The Great Gatsby

Reading Quiz #3: The Great Gatsby

1.

B. Nick Caraway sets up a meeting for tea with both Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan at the request of Gatsby. Gatsby is full of nerves and embarrassment at first; however, events take a turn for the better. As the two begin to hit it off, this meeting is moved to Gatsby’s mansion. Presumably to show off his material success to his lost love. One stop on the tour included showing Daisy his bedroom. At this time, Gatsby presents to Daisy the dozens of linen, silk, and fine flannel shirts that he has bought for him by a man in England. At the sight of such beautiful shirts, Daisy begins to weep into the shirts. The reader can assume that her reaction is the result of the sudden realization of what she had missed out on by marrying Tom instead. The scene Fitzgerald included about Daisy’s wedding day allows us to assume that she was only marrying Tom for his money, when revealed she drank herself to intoxicate and numb the pain of the decision she was making that did not make her happy. Now realizing that Gatsby came across success as well, upsets Daisy because she could have lived a happy life with the man she truly loved.

2. Discuss how Fitzgerald uses figurative language in order to characterize Gatsby’s expectations of his meeting again with Daisy.

“As I went over to say goodbye I saw that the expression of bewilderment had come back into Gatsby’s face, as though a faint doubt had occurred to him as to the quality of his present happiness. Almost five years! There must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams – not through her own fault but because of the colossal vitality of his illusion. It had gone beyond her, beyond everything. He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion, adding to it all the time, decking it out with every bright feather that drifted his way. No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart.

As I watch him he adjusted...