There are so many lines and passages in The Great Gatsby that are amazingly written. Select one and quote it here. Explain what you liked about Fitzgerald's diction and/or syntax in the passage. (The deadline to post a response to this blog is midnight, Sept. 12, 2013.)
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
In the words of Fitzgerald...
There are so many lines and passages in The Great Gatsby that are amazingly written. Select one and quote it here. Explain what you liked about Fitzgerald's diction and/or syntax in the passage. (The deadline to post a response to this blog is midnight, Sept. 12, 2013.)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Fitzgerald is such a great writer and one of my favorite passages is when Daisy and Gatsby kiss. Fitzgerald writes, "His heart beat faster and faster as Daisy's white face came up to his own. He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning-fork that had been stuck upon a star. Then he kissed her. At his lips' touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete." This passage is my favorite because I like how Fitzgerald's word choice creates strong imagery by using the senses. When he used the word "wed", he made Daisy and Gatsby's relationship feel concrete to the reader. He also says that "she blossomed for him like a flower". Throughout the novel, Daisy is described as being a flower and by using the word "blossom", it shows how Daisy is finally complete with Gatsby!
My favorite quote in the book is when Nick describes Gatsby's smile. "He smiled understandingly--much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced--or seemed to face-- the whole external world far an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just of far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey. Precisely at that point it vanished-- and I was looking at an elegant young rough0neck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd. Some time before he introduced himself I'd got the impression that he was picking his words with care"(41). I really like this part because it explains a lot about Gatsby. It says that he smiles an understandingly smile. He believed in you when you didn't even believe in yourself. Gatsby is everything you would want and should be. I also like how Fitzgerald never really came out and told you everything. He worded everything in such a way that everyone could understand what was happening, and the way it was explained actually gave a sort of example and reason why the character or setting is what they are.
One of my favorite quotes from the novel was when Nick is describing his final moments on the beach by Gatsby's house. "And as I sat there brooding on the old, unknown world, I thought of Gatsby's wonder... He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night." This passage intrigues be because Fitzgerald managed to matter-of-factly describe Gatsby's situation through an eloquent description. His use of words like "dark", "obscure" and "unknown" emphasize how human beings relentlessly pursue their dreams through unknowns and highlight the somber atmosphere.
I did not know how beautiful Fitzgerald's writing style was until I read the book aloud in class, yesterday. My favorite passage was, "For Daisy was young and her artificial world was redolent of orchids and pleasant, cheerful snobbery and orchestras which set the rhythm of the year, summing up the sadness and suggestiveness of life in new tunes. All night the saxophones wailed the hopeless comment of the BEALE STREET BLUES. while a hundred pairs of golden and silver slippers shuffled the shining dust. At the gray tea hour there were always rooms that throbbed incessantly with this low, sweet fever, while fresh faces drifted here and there like rose petals blown by the sad horns around the floor." This passage stands out to me not only because of the beauty and fluidness of the passage and the masterful use of adjectives and verbs, but because, unlike any other passage in the novel, the truth is so easily seen and well described in this passage. Fitzgerald characterizes Daisy as living in an "artificial world", which is true from all angles. This passage stood out to me on a level that no other passage had the ability to do.
Post a Comment