Plot:
chapter 1 [pg 5]
● nick goes on about how he’s incredibly honest and how hot gatsby is
● he then talks about the bond business and how he ended up in west egg etc.
● he goes to visit tom and daisy and jordan
● daisy is happy to see him, nick mentions gatsby
● daisy accuses tom of hurting her finger
● tom talks about some racist book he’s read, daisy tells nick about the butler’s
nose
● tom gets a telephone call and jordan listens in
● daisy talks about how upset she is
● jordan reads to tom, daisy asks nick if he’s engaged
chapter 2 [pg 21]
● nick describes the valley of ashes
● tom brings nick to the garage, tom talks to wilson and then tells myrtle to meet
him
● myrtle buys a load of things on the journey, including a dog
● they go to the apartment and nick meets catherine & the mckees
● they talk about various things, including mr mckee’s photographs, how myrtle
didn’t marry someone because he borrowed a suit, how myrtle met tom
● tom breaks myrtle’s nose
● nick is watching mr mckee in his underwear...
chapter 3 [pg 33]
● nick describes gatsby’s party
● nick finds jordan, she and some other people gossip about gatsby
● jordan and nick find the owl-eyed man in the library
● nick meets gatsby and spends a long time describing his smile
● gatsby speaks to jordan alone and jordan comes out amazed
● owl eyes crashes his car
● nick describes his work and says he likes jordan, saying he doesn’t care
about her dishonesty
chapter 4 [pg 49]
● nick writes millions of names of the people at gatsby’s parties
● nick gets in gatsby’s car and gatsby tells him about his ‘past’
● nick describes the city then meets meyer wolfshiem
● nick is vaguely anti-semitic for a bit and then gatsby reveals that wolfshiem is
a gambler
● they go up to tom and gatsby disappears
● jordan tells nick about gatsby and daisy’s love and daisy’s bridal dinner
● jordan tells nick that gatsby wants him to invite him and daisy to his house
chapter 5 [pg 65]
, ● nick tells gatsby he’ll invite daisy round, and gatsby offers him a business
deal but nick declines
● nick and gatsby get ready, then daisy arrives
● gatsby and daisy are awkward, he nearly smashes the clock
● nick talk about how some guy wanted everyone to have thatched roofs
● gatsby and daisy aren’t awkward anymore, gatsby invites them to see his
house
● he shows daisy the rooms and she cries over the shirts
● gatsby talks about the green light then makes klipspringer play the piano
chapter 6 [pg 78]
● nick reveals gatsby’s past – his parents were farmers, he felt janitor’s work
was beneath him, he changed his name and went with cody out to sea
● tom and two other people come to visit gatsby, the woman invites gatsby to
dinner but they leave before he comes out the door
● tom and daisy come to one of gatsby’s parties but there is ‘an unpleasantness
in the air’
● daisy offers nick a green card
● gatsby shows tom and daisy all the people
● they sit down to dinner, someone called miss baedeker is drunk
● daisy and nick watch the director and the actress under the tree
● tom asks nick if gatsby is a bootlegger, daisy starts to sing
● gatsby is upset that daisy didn’t like it
● five years in the past, gatsby and daisy kiss
chapter 7 [pg 90]
● nick goes over to gatsby’s house and finds that he’s fired all his servants
● gatsby and nick go to visit daisy, jordan and tom
● daisy kisses gatsby
● pammy (daisy and tom’s child) is paraded in front of everyone
● they eat lunch then go to town (daisy in a car with gatsby...)
● tom stops to get gas at wilson’s and wilson says he’s sick
● myrtle mistakes jordan for daisy
● they have mint juleps, they talk about some guy called biloxi and tom tries to
catch gatsby out by asking if he knew him at oxford
● tom confronts gatsby, they argue, gatsby wants daisy to say that she never
loved tom but she can’t, tom says he knows how shady he is
● tom tells daisy to go home in gatsby’s car
● nick ‘remembers’ that it’s his birthday
● wilson has myrtle locked up, she runs out into the road, she dies
● a policeman questions wilson, tom realises that it was gatsby’s car and cries
● gatsby describes what happened to nick
● daisy and tom eat fried chicken, gatsby watches from outside
chapter 8 [pg 117]
● nick describes gatsby’s past – daisy has a nice house, they fall in love, he
goes to war and goes to oxford, daisy gets bored and meets tom, gatsby can’t
find daisy
● nick compliments gatsby
● nick calls jordan but he doesn’t care about her anymore
● people try to comfort wilson, he shows them myrtle’s dog leash
● wilson goes hunting for gatsby
● gatsby goes swimming and nick finds him dead
chapter 9 [pg 130]
, ● catherine lies at the inquest
● daisy and tom have left, nick can’t reach anyone on the phone
● wolfshiem sends him a letter
● slagle hangs up the phone when nick tells him gatsby’s dead
● henry gatz visits and is in awe of the house
● klipspringer wants his tennis shoes back
● nick visits wolfshiem and wolfshiem tells him how he ‘made’ gatsby but
doesn’t want to go to the funeral
● henry gatz shows nick gatsby’s schedule
● owl eyes comes to the funeral
● nick breaks up with jordan
● nick sees tom in the street and confronts him
● nick gets sentimental
Jay Gatsby
● Before Nick meets Gatsby, he imagines him to be ‘a florid and corpulent person in his
middle years’.
● Gatsby’s background is a mystery, Tom Buchannan calls him ‘Mr Nobody from
Nowhere’.
● Not much is known about Gatsby – lots of gossip. He is said to have attended Oxford
University and a common rumour suggests he has killed a man. Others say he was a
German spy during WW1, and that he is related to the German ruler Kaiser Wilheim II.
● The title ‘The Great Gatsby’ prepares us for the story of an exceptional man. Is Gatsby
really that great? Should we trust Nick’s judgement that he ‘turned out alright in the
end’.
● James Gatz grew up in North Dakota, at 17, he changed his name to Jay Gatsby.
● Gatsby’s reinvention links strongly to Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital.
● As a boy he explored the shores of Lake Superior. His experience allowed him to warn
Dan Cody his yacht was moored in a potentially dangerous place.
● Following Cody’s death Gatsby became involved with the gambler Meyer Wolfsheim.
● Gatsby owns a Rolls Royce car and has clothes bought at expensive shops in London. He
uses the term ‘Old Sport’, to make him seem upper class.
● The pages in his library remain uncut and unread, so although Gatsby aims to project an
image of an old-world aristocrat, he actually comes across as a new-world showman.
● Gatsby ‘did extraordinarily well in the war’ his brave conduct led to promotion to the
rank of major, enhanced his social status. Of course, the war was also disastrous as it
separated him from Daisy.
● Nick reminds us that young men didn’t just ‘drift coolly out of nowhere and buy a palace
on Long Island Sound’.
● Gatsby’s house ‘was a factual imitation of some Hotel de Ville in Normandy’.
● ‘He invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen-year-old boy would be likely to
invent and to this conception he was faithful to the end’
● He had ‘some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life, as if he were related to one
of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away’ –
(Chapter 1)
● ‘Come out to determine what share was his of our local heavens’ – (Chapter 1)
● ‘In his blue gardens, men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings
and the champagne and the stars’ – (Chapter 3)
● ‘One of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance’ – (Chapter 3)
