Recall and comment upon what he says about:
- People (characters)
- Alcohol
- Cars
- West Egg / East Egg
- Marriage
- Education
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Chapter 4
During the modern period writers began to produce literature that was highly mistrustful and skeptical of institutions, absolute truths, and individuals. ASSUME, if you will please, Fitzgerald is voicing the modern disdain in his novel, The Great Gatsby. What does Fitzgerald seem to be especially mistrustful of so far?
Recall and comment upon what he says about:
Recall and comment upon what he says about:
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Fitzgerald seems to be especially mistrustful about people because a lot of people are so interested about Gatsby and many people have a lot of suspicions about him. People have some suspicions that he has killed a guy (48).
ReplyDeleteMarriage is another mistrustful thing in this novel because Fitzgerald is having two characters (Tom and Mrs. Wilson) lie to their spouse and have an affair. That is mistrustful because their spouses trusted them to be faithful and they aren't being faithful.
Education is another mistrust because some characters think that if you study at one school,then you are less educated then other people who studied at another school.
Alcohol is another mistrust because they aren't supposed to be drinking but yet they don't trust the law and just drink because they don't have any suspicions about getting caught.
Fitzgerald appears to show the lack of trust between characters. Nick appears untrusting of Gatsby, despite his undying admiration of him. With alcohol, it shows how it changes people enough for a man to break a woman's nose. The mistrust with cars was demonstrated more than twice with given examples: the relationship between Tom and Mr. Wilson because of a faulty car, Nick's witnessing of a car accident at Gatsby's party, and the story of Tom crashing his car into a carriage. There are differences with East Egg and West Egg with the general personalities of the people that reside in either island; causing a small mistrust of rivaling people. There is no guarantee that the person you marry will be forever faithful, so the mistrust is with that accusation. Being educated has a mistrust in an entirely different subject, but can be generalized to the higher expectations and accusations with the logical mind.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the part about how alcohol changes people just like when Tom punch and brake Daisy's nose. Cars because only the rich could afford to have them were prized and almost treated like they were someones child. Also Education was a big part of it. If you had a college education then you most likely had a lot of money because you could afford to be in it. But with all of the money, cars, and education, it changes people and can make them go in another direction than you thought they would go. Most of the time not in a good way. People can get used to having money and or power so they can get away with doing some things that others don't.
DeleteI think Fitzgerald uses people mostly to display distrustfulness because everyone so far in this novel is not honest, nick thinks gatsby is making up all of his past about hunting big game and collectin jewels in Europe and gets war medals from a bunch of different European countries (70) and for alcohol it is during the 1920's and Gatsby may be bootlegging alcohol for his parties? And as Brittany said that the married couple in this book are extremely dis honest and cannot even stand eachother and Tom cheats and has a mistress which is bad.
ReplyDeleteFitzgerald makes people seem like always whiny and lie to each other for their own gains of money and love. Cars are used to show how much power is in them which is common for sport cars and other fancy cars among the rich people. He uses west and east egg to show from the rich to the poor. Now my question is why does he do this with the characters so obviously he sort of making them bug out in the story which makes me wonder if there is more to it than what is showing so much maybe there is something within this what do you think?
ReplyDeleteA lot of things in this novel seem to be mistrustful. The character's in this story seem to all be "cheating" on each other. Tom for example is having an affair with Mrs. Wilson. And then in Chapter 4 we learn that Gatsby and Tom's wife, Daisy, used to have a thing back in the day before Gatsby went to war, and now Gatsby wants to get to know her again, not taking into mind that she has a hush band. Back then it didn't seem like people cared if one was married or not, so there was no trust or faithfulness in the marriages.
ReplyDeleteI believe Fitzgerald is showing mistrust by using east egg/west egg as locations on long island. The "eggs" represent what I believe to be differing social class among the rich. The people that live in west egg are people who made there richs through entrepreneurship while those of east egg are more aristocratic and get there money from their familys. These aristocrats disdain "new money". fitzgerald may have been one of those people that lived in west egg, giving him reason to mistrust the seperation of social classes.
ReplyDeleteFitzgerald uses people, in my opinion, to display distrustfulness the most because no one in the story is completely honest with each other, even if Nick might think he is the most honest person, he definitely isn't because he isn't telling Daisy about Tom. Jordan cheated golfing. Gatsby may be involved in organized crime. No one in this novel is completely 100% true to themselves or others.
ReplyDeleteFitzgerald represents people of this time period to be liars and dramatics, he Depics them as doing this for wealth and fame. Cars represent the richness and the power of the wealthy people while poor people walk and ride bikes. Fitzgerald divides the rich and the poor by using west egg and east egg. as collin said i think that fitzgerald depics people as smugglers and liars, like how Gatsby bootlegged alcohol to his parties.
ReplyDeleteThe main areas that he seems mistrustful of are of people, marriage, and alcohol. Most of the characters in his story are self centered liars. The married couples we encounter are unhappy in the situations and fabricate the truth wherever they can. Also the way he views people drinking alcohol is something that only a simple minded person would do.
ReplyDeleteHow might Nick's views on alcohol be reflective of the era?
DeleteNicks views on alcohol are reflective of the "roaring twentys" in that he, for the most part isnt pro drinking, just like many people who led to the ban. In contrast Nick also represents the biggest aspect of this era; excessiveness. The one time that Nick does drink he gets WASTED for most of the day and night; " I have been drunk just twice in my life and the second time was that afternoon, so everything that happened has a dim hazy cast over it" (Fitzgerald, Pg. 33).
DeleteNick obviously doesn't drink often, like Torin cited he's only drank twice and his life. I feel like now that he is hanging out with Gatsby who can obviously get tons of alcohol that he will start drinking more often than ususal. Especially with Jordan. But that's just my feeling..
DeleteWriters using modern literature that is highly mistrustful and skeptical of institutions, absolute truths, and individuals portray what they see, feel, or experience in that time. The time of industrialization, gangs, fame and fortune, social classes. Fitzgerald feels mistrustful on all those aspects in people, alcohol, cars, east and west egg, marriage, and education. People can be mistrustful on rumors they hear, things they do, influencing others, keeping stuff, honesty. Alcohol is one of those influences that change peoples judgment and honesty which makes it mistrustful. In the end of chapter 3, this guy got in an accident and one of the wheels came straight off. So cars in that age were still uncertain for some people. East and West Egg is two places, kind of like two people, they keep secrets, have different social class, still similar in some ways and also different in others. A marriage is the official word that bonds two people together, but it can be broken from another person coming and intervene. Marriage has honesty and trust. Tom and Daisy, they don't seem to have trust. And as for education, people can just lie about what they know or not know. Education can be the one to get you higher in life in that age.
ReplyDeleteExplain the passage: "there are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired" (85). Nick says this phrase beat in his ears with a sort of heady excitement. Explain what he means by this.
ReplyDeleteWhat I think Nick means by his phrase is that there are people who are wanted, people who are wanting, people who don't have the time, and people who don't take the time. I think Nick feels he is one of those people.I am not sure which one he thinks he is but I think he is all of them sometimes.
DeleteI believe that Fitzgerald is making a world of lies while putting a spec of truth (nick) into the world. Almost everyone in this story has lied somewhere in this novel and we've only reached the end of chapter for. We have cheating spouses, cheating in competition, rumors being spread, not believing what people tell you, and breaking the law! I think that Fitzgerald is saying that you can really only truest yourself in a way. I don't think it was a mistake for him choosing someone as honest as Nick is to be the narrator because really Nick cant rust anyone else but himself when all he is surrounded by is a bunch of people that always lie.
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ReplyDeleteWhat I believe Nick means when he says "There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired" (85) He means that there are only 4 types of people. Where it says this phrase beats in his ears with a sort of heady excitement I believe it means that Nick is constantly thinking of this, it is like a guideline, a kind of rule that he follows of how to judge himself and others.
ReplyDeleteI agree, but why would that apply if on page 84, he says he's not thinking of Gatsby, Daisy, or anyone besides Jordan?
DeleteI think Fitzgerald was mostly mistrustful about the characters. They all live deceptive, mysterious lives that dont prove to help them out in any way. The characters are constantly being caught lying, believing in rumors they hear and only spreading them even more, and they all have some big secret that no one can know about. Except for Nick, all of the characters are mistrustful to themselves and the others around them.
ReplyDeleteFitzgerald seems to show how mistrustful people can be, like at Gatsby's party it seemed like most people there were gossiping about after he threw a nice part for them. It also seems like Fitzgerald shows disdain for marriage, with all the examples of cheating wives and husbands such as Tom and Myrtle Wilson.
ReplyDeleteI think what nick means by that passage is people that already have what they want, people who are working or what they want, and people that just dont care anymore. Fitzgerald seems to be showing mistrust with all the characters, because all of them are constantly spreading rumors, and cheating on each other. There are no happy successful marriages in this book, and i agree with caleb that this may be how fitzgerald is expressing his view of marriage. All of the characters have faults so far excpets nick, why is that?
ReplyDeleteI would say that so far, Nick is most distrustful of the characters in the story. Tom and Daisy are a great example of this; they are married but when Tom takes Nick to New York he reveals that he is having an affair with a girl from the Valley named Myrtle Wilson. Another great example is Gatsby himself. This mysterious man has huge parties every night that Nick watches from his house. When he gets invited, Nick isnt sure what to think of Gatsby because of all the rumors and stories that he has heard of him.
ReplyDeleteYeah I agree with most people here saying Fitzgerald seems to be mistrustful about the characters, he's showing how people really are. And most people really are mistrustful, I like how Caleb used the example of Gatsby throwing a nice party and people gossiping. They are mistrustful because the majority of the people are sneaking off, cheating, lying, doing bad stuff.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Fitzgerald is mistrustful with the characters in this story. Most of the characters in this story just gossip drink and cheat. They cant ever really believe what another person tells them because everyone lies so much in this story.
ReplyDeleteI agree with everyone else about the people are mistrustful. Gatsby isn't revealing his past. He is a mysterious man. He throws parties just for the heck of it. And at those parties people are gossiping about him. The characters are mistrustful to each other. They are telling the truth to each other. Tom is cheating. To me it seems like a lot of the characters in this book are mistrustful.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Amanda and Brooke. This novel is all about mistrust and being ledthe wrong way and full of lies and misunderstanding. People didn't trust gatsby because of how mysterious he is and all the lies and stories about him saying that he killed a man and how he stole money to get rich but yet people still want to goto his parties and be around him all the time. Alcohol makes people to hurtful things and cause problems like how Mertyle Wilson stared yelling and screaming Daisys name and saying things about her that makes Tom angry and breakes her nose. And Tom is cheating on his wife and then daisy end up loving gatsby again so all of this novel is about mistrust and misleading people
ReplyDeleteTo me, I believe the two most mistrustful things in this story is marriage and the characters throughout the book. The marriages between Daisy and Tom & Myrtle and Mr.wilson are very strange and scandalous. I'm not exactly sure why Fitzgerald made the relationships throughout this book about cheating and lying but this is a perfect example of mistrustful behavior. Also, each character has secrets and lies and each character gossips about what they hear and has their suspicions about Gatsby. The mistrust with alcohol is how often it can change the characters. For example: Tom hitting Myrtle in the nose infront of everyone at their party for saying Daisy's name. Finally, the mistrust between West egg and East egg is that both Tom and Myrtle, & Daisy and Gatsby live in different 'eggs' making it easier for both couples to cheat on their significant other.
ReplyDeleteI believe the people are distrustful. Except Nick of course because he's the most honest person he's ever known. Mr. Fitzgerald wrote a rather scandelous novel. For example all the cheating that goes around in this book. Lots of deception if you will plays a huge role. Tom cheating on Daisy, she knows but she doesnt act upon it. Myrtle cheating on Mr. Wilson. Mr. Wilson found out she was cheating on him a day before her death. Wether or not it was heart breaking to Mr. Wilson I do not know. But scandelous girls best look both ways before crossing the road.
ReplyDeleteFitzgerald seems to motion that people are mistrustful. i also agree with paul that nick seems to be the only one who is trust worthy. but overall Fitzgerald is most mistrustful about the people in this story because most of them seem to be liars cheaters or have tons of secrets. Theres also things about alchohl Fitzs seems to share that the law of distrabution of that beverage is mistreated very much and seems to be ignored by most. fitzs also shares that your social class relies on what egg you live on either east or west egg.
ReplyDeletei believe that the people inn the story are very distrustful, except Nick, as he says he is the only honest person he has known since he moved to west egg. Gatsby and all these other rich people are in a big competition to see who has the most money and trying to be the best. I don't think Gatsby was being honest about having all those medals and hunting the big game he saved he did, i think it was to show who was the best. And the alcohol he had brought to his parties, it was probably bootlegged because the prohibition was going on in that period of time. Education was a big thing then, because if you had an education and went through college, you had money, and those with money felt like they had more power and could get away with more things than others.
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