Chapter 9: Minor Characters...

Well, what do you know? My last post for Gatsby....

*Michaelis:
--He remains with Wilson at the end of Chapter 8 for some time but then leaves back to his home only to come back to check on him again and discover that he wasn't there anymore. And, we find out he went and killed Gatsby because he thought he killed his wife Myrtle, and then he killed himself too.
--Michaelis attempts to comfort Wilson as best he can but, despite them being neighbors for presumably some time, he doesn't really know much, if anything, personal about him.
>> "Michaelis didn't see anything odd in that and he gave Wilson a dozen reasons why his wife might have bought the dog leash." (pg.166) i.e: one of many attempts to comfort Wilson
--He then listens to Wilson tell him all about how he's going to find the man who killed Myrtle as well as listens to Wilson ramble on about the all knowing eyes of T.J Eckleberg (i.e: "God").         
--After Wilson disappears and murders Gatsby, the police question Michaelis about Wilson.
>> "The police, on the strength of what he said to Michaelis, that he 'had a way of finding out,' supposed that he spent that time going from garage to garage thereabouts inquiring for a yellow car." (pg.168)
--He is only mentioned briefly in the beginning of Chapter 9.
>> "When Michaelis's testimony at the inquest brought to light Wilson's suspicions of his wife I thought the whole tale would shortly be served up in racy pasquinade..." (pg.171)
--So other than keeping Wilson company as he slowly fell into grief-driven madness, Michaelis didn't really play any other major parts in the end of the book. Perhaps if he had been with Wilson all through-out the night, perhaps if they had been better neighbors and had felt they could rely on each other in times of grief and tragedy, than maybe the book would have ended differently but, who's to know?

*Meyer Wolfsheim:
--Nick sends word to Wolfsheim of Gatsby's death and upcoming funeral but other than a letter of brief condolences and a long list of excuses as to why he cannot get mixed up in the mess right now, Wolfsheim really shows no signs of being greatly touched by the death.
>> "Let me know about the funeral etc do not know his family at all." (pg.174)
--That's incredibly impersonal but it seems as was the case with many people who "knew" Gatsby. Maybe if Gatsby weren't so obsessed with getting the past he had with Daisy back, he'd of realized how lonely his life truly was. He was always surrounded by people but he never could call a single one of them "friends."
--Nick goes into NYC to see him and is told by Wolfsheim's secretary that he went to Chicago but big surprise, at the mention of Gatsby, Wolfsheim's appears from the back of the building. He says he "made" Gatsby what he was and that he knew he could "use him good."
>> " 'We were thick like that in everything-' He held up two bulbous fingers '-always together' " (pg.179)
--So close, but he refused to come to his funeral.
>> " 'I can't do it-I can't get mixed up in in,' he said' " (pg.180)
>>" 'Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead,' he suggested. 'After that my own rule is to let everything alone.' " (pg.180)
--Absolutely disgraceful but hey, he's a 1920's gangster! He didn't get to live so long doing what he does by making friends and crying at their funerals, right? He's worried for his own skin. Who can blame him for that?

*Owl Eyes:
--Surprisingly he makes an appearance in this chapter, during the funeral scene. He came running up to the grave plot in the pouring rain.
>> "Dimly I heard someone murmur 'Blessed are the dead the rain falls on,' and then the owl-eyes man said 'Amen to that,' in a brave voice.
       We straggled down quickly through the rain to the cars. Owl Eyes spoke to me by the gate.
        'I couldn't get to the house,' he remarked.
        'Neither could anybody else.'
        'Go on!' He started. 'Why, my God! they used to go there by the hundreds.'
        He took off his glasses and wiped them again outside and in.
         "The poor son-of-a-bitch,' he said." (pg.183)
--I think he summed it up pretty well if I do say so myself. All those people would of made it to Gatsby's parties rain or shine, but nobody could be bothered to come to his funeral.

-Kelli <3

Chapter 8: Symbols...

Hello fellow group members! I was supposed to post over the weekend but I've been sick since yesterday, but I've got my post for you all today. Sorry for any inconveniences that may have caused. And wow people did a lot of stuff go down in Chapter 7!!

*Light:
--The beginning of this chapter starts off without much light at all. I found the darkness mentioned a few times there in the beginning.
>> "We pushed aside curtains that were like pavilions and felt over innumerable feet of dark wall for electric light switches..." (pg.154)
>> "Throwing open the French windows of the drawing room we sat smoking out into the darkness." (pg.155)
--Then he tells his story bout Daisy and we see some light com into the picture.
>> "Her porch was bright with the bought luxury of star-shine..." (pg.157)
--But not much because soon after Gatsby leaves for the War.
>> "Through this twilight universe Daisy began to move again with the season..." (pg.158)
--And back at the house:
>> "It was dawn now on Long Island and we went about opening the rest of the windows downstairs, filling the house with grey turning, gold turning light." (pg.159)
--At Wilson's garage we also see more light mentioned.
>> "About five o'clock it was blue enough outside to snap off the light." (pg.167)
I'm not sure exactly what was meant with this last mention of light at the garage so any ideas would be nice :)

*The Cars:
--When Gatsby talks about his time spent with Daisy, he mentions driving around to places in her white car. I believe this symbolizes the purity of the love the two of them shared at this time. Wealth didn't come between their relationship yet to change it's definition.
>> "He stayed there a week, walking the streets where their foot-steps had clicked together through the November night and revisiting the out-of-the-way places to which they had driven in her white car." (pg.160)
--This also occurred after Daisy had left with Tom. Gatsby was just coming back and revisiting all the places the two of them had been which I think strengthens the belief that the white car symbolizes their untainted love before everything else got into it and ruined it, making it a tainted yellow. I find it interesting that Gatsby and Daisy were driving together in a yellow car when they struck Myrtle. I think it shows what a giant mess their love has become.
--George Wilson mumbles on about the yellow car that struck Myrtle. He talks about how he has ways of figuring out who owns the car (pg.164). To him, all the car symbolizes is the death of his wife.

*Doctor T.J. Eckleburg:
>>" 'I spoke to her,' he muttered, after a long silence. 'I told her she might fool me but she couldn't fool God. I took her to the window-' with an effort he got up and walked to the rear window and leaned with his face pressed against it, '-and I said 'God knows what you've been doing, everything you've been doing. You may fool me but you can't fool God!' ' " (pg.167)
>>"Standing behind him Michaelis saw with a shock that he was looking at the eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg which had just emerged pale and enormous from the dissolving night." (pg.167)
--Michaelis told Wilson it was just an advertisement but even he had to turn away from the billboard after looking at it for a few minutes.
--The eyes obviously represent "God" watching over what people are doing. I think it's placement in the Valley of Ashes makes sense as it's the place everyone has to pass in order to get to NYC or back to the Eggs. You have to pass by these eyes in order to do either. You can't escape judgement. You can't totally escape from your sins without being seen by at least one pair of eyes.

-Kelli <3

Chapter 6: Themes...

"The truth was that Jay Gatsby, of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself." -pg.104

**Doesn't really relate to the rest of the post but I wanted to add it in***
So in this chapter we learn about Gatsby's true background. His name was James Gatz and he was born on a farm in North Dakota. He never really had a close relationship with his parents. He did go to college at St.Olaf's in Minnesota but he left the school because of how humiliated he was to have to be a janitor to pay for his education. He did odd jobs around Lake Superior for a while until he made the acquaintance of the millionaire Dan Cody when his yacht dropped anchor there. He wandered with Cody across the continent three times and became infatuated with the life of luxury he was shown. Cody left Gatsby twenty-five thousand dollars but Gatsby never received that money because Cody's mistress, Ella Kaye, kept it for herself. From then on, he worked to get money fast however he could.


*The American Dream & The Immorality of the 1920's:

--Well, as many have discussed so far on their blogs, we continue to see the decline of the American Dream in this chapter. Gatsby grew up on a farm and had a very rural life and one might think that because of that background, a strong work ethic was ingrained in him along with a humble attitude. One would be wrong. Gatsby's humiliation at having to pay for his schooling by being a janitor shows that.
>> "He stayed there two weeks, dismayed at its ferocious indifference to the drums of his destiny, to destiny itself, and despising the janitor's work with which he was to pay his way through." (pg.105)
--Gatsby's humble beginnings are most likely the cause for his now lavish way of living. He didn't grow up with a silver spoon in his mouth and once he had a taste of the life Cody showed him, he never wanted to go back to being a "no-name loser."
--We also see more of the deplorable side of his character:
>>  "He was a son of God--a phrase which, if it meant anything,means just that--and he must be about His Father's Business, the service of a vast,vulgar and meretricious (definition: Apparently attractive but having in reality no value or integrity) beauty." (pg.104)
>> "...of the others because they were hysterical about things which in his overwhelming self-absorption he took for granted." (pg.104-105 top)
>> "The most grotesque and fantastic conceits haunted him in his bed at night." (pg 105) And pretty much that whole paragraph gives us a beautiful portrait of the degree of Gatsby's desire for wealth and luxuries.
--Gatsby really epitomizes the mindset of the "new money" coming to the West Egg. He is the corrupt American Dream. His life has become all about impressing other people and trying to "woo" daisy with wealth and his notoriety. With all the speculation having read thus far, I believe it's safe to say Gatsby did not earn his money in all legal practices. Having said that, it shows how an honest day's work that was upheld in the traditional American Dream is now thought of as only a way to delve deeper into poverty. No one thinks that an honest day's work will get them any wealth anymore, at least not the wealth they want. The avarice of the people of the 1920's is beyond exuberant and blinded people to more noble pursuits of the American Dream.

--We also see more of the division of the people of the West Egg and the East Egg. Nick comes over to Gatsby's house and discovers, much to his surprise, that Tom is there with his friends, the Sloanes. Gatsby invites them over to his next party and Mrs.Sloane invites Gatsby, insincerely, to a dinner party with them. Gatsby doesn't realize their insincerity or chooses to ignore it, and goes to fetch his car to follow them on their horses but while he's doing that, Tom and the Sloanes leave without him.
>> " 'My God, I believe the man's coming,' said Tom. 'Doesn't he know she doesn't want him?' " (pg.109)

--Another of Gatsby's parties is also shown in this chapter but at this one Tom, Daisy and Nick all go together, which of course makes the night more memorable in it's awkwardness. These parties are also, of course, the epitomes of immorality in the 1920's. There's illegal drinking, dancing men and women with little decorum, and more folly then good "whole-some fun."
>> "Or perhaps I had merely grown used to it, grown to accept West Egg as a world complete in itself, with its own standards and its own great figures, second to nothing because it had no consciousness of being so..." (pg.110)
--Tom and Daisy know absolutely no one at this party showing how little status and real repertoire those of the West Egg have to those of the East Egg.
>> "It is invariably saddening to look through new eyes at things upon which you have expended your own powers of adjustment." (pg.110-111 top)
--More of the immorality of the 1920's is shown through the party guests that accompany the same table as Nick, Daisy, and Tom.
>> " 'Oh she's all right now. When she's had five or six cocktails she always starts screaming like that. I tell her she ought to leave it alone.' " (pg.113)
>> " 'Anything I hate is to get my head stuck in a pool,' mumbled Miss Baedeker. 'They almost drowned me once over in New Jersey' " (pg.113)
--Hello lady! If you were almost drowned at some other party because you were to wasted to help yourself, then why are you still drowning yourself in cocktails!! If I was almost drowned I certainly would hope I had learned better than to drink such copious amounts of alcohol. It just shows the lack regard for one's self at this time. Every one's "on top of the world" and nothing can harm them.

--There's also a certain amount of disillusionment that goes along with Gatsby at least, but I think could apply to many people of the 1920's. Gatsby, at the end of the chapter, seems intent on picking up with Daisy right where they left off and is upset that she didn't like and/or "understand" the party.
>> " 'Can't repeat the past?' he cried incredulously. 'Why of course you can?' " (pg.116)
>> " 'I'm going to fix everything just the way it was before,' he said, nodding determinedly." (pg.117)
>> "He talked a lot about the past and I gathered that he wanted to recover something, some idea of himself perhaps, that had gone into loving Daisy. His life had been confused and disordered since then, but if he could once return to a certain starting place and go over it all slowly, he could find out what that thing was..." (pg.117)
--Gatsby wants Daisy to leave Tom for him as though it were an easy thing to do. It's not just leaving Tom though, it would be leaving a whole life she built in the East Egg, which I don't think Gatsby completely gets. Which many people of this time period have ideas and goals that they want to set out and accomplish, not realizing that there are all these other factors and "walls" that one must first overcome. And sometimes, these "walls" are people and lives which are "foundations" and not "walls." I think Disillusionment is a major thing that adds to the immorality of the 1920's. Everyone predominantly thinks of themselves as better than they are (i.e: Myrtle going for Tom, Gatsby thinking he could go to dinner with Tom and the Sloanes, etc.).

Ok that's all I've got for now. I sort of did this piece by piece if you can tell, not all at the same time, but I hope it still connects and makes sense and doesn't confuse anyone. Having said that, please let me know if I missed something cause I did do it in pieces ^.^

-Kelli