The Great Gatsby What Makes Nick Think His Life Is Starting Again

In The Great Gatsby, Chapter 1, the tabular array is set up, both figuratively and literally. Figurative table setting includes meeting our narrator, Nick Carraway, and getting a sense of the wealthy Long Island neighborhood where the novel will take identify. Literal table setting—well, that's the dinner Nick has with his cousin Daisy, her husband Tom, and their friend (and Nick'due south eventual beloved interest) Hashemite kingdom of jordan Bakery.

Continue reading to learn more than nigh what happens in this chapter, understand how information technology touches on the novel'due south main themes, and see close readings of key quotations!

Quick Annotation on Our Citations

Our citation format in this guide is (chapter.paragraph). Nosotros're using this organisation since there are many editions of Gatsby, so using page numbers would only work for students with our copy of the book. To find a quotation we cite via chapter and paragraph in your book, you can either eyeball information technology (Paragraph i-fifty: beginning of chapter; l-100: middle of chapter; 100-on: end of chapter), or use the search function if yous're using an online or eReader version of the text.

The Great Gatsby Chapter 1 Summary

Nick Carraway introduces himself as a nonjudgmental observer of other people who has recently returned to his home in a wealthy Midwestern family from the Due east Declension later a devastating disappointment. This thwarting is the story he is most to tell, which happened two years earlier.

Later on graduating from Yale, and fighting in WWI, Nick decides to become a bond trader and moves near NYC.

Nick rents a house in West Egg, a Long Island suburb that is less fashionable than Due east Egg, which lies across the Long Island Sound. His tiny, cheap bungalow is next to Gatsby's enormous, tacky mansion.

Nick goes to have dinner with his cousin Daisy and her extremely rich husband Tom Buchanan, whom he knows slightly from Yale. Their house is overwhelmingly decorated. Tom is gruff, aggressive, and physically intimidating. Daisy and her friend Hashemite kingdom of jordan Baker are wearing white dresses that look like balloons in the breeze. Daisy laughs a lot and speaks in a low, extremely highly-seasoned vocalism. Their chat is scattered and shallow, and everyone talks over each other.

During dinner, Tom suddenly reveals himself to exist a racist, influenced past a book that argues that the "dominant white race" is in danger of being overwhelmed by minorities. The phone rings for Tom. Later on he goes to answer it, Daisy seems upset and leaves the room. Hashemite kingdom of jordan tells Nick that the phone phone call is from Tom's mistress in New York. The rest of dinner is tense and awkward and makes Nick feel similar he should telephone call the police.

Afterwards dinner, Daisy takes Nick aside and tells him that she has become contemptuous. Nick asks Daisy almost her two-year-old girl. Daisy doesn't seem to accept any maternal feelings. When she found out that she had given birth to a daughter, Daisy's showtime reaction was to cry. She hopes her daughter volition grow upwards to be a "cute fool" (i.118). Despite the fact that Daisy seems to be baring her soul to him, Nick thinks this display of misery is some kind of an human action.

Daisy and Nick rejoin Tom and Jordan, and Nick realizes that Jordan is a relatively famous professional person golfer. He'southward seen her in magazines and has heard an unpleasant story near her.

After Hashemite kingdom of jordan goes to bed, Daisy matter-of-factly tells Nick to start a romantic relationship with Jordan. Tom, meanwhile, tells Nick non to believe anything Daisy told him when she took him aside. Tom and Daisy ask Nick almost a rumor that he was engaged. Nick denies it. This rumor is actually one of the reasons he has come East.

Nick leaves the firm dislocated about why Daisy doesn't simply have her girl and leave Tom. However, he can meet that she has no intention of doing and then.

Back at his house, Nick sees the figure of Gatsby outside his mansion. Nick thinks most introducing himself, just refrains when he sees Gatsby stretching his artillery out toward a dark-green low-cal on the opposite shore of the bay.

The green lite on Daisy's dock: an aurora borealis only Gatsby tin see.

Key Chapter 1 Quotes

In my younger and more vulnerable years my male parent gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind always since.

"Whenever yous experience like criticizing any one," he told me, "but remember that all the people in this world oasis't had the advantages that y'all've had." (1.1-2)

The opening lines of the volume colour how we sympathize Nick's description of everything that happens in the novel. Nick wants to present himself as a wise, objective, nonjudgmental observer, but in the grade of the novel, as we acquire more and more than most him, we realize that he is bossy and prejudiced. In fact, it is probably because he knows this about himself that he is so eager to start the story he is telling with a long caption of what makes him the best possible narrator.

Gatsby turned out all correct at the end; information technology is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul grit floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men. (ane.4)

This is how Nick sums up Gatsby earlier we have even met him, before we've heard anything about his life. As you lot read the book, think about how this data informs the way you're responding to Gatsby'southward actions. How much of what we come across well-nigh Gatsby is colored by Nick's predetermined conviction that Gatsby is a victim whose "dreams" were "preyed on"? Information technology often feels like Nick is relying on the reader'due south implicit trust of the narrator to spin Gatsby, brand him come up across as very sympathetic, and gloss over his flaws.

"Well, it's a fine book, and everybody ought to read it. The idea is if we don't await out the white race will be—will exist utterly submerged. It's all scientific stuff; it'due south been proved."

"Well, these books are all scientific," insisted Tom, glancing at her impatiently. "This fellow has worked out the whole thing. It's upwardly to us who are the dominant race to watch out or these other races will have control of things." (one.78-80)

Tom says this at dinner about a volume he'south actually into. Tom is introduced as a cracking and a bigot from the very beginning, and his casual racism here is a good indicator of his callous disregard for human life. We will see that his affinity for beingness "ascendant" comes into play whenever he interacts with other people. At the same time, yet, Tom tends to surround himself with those who are weaker and less powerful—probably the meliorate to lord his physical, economic, and class power over them.

"I'1000 glad it's a girl. And I promise she'll be a fool—that's the best thing a girl can be in this earth, a cute piffling fool." (i.118)

Daisy tells Nick that these are the showtime words she said after giving birth to her girl.

This funny and depressing have on what information technology takes to succeed as a adult female in Daisy'south earth is a skilful lens into why she acts the way she does. Considering she has never had to struggle for annihilation, because of her fabric wealth and the fact that she has no ambitions or goals, her life feels empty and meaningless to her. In a way, this wish for her girl to be a "fool" is coming from a skillful place. Based on her own experiences, she assumes that a adult female who is besides stupid to realize that her life is pointless will exist happier than one (similar Daisy herself) who is restless and filled with existential ennui (which is a fancy style of describing being bored of one's being).

But I didn't call to him for he gave a sudden intimation that he was content to exist lone—he stretched out his arms toward the night water in a curious mode, and far as I was from him I could have sworn he was trembling. Involuntarily I glanced seaward—and distinguished null except a single green light, minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock. (one.152)

The showtime time Nick sees him, Gatsby is making this half-prayerful gesture to the light-green light at the end of Daisy's dock. This is our outset glimpse of his obsession and his quest for the unobtainable. Gatsby makes this reaching movement several times throughout the book, each fourth dimension because something he has strived for is just out of his grasp.

I guess what I'thousand saying is that Jay Gatsby is a walking, talking demotivational poster.

Affiliate 1 Analysis

At present, let's hash out the way this chapter works with the novel'due south themes, and also which major graphic symbol events are central to take away from it.

Themes and Symbols

Society and Class. Right away, we see the difference between West Egg, the town of the vulgar nouveau riche and those driven by ambition to become them, and East Egg, the place where the quondam coin aristocracy lives in more classy luxury. Nick is hyper-enlightened of form differences when he has lunch with Daisy and Tom. Everything about them, from their house and its decor, to the manner Daisy and Hashemite kingdom of jordan flop on the furniture in carefree colorlessness, shows how incredibly wealthy and pampered they are. At the same time, Daisy's half-joking remarks about her boredom and her cynicism show the darker side of having any you lot want whenever you want it—at that place stops being much point to life.

Dearest and Relationships. Nick has several insights into Tom and Daisy'south dysfunctional marriage. First, that Tom is having an matter and then indiscreet that anybody including Jordan knows well-nigh it. Second, that Daisy is clearly miserable nigh Tom's cheating. But finally—and nigh importantly—that Daisy simply will not leave no thing how terrible she feels most his behavior. Their human relationship, notwithstanding flawed, works for the ii of them—something Nick figures out most immediately when he sees them standing next to each other as he leaves. This foreshadowing is crucial to keep in listen as nosotros sentinel Gatsby'southward try to win Daisy over.

The Greenish Calorie-free. This chapter marks our kickoff see with one of the near important symbols in the novel: the green calorie-free at the end of Daisy's dock to which Gatsby assigns almost indescribable value. This light stands for everything that has been driving him over the past five years: the desire to exist with Daisy, the quest for enough money to marry her, and the mirage that she has been every bit obsessed with him every bit he has been with her.

The American Dream. More than universally, this desire to obtain something that is forever just out of attain—and arguably tin can never actually be reached—is true for many of the novel's characters as they pursue their versions of the American Dream (the idea that hard work lonely will guarantee success).

Reach exceeds grasp? Bank check. Unrealistic—nay, delusional—goal? Check. Yup, that pretty much sums upwardly the American Dream as described by this novel.

Crucial Character Beats

• Nick moves from the Midwest to West Egg, adjacent door to Gatsby. He'south sick of his ho-hum Midwestern life and wants to recapture some of the excitement of fighting in WWI.

• Nick has dinner with Daisy and Tom. They are rich, and their lives seem totally meaningless. Tom displays his racist ideas and Daisy displays a total lack of maternal feelings.

• Nick learns that Tom is having an matter, he figures out that Daisy is unhappy but will never go out Tom, and he meets Hashemite kingdom of jordan Baker, who volition become his romantic interest.

What's Next?

Wondering why the volume starts the way it does? For example, what does Nick's dad'due south communication mean? And what'southward with that strange verse form Fitzgerald uses as an epigraph? Check out the caption of the novel's kickoff.

Did you know that this wasn't Fitzgerald's offset choice of championship? Learn more than about the history and meaning of the title.

Move on to the summary of Chapter 2 or go back to the overview of the whole novel.

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About the Author

Anna scored in the 99th percentile on her SATs in high school, and went on to major in English at Princeton and to get her doctorate in English Literature at Columbia. She is passionate well-nigh improving student access to college education.

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Source: https://blog.prepscholar.com/the-great-gatsby-chapter-1-summary

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