so on. The flappers are “wanderers, confident girls who weave here and there among the stouter and more stable” until “suddenly one of these gypsies, in trembling opal, seizes a cocktail out of the air, dumps it down for courage, and... dances out alone on the canvas platform.” At this display, Nick tells the reader in understatement, “The party has begun.” Much of the criticism of The Great Gatsby considers the roles and portrayals of women in the book. Much of the action of the novel leading to strange or unruly behavior by men is instigated by women. Gatsby’s desire and fortune-craving are inspired by Daisy. Daisy Professor Magda Haroun 54 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 also charms Nick before repelling him and changing his understanding of the world he has encountered. Nick arrives at the first party at the behest of Gatsby; an invitation arrives via Gatsby’s butler (dressed, notably, in blue). Nick attends, dressed in white, the color of the Buchanans and their ilk. After all the celebration of the party dressings, the first thing Nick notices is commerce: “young Englishmen... all well dressed, all looking a little hungry, and all talking in low, earnest voices to solid and prosperous Americans.” The women are young, impetuous, boozy, and vital; the men are solid, sober, hungry, reserved, scheming. Nick feels out of place, and is about to “get roaring drunk from sheer embarrassment,” when Jordan Baker finds him. As he begins to speak with her, two young women (in yellow dresses) approach her, star-struck by her celebrity as a golfer. As they talk, Nick learns that Professor Magda Haroun 55 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 one of them had torn her (blue) dress at a previous party, and that Gatsby had sent her a new one (the cost is $265, another instance of detail revealing much about character, status, and the like). One of the girls notes, importantly, that “There’s something funny about a fellow that’ll do a thing like that... He doesn’t want any trouble with anybody.” One of the girls then says, “Somebody told me they thought he killed a man once.” Another breaks in with the rumor that he was a spy, another that he had grown up in Germany, and so on. The speculation causes others to lean in, to try to hear more. Gatsby’s whereabouts is the object of so much debate, causing Nick to observe: “It was testimony to the romantic speculation he inspired that there were whispers about him from those who had found little that it was necessary to whisper about in this world.” Professor Magda Haroun 56 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 After finishing dinner, Nick and Jordan go to look for Gatsby, as Jordan senses Nick’s discomfort at not yet having met the host. In the library, however, they find an older man in spectacles, drunk, looking over some of the books, crying that the library actually held things of substance—an important comment given the ethereality of the parties, the women, the conversations, the rumors. In some ways, situated far into the house, concealed from most and away from the parties, the library symbolizes the kernel of substance at the heart of the mythical Gatsby. The old man, later, crashes a car to conclude the chapter, a foreshadowing of the disaster to come. When Nick experiences Gatsby in person, after all the innuendo and rumor, he is unsure if the man he is meeting is genuine or just another invention, similar to the rumors. Of course, Gatsby is an invention; the reader simply does not yet know this to be true. Professor Magda Haroun 57 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Fitzgerald has carefully layered the first impression, such that the evidence and suspicion are present in the very language, so that the reader’s impressions of Gatsby have the same uneasy quality as Nick’s. Gatsby leaves to take a call from Chicago, a town most famous at the time for corruption. Prohibition had led to the rise of gang activities most famously connected to Al Capone. Given the context of conjecture regarding Gatsby’s past, his taking a call from Chicago creates an atmosphere of suspicion. Nick reveals to Jordan that he had expected Gatsby “would be a florid and corpulent person in his middle years.” The unspoken suggestion was that Gatsby was too young, a bit too dashing, to have really worked for the massive fortune he had attained. He had not inherited it, that anyone knew, so how did he come about it? Jordan reveals another rumor, that he had attended Oxford, and she doesn’t believe it. Professor Magda Haroun 58 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Everyone Jordan knows is careless—precisely the thing Nick notices about the East Egg residents as well as the partygoers, and the thing for which he develops intense animosity by the novel’s end. Such carelessness, as he sees it, leads to tragedy, recrimination, and the dissolution of lives and fortunes. Chapter Four The list of guests reveal to the readers the ability of Gatsby’s parties’ to attract the ambitious, the curious, the newly rich, and the socially ungracious. Nick underscores the disconnection of the privileged and the aspiring from the situation of most people in the country in the valley of ashes particularly. The overdone quality of everything related to Gatsby and West Egg is further reinforced in the next section, wherein Gatsby arrives to take Nick to lunch, driving his elaborate car. It is important to note that the car’s Professor Magda Haroun 59 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 overblown quality signifies Gatsby’s wealth, as well as his conspicuous lack of the understated mores that characterize Daisy and Tom Buchanan. Gatsby realizes Nick’s amicable relation with Daisy, and readers realize later that Gatsby has worked to rapidly develop a friendship with his neighbor, such that he could exploit it to hasten his “accidental” reunion with Daisy. At the same time, Nick observes Gatsby, in an attempt to reconcile what he knows and can discern from Gatsby with the rumors swirling about him. Aware of both Nick’s observation and the whisperings that surround him, Gatsby divulges his history—a very calculated story—to Nick as they drive. Gatsby claims he descended from wealth in the “Middle West,” and when Nick asks where, exactly, he came from, Gatsby answers, “San Francisco,” revealing a lack of knowledge about geography (making the Oxford claim Professor Magda Haroun 60 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 seem the more specious) as well as the likely fabrication of his past. Gatsby moves on, talks in “threadbare” phrases such that Nick sees only “a turbaned ‘character’ leaking sawdust at every pore.” He “swallows” or “chokes on” the phrase “educated at Oxford,” and his entire bearing as well as his glance seem sidelong to Nick. However, when Gatsby flashes his Christmas card from the commissioner and the cop lets him go, the Gatsby image appears to be firmly established. Critics have recently devoted much consideration to the portrayal of race and ethnic differences in Fitzgerald’s work, and in The Great Gatsby particularly. Nick’s statement, “Anything can happen now that we’ve slid over this bridge,” suggests a slackening or loosening of the rules governing places like Fifth Avenue and East Egg, or it could suggest something darker, related to the mixing of individuals so forcefully lamented by Professor Magda Haroun 61 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Tom Buchanan in the novel’s opening chapter. In the very next scene, Wolfsheim’s Jewish identity is depicted in ways most contemporary readers would find offensive to some degree. Wolsheim’s relation with Gatsby reveals to Nick, Gatsby’s involvement with shady characters. Not only does Wolfsheim wear cufflinks made of human molars, he helped fix the 1919 World Series. At the end of the scene, Tom Buchanan happens to catch sight of Nick. Tom tells Nick how Daisy is “furious” because he hasn’t called. When Nick introduces Gatsby to “Mr. Buchanan,” Gatsby is clearly uncomfortable, and then he quickly disappears. Immediately afterward, Nick segues into the story behind Gatsby and Daisy. The story paints Daisy, once again, in white. Gatsby meets her before he goes to war, and does so when the houses in Daisy’s neighborhood are festooned with “red, white, and blue banners.” Fitzgerald wanted the Professor Magda Haroun 62 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 resonance of American identity in the scene, and the idyllic meeting of the two under such circumstances was so powerful that the novelist wanted, for a short time, to name the novel Under the Red, White, and Blue. The tale also paints Gatsby again as the man possessing the ability to look at people and charm them. Jordan tells the story, as she grew up with Daisy in Louisville, and was best friends with her. It is Jordan who assures Nick that Gatsby looked at Daisy “in a way that every young girl wants to be looked at, and because it seemed romantic” to her she has “remembered the incident ever since.” Tragically, Gatsby leaves, and disappears for four years, during which Daisy has her debut and soon becomes engaged to Tom Buchanan from Chicago. Jordan notes that he gave Daisy a “string of pearls valued at over three hundred and fifty thousand dollars.” Professor Magda Haroun 63 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Daisy, however, seems reluctant. Jordan finds her drunk and despondent just before the bridal dinner, clutching a letter and a bottle of wine, having thrown her pearls into the trash. As Jordan and Daisy’s mother work to sober her up, she refuses to let go of the letter, even taking it into the cold bath, they make her take. The letter disintegrates “like snow” and no one ever learns what was on it. The prose and the mode of the tale leave the powerful suggestion that Gatsby had written the letter. Daisy marries Tom and discovers he is a philanderer (in an anecdote that also operates as yet another foreshadowing of the novel’s climactic events). She gives birth to her daughter, while she and Tom were travelling. Jordan characterizes Daisy as enduring, not drinking much, not developing a reputation, despite their wild crowd. All seems settled. Then, however, she hears the name Gatsby on the night that Jordan stays at the Buchanans, and it troubles Professor Magda Haroun 64 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Daisy enough that she wakes Jordan to ask more about him. Later, while riding in a carriage through Central Park, Nick also learns that Gatsby moved to the mansion on West Egg so he could be near Daisy. In modern terms, given his behavior, his reading of Chicago newspapers, and his elaborate scheming, one might consider Gatsby a stalker. His behavior raises doubts about the image he is propagating. Gatsby displays the dangers of idealizing an unworthy or even sinister object. Nick feels the conflict of those dangers, borne of admiring Gatsby’s unfaltering spirit while disapproving of his methods and scorning his acquisitiveness. But Nick feels the same conflict elsewhere: enjoying the charms of the people he meets while feeling repulsed by their cynical and reckless behavior. Professor Magda Haroun 65 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter Five By this point, Fitzgerald has laid the foundations for the climactic events of the novel to unfold. In this chapter Daisy and Gatsby will meet, precipitating events that will result in the shattering of Gatsby’s dreams and the bringing about of his untimely death. These events will also galvanize Nick’s disdain for the life of the rich—and by extension demonstrate Fitzgerald’s own indictment of American culture—and thrust Tom and Daisy Buchanan back into the spiral of meaninglessness and recrimination to which their lives had descended. Nick tells Gatsby he will invite Daisy to tea the following day, but Gatsby makes him wait another day, so that he can hire someone to cut the grass in Nick’s yard. Later, Gatsby will insist on flowers and baked goods, working hard to engineer the moment to specifications he has long imagined. Professor Magda Haroun 66 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Nick muses on the house Gatsby acquired, and the previous owner’s similar misunderstanding of what wealth did and did not provide. In noting it, Nick makes an implicit indictment of American culture. While Gatsby’s home is ornate and expensive, the colors gold, lavender, rose, and a mixture of other colours reveal its “gaudy” outsider status— there is no white. The silhouette is described as “feudal,” primitive, and gauche, and the rooms are distinctly wrong in the age of Modernism and Art Deco. As Gatsby surveys the house interior with Daisy, he watches her the entire time, as though he “revalued everything in his house according to the measure of response it drew from her well-loved eyes.” The house, from which he isolated himself during parties, comes alive as it finds its purpose, and Gatsby’s appreciation for it changes. Professor Magda Haroun 67 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 As Gatsby opens his patent cabinets and reveals his shirts, “piled like bricks,” a relevant description, given how they (and other possessions) have built the man. The shirts are all colors but white, and as he tosses them to the bed, Daisy begins “to cry stormily.” She cries because the shirts are so beautiful, and because she has not seen their like. Gatsby has attained the momentary attention of his lost love, and has achieved the goal to which he has devoted five years of his life. But he also did not yet have it; Daisy would go home at the end of the day. As well, the realization would come soon that the love he hoped to recreate could never be the same. He tries to draw her attention to newspaper clippings of her that he has collected, when the phone rings. The conversation suggests something shady, hinting at a past that will trouble Gatsby’s attempts at rejoining her. When the conversation ends, Gatsby exclaims that Professor Magda Haroun 68 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Klipspringer, the boarder in his home, will play the piano for them all. Chapter Six A reporter seeks out Gatsby for a comment regarding controversial happenings on Wall Street, since his name was dropped in the office, being the source of speculative legends. Nick points out that for some reason or another Gatsby took satisfaction in the legends. Insomuch as they might have been heard by Daisy, it’s easy to see why Gatsby would enjoy a little notoriety. It would help with the attraction factor. But Nick reports more of the rationale for Gatz’s change, reasons that predated his meeting Daisy Fay. In another moment revealing some of the novel’s thematic concerns with social class, Nick tells how Gatz’s parents were “shiftless and unsuccessful farm people” Professor Magda Haroun 69 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 and that their ambitious young son “never really accepted them as his parents at all.” For Jimmy Gatz, “Jay Gatsby” is the manifestation of an ideal projected by a seventeen-year-old boy desperate to be glamorous and from another place and time. As Nick points out, Gatsby’s mindset never allowed his vision to mature. The lack of maturity in his cultivated identity is exactly what Tom Buchanan and others like him sense and reject in Gatsby. According to a number of critics, Gatsby’s past is Fitzgerald’s spin on the typical Horatio Alger tale. Readers of The Great Gatsby would have been, on the whole, more familiar with such tales than would today’s readers. A very popular nineteenth- century author, Horatio Alger published a string of similar tales in which young men of modest means would, through their own stout-heartedness, ingenuity, and American pluck, rise above and prevail over their native Professor Magda Haroun 70 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 situations to become captains of industry, leaders of men, and altogether virtuous American types. Gatz’s tale, with its protagonist who “knew women early,” who lived “beating his way along the south shore of Lake Superior” essentially as a mercenary sailor, who “lived naturally through the half-fierce, half lazy work of bracing days,” was the typical Horatio Alger protagonist in far grittier circumstances. His imagination foresees “a universe of ineffable gaudiness,” all the pomp of wealth. For Gatsby, coming from nothing, the promise of wealth is the promise to have everything. Tom Buchanan might well have noted that the promise of wealth is the ability to depend on nothing. While Nick supposes Gatsby had some sense of the unreality of his dreams (“a promise that the rock of the world was founded securely on a fairy’s wing”), Gatsby also had enough faith in hope, and enough instinct, to seek the nearest opportunity and to seize it—like an Alger hero. Professor Magda Haroun 71 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 However, Gatsby’s story takes its turn when he meets Dan Cody. A former miner from what was still an American wilderness, Cody had vast stores of wealth, and was thus the target of “an infinite number of women” bent on separating “him from his money.” On meeting Gatsby, Cody took him on, seeing in him ambition and judgment, and made the young man, for all intents and purposes, his ward. Nick points out that Gatsby only tells him of the past much later. (Chapter Eight reveals that Gatsby tells the story in the very early morning following the car accident that kills Myrtle Wilson.) Nick still feels a loyalty to Gatsby, the only person from the summer for whom he still holds any affection, and so notes that he tells the story to dispel the rumors that became worse after the scandalous death. But Nick’s purpose of retelling Gatsby’s story, is to let the reader know about Professor Magda Haroun 72 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 the past and its impact, the true sad story of a man with whom he empathized. Tom Buchanan’s small riding party arrives at Gatsby’s for a quick drink. Gatsby raves, and the party greets his enthusiasm with disdain—a fact clear to Nick but not to Gatsby. Gatsby asserts himself toward Tom, and mentions that he knows Daisy, to which Tom mutters only, “That so?” The man, Sloane, and the “pretty woman,” are only mildly more talkative. The woman suggests they attend Gatsby’s next party, and it is possible she is joking. Sloane accepts Gatsby’s tacit invitation “without gratitude.” The entire party believes itself above Gatsby. Gatsby, however, bent on a good showing and, more particularly, driven to see more of Tom, takes their niceties as serious invitations, much to Tom’s consternation. Tom says to Nick: “I wonder where in the devil he met Daisy. By God, I may be old-fashioned in my ideas, but women run Professor Magda Haroun 73 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 around too much these days to suit me. They meet all kinds of crazy fish.” This is ironical coming from a boor like Tom Buchanan. Tom’s jealousy has him at Daisy’s side the following Saturday as the two attend Gatsby’s party. Nick senses “an unpleasantness in the air, a pervading harshness that hadn’t been there before,” or, more accurately, that his experience had not yet caused him to see. Daisy’s eyes are having an effect on the way he sees the party now, just as they had an effect on Gatsby’s own sense of his possessions and achievements. As such, Nick muses: West Egg [is] a world complete in itself, with its own standards and its own great figures, second to nothing because it had no consciousness of being so, and now I was looking at it again, through Daisy’s eyes. It is invariably saddening Professor Magda Haroun 74 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 to look through new eyes at things upon which you have expanded your own powers of adjustment. The entire sense of being “second to nothing” due to having “no consciousness of being so” is also often seen as a greater criticism of American exceptionalism, the nationalistic sense of absolute superiority and greatness in all things on which American culture writ large asserts. The decade of the twenties is notable for its optimism and sense of manifest and pre-ordained American greatness, a feeling for which the Great Depression was a most horrible comeuppance. Given its overwhelming feel of dread, illusion and tragedy, and its particular focus on American affluent culture as well as the pointlessness of existence in the valley of ashes, The Great Gatsby has been read as Fitzgerald’s statement of warning. Professor Magda Haroun 75 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 According to Nick (and, thus, Fitzgerald) Daisy and Tom are insulated by wealth. They are cynical and dead to all emotion from their protected spot, far from struggle. They, and others like them, the affluent dressed in white with their pallid faces, having never known struggle and the feelings of agony and triumph, hold nothing but scorn for such extremes. Additionally, Broadway has “begotten” West Egg by allowing a new route for people of average or lowly means to shortcut the access to wealth and, thus, privilege. “Ordinary” people can now attain the province of the elite. Thus, Tom’s jealousy of Gatsby arises more from his feeling violated by a person of a lower station than out of any real concern for his own wife. Of course, Tom does not see how his zeal for Myrtle Wilson is ironic in this setting; his lies to avoid having to marry Myrtle, however, speak to his fear of “mixing” classes. Professor Magda Haroun 76 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 As the party winds down, Nick reports that both Daisy and Gatsby are in a state of high agitation. She is worried about what might happen between her and Gatsby. Still uncertain, still torn, Nick says “her glance” revealed a worry over the “romantic possibilities” of those parties. For Daisy, a woman for whom adoration is most important, such a change (now that she knows of the half-decade mission) would be ruinous. As for Gatsby, his agitation is more anticipation for what, in his mind, must happen next: “He wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: ‘I never loved you.’” Nick suggests to Gatsby, “You can’t repeat the past,” to which Gatsby responds, “incredulously. ‘Why of course you can!’” Nick imagines Gatsby seeing the full trajectory of his life in that moment from back when it all began He placed immortal dreams upon something Professor Magda Haroun 77 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 mortal, perishable, changeable, uncertain. The rock of his existence was, he might learn, sand. Chapter Seven The longest chapter by far in The Great Gatsby, Chapter Seven is the fruition of Fitzgerald’s layers of style and theme as well as particulars of character, events, exposition, and setting. The events lead to the death of Myrtle Wilson, Daisy’s abortive betrayal of Tom, Gatsby’s ruin, the end of Nick and Jordan’s affair, and the beginning of George Wilson’s murderous quest. The foreboding begins immediately. For the first time since his arrival in West Egg, Gatsby does not throw a party: “the lights failed to go on one Saturday night— and, as obscurely as it had begun, his career as Trimalchio was over.” Nick notes that the servants are new, and do not seem servants so much as people temporarily assuming the role of servants. The Professor Magda Haroun 78 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 observation suggests more bad dealings in Gatsby’s business affairs. Gatsby himself informs Nick that the servants are “some people Wolfsheim wanted to do something for,” and that he needed discreet individuals, given that Daisy is now visiting in the afternoons. Daisy invites Nick to lunch at the Buchanan house, as well as Jordan Baker and Gatsby. Nick and Gatsby arrive as Tom argues on the phone about selling a car, indicating George Wilson is on the other line. When Tom returns from the phone call, Daisy sends him back to make a cold drink. Once Tom leaves, Daisy kisses Gatsby and tells him she loves him. As her daughter comes into the room, she reverts to an overblown affectation of motherly love. The child has a different effect on Gatsby, making real Daisy’s bond to Tom, in ways that his willful denial could no longer overcome. Professor Magda Haroun 79 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Tom prevails on Gatsby to go outside, to “have a look at the place,” asserting himself in the only way he knows. The effect is not what Tom had hoped for; instead, Gatsby points out the location of his own home, “right across from you.” Tom’s response echoes his earlier, suspicious “That so?” Back inside, as Daisy lobbies to go to town, Tom continues to attempt his domination of Gatsby through his home. Asserting that he has made stables from his garage. While the women prepare to depart and Tom goes to get whiskey for the trip, Gatsby and Nick have one of the novel’s most famous exchanges: Gatsby turned to me rigidly: “I can’t say anything in this house, old sport.” “She’s got an indiscreet voice,” I remarked. “It’s full of—” I hesitated. “Her voice is full of money,” he said suddenly. That was it. I’d never Professor Magda Haroun 80 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 understood before. It was full of money—….the golden girl... Daisy’s charm derives from her wealth that frees her from bearing responsibility for her actions. She can afford to be devil-may-care, flirtatious, since she is financially insulated and protected from the outcomes of her behavior. Nick’s realization of the source of her charm sets yet another brick in the wall building between himself and the Buchanans and all they stand for. Tom tells Nick, accusingly, that he is not as dumb as Nick and Jordan must think, and reveals that he has checked on Gatsby’s background. As tensions rise and they ride silently for a while, Nick notes Eckleburg’s eyes, both reminding the reader of the presence of either a ruinous god or an unblinking conscience over the valley of ashes. It also sets up the need for gas, and the necessary stop at Wilson’s. Professor Magda Haroun 81 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 At Wilson’s, Tom lets George mistakenly assume Gatsby’s elaborate car to be the one he plans to sell. George also tells Tom he has “wised up to something funny,” and that he and Myrtle plan to move west. Early in the scene, George is described as “hollow- eyed” and sick, and Fitzgerald is once again using eye imagery at a moment of tension. He looks a wreck, spiritually as well as physically. Tom finally confronts Gatsby directly, asking, “What kind of row are you trying to cause in my house, anyhow?” Daisy steps in to defend Gatsby, asking Tom to have “self-control.” Daisy’s asking for such is not only ironic, given her role in the affair. Gatsby becomes most animated when he says, thinking to strike a death blow, “Your wife doesn’t love you... she’s never loved you. She loves me.” For Gatsby, the love of the golden girl, the final attainment after the upward struggle, is the most important thing. He thinks Professor Magda Haroun 82 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 that his saying it will undo Tom and bring Daisy to him. It does not. Daisy tells Tom he’s “revolting,” but even then, she does not fully capitulate to Gatsby’s wish, to tell Tom she never loved him. The one time she does so is with “perceptible reluctance.” In the moment when truth matters, she is unsure which gesture will compel her to the next scene. Thus, when her confused honesty finally surfaces, it is the first of many rebukes of Gatsby’s dream. She does confess to having loved him— Gatsby’s romantic ideal—but the ideal is flawed because in the same breath, she avers that she loved Tom as well. Nick describes the intensity of Gatsby’s response: “Gatsby’s eyes opened and closed.” He takes his last refuge, insisting that Daisy is leaving Tom. Daisy temporarily says she is, “with a visible effort.” At that point, Tom reverts to his original tactic, questioning Gatsby’s background. Professor Magda Haroun 83 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 The argument over merit has its base in money, as if wealth, gotten only one way, were the sole permission for actions. Tom’s savagery and the novel’s portrayal of him suggest to many critics much about Fitzgerald’s feeling regarding American culture at the time, particularly among the social elite. But the other idea at work in the entire exchange is the place of the romantic, the dreamer, in such a culture. Daisy’s actions in the scene, particularly, have generated much writing, not only about gender roles, but also about Fitzgerald’s attitude toward tenets of Romanticism as expressed in the novel. Nick’s description of the remainder of the fight suggests some of the novelist’s thinking: “But with every word [Daisy] was drawing further and further into herself, so that he gave that up, and only the dead dream fought on as the afternoon slipped away, trying to touch what was no longer tangible, struggling Professor Magda Haroun 84 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 unhappily, undespairingly, toward that lost voice across the room.” For Gatsby, the realization is complete: the past is gone. There is no way to recreate that perfect moment. Tom learns that Gatsby’s car has hit Myrtle. Tom talks with George, to make sure George does not tell police it was his car. As he does so, he is able to maintain his composure and exonerate himself from suspicion. As Nick turns to leave, to meet his taxi back to West Egg, he encounters Gatsby lurking in the trees, wearing a ridiculous pink suit. Nick finds everything about Gatsby, as well, “despicable.” For Nick, a woman has died from carelessness. For the rest, the matters of importance have to do with status and relationships. Gatsby is more concerned with protecting the stupid and selfish actions of Daisy than with the fate of Myrtle. Tom professes loathing for Gatsby more forcefully than any feeling of loss. Professor Magda Haroun 85 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Nick sees Tom and Daisy sitting together, talking intently, Tom’s hand atop one of hers, and untouched fried chicken and glasses of ale between them. More than that, however, Nick sees “an unmistakable air of natural intimacy about the picture, and anybody would have said that they were conspiring together.” Gatsby had not penetrated the marriage, such that it was. Nor, really, had Myrtle. For all of the damning of society and accusation contained in the novel, for better or worse, Tom and Daisy were connected. Nick could see it, but Gatsby could not, and would refuse to understand it. He intended to keep vigil, and Nick notes that he will be “watching over nothing.” At least, nothing that will be as he thinks it or wants it to be. Chapter Eight Gatsby’s delusions persist when he arrives home at around four in the morning. As Nick suggests he should leave, Gatsby insists he has to stay to see what Professor Magda Haroun 86 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Daisy will do, and Nick saw how “he was clutching at some last hope and [Nick] couldn’t bear to shake him free.” Daisy’s behavior is clear, by then, to everyone but Gatsby. As dawn breaks, Gatsby still maintains Daisy’s preference, through the years, for him. But the story he tells, about knowing how he had lost “the freshest and best” part of the affair, suggests—possibly—his dawning understanding of what had happened. But readers will never know for sure. The gardener approaches and announces he’d like to drain the pool, and Gatsby asks him to wait, as he would like to swim once, since he had not all summer. Nick doesn’t want to leave, though he can’t figure why, until, as he leaves to head to the city, promising to call, he turns impetuously and shouts, “They’re a rotten crowd... You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.” It is the last thing he will say to Gatsby. Professor Magda Haroun 87 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Though Nick says he “disapproved of [Gatsby] from beginning to end,” he was glad to have complimented him. Readers know from the first chapter that Gatsby, despite his considerable flaws, is valued due to his pursuit of imperishable hope, and that for Nick, that fact redeems him. The final compliment makes it known, and, of course, it also places the final image of Gatsby, in his “rag” of a pink suit, before a background of “white” steps. For a fleeting moment, Gatsby has attained rarefied air. George realizes he can find out who did it, since he knew the car, and that Tom Buchanan knew the owner: “I spoke to her,” he muttered, after a long silence. “I told her she might fool me but she couldn’t fool God. I took her to the window”—with an effort he got up and walked to the rear window and leaned with his face pressed against it—“and I said ‘God knows what Professor Magda Haroun 88 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 you’ve been doing, everything you’ve been doing. You may fool me, but you can’t fool God!’” Standing behind him, Michaelis saw with a shock that he was looking at the eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg, which had just emerged, pale and enormous, from the dissolving night. “God sees everything,” repeated Wilson. As Michaelis points out, Wilson’s “God” is an advertisement. Beyond that of Wilson and the cadre of characters involved in the tragedy, there is a subtle indictment here of American culture, again. The scene implies Americans’ willingness to worship commercialism, as seen through the belief in this advertisement, an ultimately silly and crass attempt to gain customers among the less discerning individuals in the valley of ashes. To be sure, Wilson is also a bit deranged at the moment, and likely had been for some time, but the powerful suggestion—when taken Professor Magda Haroun 89 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 together with other commentary throughout the novel—acts as Fitzgerald’s criticism of consumer culture at the time. At the same time, Gatsby, while waiting for a phone message from either Nick or Daisy, headed for the pool, to float on a “pneumatic mattress that had amused his guests during the summer.” He would use his own indulgent home, finally, for himself. As he does so, floating in the pool, Nick imagines, quite persuasively, that in the clear sunlight, Gatsby might well have had a moment of revelation: No telephone message arrived... I have an idea that Gatsby himself didn’t believe it would come, and perhaps he no longer cared. If that was true he must have felt that he had lost the old warm world, paid a high price for living too long with a single dream. The ashen figure is, of course, the final realization as well as the figure of George Wilson. It is as close to the Professor Magda Haroun 90 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 moment of murder the novel will come. In the next paragraph, it is the chauffer who hears the shots. When Nick joins the servants to rush to the pool, the water barely moves, and only a “thin red circle in the water” hints at the violence. “A little way off in the grass,” Wilson lies dead, having shot himself. As Nick says, “the holocaust was complete.” Chapter Nine The newspaper coverage is sensational, and the range of Wilson’s despair—at cuckolding, at oppression, at his wife’s disregard, his conviction regarding God and morality—is “reduced to a man ‘deranged by grief.’” Nick becomes Gatsby’s only spokesperson, the majority of the man’s associates suddenly silent and gone. Of the people involved in the car accident, Tom and Daisy have left for Europe, gone even before the murder had occurred. As Nick looks around the house for anyone to assist with putting affairs in order, he Professor Magda Haroun 91 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 finds only the picture of Dan Cody, a reminder that he is, of course, dealing with a man without a past. Because of Tom’s skewed sense of entitlement, two people are dead. Daisy was fully complicit in the death of the third. Nick realizes: 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.... In the end, Gatsby’s house is a “huge incoherent failure of a house.” The community is empty, deformed, and tainted. Some critics have noted the spooky prescience of some of the novel’s final imagery, given the crash to come four years later. Professor Magda Haroun 92 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 But as Nick is able to gradually imagine the island in its original form, a “fresh, green breast of a new world,” he marvels at humankind’s “capacity for wonder,” what he feels ultimately was Gatsby’s saving grace. Wonder drove Gatsby “a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close he could hardly fail to grasp it... Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us.” Our pursuit of it, Nick says, is why “we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Professor Magda Haroun 93 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 (2-5) Critical Review. Matthew J. Bruccoli Looks At Fitzgerald’s Maturation As Reflected In The Novel Fitzgerald utilized the resources of style to convey the meanings of The Great Gatsby. The values of the story are enhanced through imagery as detail is used with poetic effect. Thus the description of the Buchanans’ house reveals how Fitzgerald’s images stimulate the senses: “The lawn started at the beach and ran toward the front door for a quarter of a mile, jumping over sundials and brick walks and burning gardens—finally when it reached the house drifting up the side in bright vines as though from the momentum of its run.” In his richest prose there is an impression of movement; here the lawn runs, jumps, and drifts. The technique in Gatsby is scenic and symbolic. There are scenes and descriptions that have become touchstones of American prose: the first description of Professor Magda Haroun 94 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Daisy and Jordan, Gatsby’s party, Myrtle’s apartment, the shirt display, the guest list, Nick’s recollection of the Midwest. Within these scenes Fitzgerald endows details with so much suggestiveness that they acquire the symbolic force to extend the meanings of the story. Gatsby’s car “was a rich cream color, bright with nickel, swollen here and there in its monstrous length with triumphant hat-boxes and supper-boxes and tool boxes, and terraced with a labyrinth of windshields that mirrored a dozen suns.” Its ostentation expresses Gatsby’s gorgeous vulgarity. There is something overstated about everything he owns, and Daisy recognizes the fraudulence of his attempt to imitate the style of wealth. His car, which Tom Buchanan calls a “circus wagon,” becomes the “death-car.” Jimmy Gatz/Jay Gatsby confuses the values of love with the buying power of money. He is sure that with money he can do anything—even repeat the past. Professor Magda Haroun 95 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Despite his prodigious faith in money, Gatsby does not know how it works in society and cannot comprehend the arrogance of the rich who have been rich for generations. As a novelist of manners, Fitzgerald was fascinated by the data of class stratification, which he perceived from a privileged outsider’s angle. In The Great Gatsby social commentary is achieved by economy of means, as detail is made to serve the double function of documentation and connotation. The 595-word guest list for Gatsby’s parties provides an incremental litany of the second-rate people who used Gatsby’s house for an amusement park: “Clarence Endive was from East Egg..................Beluga girls” One of his major resources as a social historian was his ability to make details evoke the moods, the sensations, and the rhythms associated with a specific time and place. Fitzgerald referred to the “hauntedness” in The Professor Magda Haroun 96 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Great Gatsby. He was haunted by lost time and borrowed time. Much of the endurance of The Great Gatsby results from its investigation of the American Dream as Fitzgerald engages into a meditation on the New World myth. He was profoundly moved by the innocence and generosity he perceived in American history—what he would refer to as “a willingness of the heart.” Gatsby becomes an archetypal figure who betrays and is betrayed by the promises of America. The reverberating meanings of the fable have never been depleted. Professor Magda Haroun 97 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter 3 Power and Ideology in Fahrenheit 451 3-1 Introduction to Fahrenheit 451 3-2 Fahrenheit 451: A Dystopia 3-3 Why Fahrenheit 451 is Supremely Relevant to the Times We Live In Professor Magda Haroun 98 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 Chapter 3 Power and Ideology in Fahrenheit 451 (3-1) Introduction to Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury's novel, Fahrenheit 451, explores the relationship between literature and society. Set in a dystopian future, where books are banned, and critical thinking and intellectual curiosity are discouraged, the novel raises questions about the impact of censorship on society. The novel depicts a world where people have become indifferent to reading and knowledge, and instead, prefer instant gratification through entertainment. They are discouraged from questioning authority or engaging in critical thinking. The censorship of books in this world is a tool to control the thoughts and behavior of the population. Professor Magda Haroun 99 Literature and Society The Program of English Interdisciplinary Studies – 2024 The protagonist of the novel, Guy Montag, starts to rebel against this totalitarian regime and begins to secretly read books. This leads him to question the government's authority and ultimately join a group of rebels who believe in the value of literature and free thought. The novel suggests that literature has the power to make people think critically and question the status quo. Through the characters in the book, Bradbury highlights the importance of preserving intellectual freedom and the value of the written word. The novel challenges readers to consider the consequences of censorship a