The Great Gatsby

 Thinking Activity: The Great Gatsby

Hello Readers! This blog is a response to the Thinking Activity assigned by Dr. Dilip Barad sir, Department of English, MKBU. In this blog I am going to discuss about Movie review of the novel 'The Great Gatsby'.

Introduction:-

F. S. Fitzgerald:- 

Francis Scott Fitzgerald was an American Novelist, Essayist and short story writer. He is best known for his novels depicting the flamboyance and excess of the Jazz Age- a term he popularized. During his lifetime, he published four novels, four story collection, and 164 short stories. Although he achieved temporary popular success and fortune in the 1920s. Fitzgerald received critical acclaim only after his death and is now widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of 20th century. His Notable works are as below.

• The Great Gatsby
• The Beautiful and Damned
• Tender is the Night
• This Side of Paradise
• May Day
• The Last Tycoon
• Flappers and Philosopher
• Head and Shoulders
• The Offshore Pirate

The Great Gatsby:-

The Great Gatsby is a 1925 novel by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. Se in the Jazz Age on Long Island, near New York City, the novel depicts first-person narrator Nick Carraway's interaction with mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby. And Gatsby's obsession to reunion with his former lover, Daisy Buchanan.

Key Facts of the Novel:-

• Writer:- F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Full Title:- The Great Gatsby
• Date of First publication:- 10th April, 1925
• Publisher:- Charles Scribner's Sons
• Type of work:- Novel
• Genre:- Tragedy, Realism, Modernist Novel, Social Satire
• Language:- English
• Time and Place written:- 1923-1924 America and France
• Setting or Time:- Summer 1922
• Setting or Place:- Long Island and New York City
• Protagonist:- Jay Gatsby

Movie screening of 'The Great Gatsby':-

On 3 January, 2023 we have a movie screening of The great Gatsby in our classroom. The Great Gatsby novel is by F. Scott Fitzgerald and the movie by Baz Luhrmann in 2013. The movie is much faithful to the Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. Movie has used modern narration techniques. Cinematography and editing of the movie is extraordinary. It gives a best scenario of 20th century American and it's Culture. It is very difficult to understand the satire on western culture becouse we are belong to eastern culture. Star cast of the movie is below.

• Leonardo DiCaprio as James or Jay Gatsby
• Tobey Mulligan as Nick Caraway
• Joel Edgerton as Tom Buchanan
• Carey Mulligan as Daisy Buchanan
• Jason Clarke as George Wilson
• Elizabeth Debicki as Jordan Baker - Daisy's best friend
• Amitabh Bachchan as Meyer Wolfsheim

Now discuss some questions related to the screening of the film.

Q. 1 How did the film capture the Jazz Age - the Roaring Twenties of America in the 1920s ?

The Jazz Age:-

The Jazz Age is also known as the Roaring Twenties of America. It was an era of American history that begun after world war I and ended with the onset of the Great Depression in 1929. However, the era's social and cultural legacy lives on and still influences American life today. The Jazz Age was a period in the 1920s and 1930s in which Jazz music and dance styles gained worldwide popularity.

The novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald termed the 1920s "the Jazz Age" with its earthy rhythms, fast beat, and improvisational style. Jazz symbolized the decade's spirit of liberation. At the same time, new dance style arose, involving spontaneous bodily movement and closer physical contact between partners. This term is coined by F. Scott Fitzgerald in his collection of short stories Tales of the Jazz Age. Jazz music is very popular in that period. It was very popular among Black people, it was initiated by African American. So the whites considered it to be music of black or lower class they heard and enjoyed but never socialized with the blacks. Fitzgerald has exploded jazz age greatly in the novel.

Baz Luhrman's movie has very faithful captured jazz music or age. The contemporary soundtrack in the movie features songs by Bryan Ferry, Jay-z, and Florence and the Machine. From the beginning of the movie we do find the loud music which lightly indicates the madness of the jazz in that period. People danced and bounced on the jazz music in Gatsby's parties. They seemed to be a lost society, careless people and rich class society. When Time was having an apartment party which revealed his cheating over Daisy, which is mirroring inferiority of 'Roaring Twenties' wD also indicated by the Loud Jazz music. The man was playing a loud trumpet in the scene. It's all suggests the nagative side of 20 th century, America.

 

Q .2 Watch PPT on the difference between the Film and the Novel and write in brief about it.

 

The difference between The Novel and Film:- 

Major four changes that made by filmmaker. 

• The Relationship between Jordan and Nick
• The Apartment party
• Lunch with Wolfsheim
• Gatsby's Death and Funeral

Relationship between Jordan and Nick:-

In the Novel Nick and Jordan have a romantic relationship that develops throughout the story. Nick is initially attracted to Jordan's beauty and Charisma. In the Novel they become a couple and break up near the end of the Novel. In the movie the relationship between Nick and Jordan is downplayed and receives less focus than it does in the novel. Their relationship is not developed as extensive as it is in the novel.

The Apartment party:- 

In the Novel, the apartment party is hosted by Tom Buchanan's Mistress, Myrtle Wilson, Who lives in apartment in the Valley of Ashes. In the film , the apartment party scene is quite different. In the film Nick sitting quietly in the apartment's living room while the adulterous couple have loud sex in the badroom. In the film Myrtle's sister Catherine giving Nick a pill that she says she got from a doctor in queens, that's not in the novel. In the novel Tom and Myrtle disappear and reappear before the other guests arrive, Nick reads a book and waits.

Lunch with Wolfsheim:- 

In the Novel, the lunch meeting is at a "well- fanned 42nd Street cellar". Where Gatsby takes Nick to lunch with his new friend Meyer Wolfsheim, a Jewish gangster. In the movie, Gatsby and Nick go to a barber shop with a hidden entrance to a speakeasy, and once inside they see not only Wolfsheim but also the police commissioner who, in the novel as in the movie. Gatsby was "able to do... a favor once". They also see there Nick's boss, whom Luharmann has turned into Tom's friend Walter Chase. In the novel, Wolfsheim expresses his admiration for Gatsby and agrees to attend his upcoming party. While in the film Wolfsheim joking about Gatsby's past and making references to his own criminal enterprises. 

Gatsby's Death and Funeral:- 

In the novel, Gatsby is murdered by George Wilson, the mechanic hasband of Tom's mistress. Wilson believed that Gatsby was the one driving the car that killed his wife. And he also believed that Gatsby might have been the one she was sleeping with on the side. The Novel says that Gatsby grabbed a "pneumatic mattress" and headed to his pool, then Gatsby's Chauffeur dramatic flourish. In the Novel and film , Gatsby is waiting for a phone call from Daisy, but in the film, Nick calls, and Gatsby gets out of the pool when he hears the phone ring. He's then shot , and he dies believing that Daisy was going to ditch Tom and go way with him. None of that happens in the book. 

Gatsby in the both versions, lonely in death, but the film is even crueler to him in this regard, dropping the last - minute appearance of his father and the unexpected arrival at the funeral of a man who Nick previously met in Gatsby's study. The Luhrman likely made these changes to suit their creative vision and to make the scene more visually appealing and emotionally impactful for a modern audience.

Q.3 How did the film help in understanding the symbolic significance of "The Velley of Ashes", "The Eyes of Dr. T. J. Eckleberg" and "The Green Light '? 

The Valley of Ashes:- 

The Valley of Ashes is a desolate, industrial wasteland located between west egg and new York City. It represents the American Dream. The American Dream of becoming economically strong is bringing a spiritual drought. It's failure for America because America is growing but is failing to balance, the rich are getting richer and the poor are becoming poor. Valley shows how the rich are disconnected from the source of their wealth. So, we can say that it represents the poverty, inequality and exploitation. 

The Eyes of Dr. T J Eckleberg:-

The eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleberg are a pair of fading. Bespectacled eyes painted on a old advertising billboard over the valley of ashes. They may represent god staring down upon and judging American society as a moral wasteland, thought the novel never makes this point explicitly. The connection between the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleberg and God exists only in George Wilson's grief-stricken mind. This lack of concrete significance contributes to the unsettling nature of the image. Thus, the eyes also come to represent the essential meaninglessness of the world and the arbitrariness of the mental process by which people invest objects with meaning. Nick explores these ideas in chapter 8, when he imagine Gatsby's final thoughts as a depressed consideration of the emptiness of symbols and dreams. 

When Daisy and friends were going for lunch to New York the billboard was shown which is interpreted as something terrible is going to happen. George Wilson also considered it to be the eyes of God's who is watching everything. Today this billboard with eyes which is watching everything can be said to be replaced with a CCTV camera. You are a under surveillance. 

Green Light:- 

Image of Green Light in the Great Gatsby symbolise that Gatsby watches across the water, which simultaneously symbolises Gatsby's love for Daisy, money, and the American Dream. Green light seems to be always shining on Daisy's dock. Gatsby had a mansion on the opposite back of the sea. He used to watch this light everyday which symbolizes hopes and dreams of Gatsby to have Daisy in his life and the American dream. It can also be interpreted as the shine and glamour of inherited wealthy people and their intolerance and unacceptable to new rich society. For Gatsby, the green light proved that he and Daisy existed in the same world and suggested the possibility that they might someday meet again. 

Q. 4 How did the film capture the theme of racism and sexism ?

Racism:- 

The Theme of Racism and Sexism we find them in dialogues of Tom Buchanan. For example, Tom Buchanan, a wealthy white man, makes racist comments about black people and uses racist language when referring to them.  One scene occurs during a party scene at the Buchanan's mansion, where Tom Buchanan makes a racist comment about the book, "The Rise of the Coloured Empires" and uses a racial slur to refer to black people. He also expressed his fear of the 'Coloured races' taking over America.  

Sexism:- 

Sexism is discrimination, typically against women, on the basis of Sex. In the movie we find three complete opposite female characters, Daisy, Jordan and Myrtle. Daisy is the novel's female lead, is seen as a symbol of beauty and grace. Daisy belonged to a wealthy family but was dominated by Tom. Tom had a mistress but when Daisy started loving Gatsby she was forced to choose any one.  Myrtle was an ambitious woman who wanted materials and her husband couldn't achieve her dream and so he had relationship with Tom. Jordan belonged to Flapper society, a new women group towards whom the society saw with discrimination, considered to be immoral and dishonorable. Overall, 'The Great Gatsby' explores the theme of racism and Sexism through its characters and their actions. 

Q.5 Watch the Video on Nick Carraway and discuss him as a narrator.

Nick Carraway is the narrator of The Great Gatsby. As a narrator, Nick plays a crucial role in shaping the reader's understanding of the events and characters in the novel. In the Film, Nick is committed to sanitarium for morbidly alcoholic, anxiety, insomnia and it is the catharsis process he writes the Great Gatsby. And this is root for him being an unreliable narrator. The major question arises that how trustworthy can a narrator who is suffering from a morbid alcoholic psyche issue. Apartment party scene, when Nick was drunken, were also smoothly narrated by Nick which are also questionable. Because a drunk person could rarely see or remember the acts he/she has done or seen. In another scene like Myrtle murder scene and Gatsby's murder scene, Nick is absent still he is narrating both the scene which is also contradictory to novel. It's like a prophecy, neither being present not knowing about the plan yet able to describe the happening. Overall, Nick Carraway is an effective narrator who provides a insightful perspective on the events and characters in "The Great Gatsby".  

Q.6 Watch the Video on Psychoanalytical study of Jay Gatsby and write about his character.

Phycho Analytical study is the study of the Mind. He is a young man, around thirty year old. Jay Gatsby's character filled with lots of Emotions. Everyone has a natural attraction towards youth, wealth, beauty and power. 

Jay Gatsby's desire to  win Daisy at the perfect place in the perfect time is biggest psychoanalytic approach in the great Gatsby. The only thing that he is truly passionate about is Daisy. Which is the driving force behind everything he does. He throw lavish parties every weekend, hoping that one day Daisy will walk through his door and be impressed by his wealth. Everyone attended his lavish parties only but no one was there with him in his bad times or at the time of funeral. Another one is shame in his character, the shame of belonging to small town and lower class. He gained wealth from the illegal business of bootlegging and share Market. He changes his name and gave other fake name only to impress Daisy. He seems very optimistic about everything and specially about Daisy that one day they both will live their lives happily together. Through Analytical study of the Jay Gatsby we find that his character was filled with the two primary emotions that word shame and hope or Guilt. Watch the video for batter understanding about this novel.

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