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The Great Gatsby Study Guide
Key facts on The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Curtis Strite
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☆☆☆☆☆The Great Gatsby
Nick Carraway narrates in both first and third person, presenting only what he himself observes. Nick alternates sections where he presents events objectively, as they appeared to him at the time, with sections where he gives his own interpretations of the story’s meaning and of the motivations of the other characters.
Past
Long Island and New York City
Gatsby has amassed a vast fortune in order to win the affections of the upper-class Daisy Buchanan, but his mysterious past stands in the way of his being accepted by her.
Gatsby’s lavish parties, Gatsby’s arrangement of a meeting with Daisy at Nick’s
There are two possible climaxes: Gatsby’s reunion with Daisy in Chapters 5–6; the confrontation between Gatsby and Tom in the Plaza Hotel in Chapter 7.
The decline of the American dream, the spirit of the 1920s, the difference between social classes, the role of symbols in the human conception of meaning, the role of the past in dreams of the future
The connection between events and weather, the connection between geographical location and social values, images of time, extravagant parties, the quest for wealth
