A century old, Fitzgerald's novel speaks to a country in which racial, ethnic, and class distinctions are constantly breaking down and being redrawn at the expense of established powers.
I like the perspective that the dynamism of the 20s nouveau riche’s culture was frightening and abhorrent to the old money elite class. Nick is right, we are living in a similar social climate.
Gatsby is a meretricious piece of junk writing. I read it a third time just recently 20 and 50 years after I had read it previously. Not a truthful word in the whole book. Also, sociological analysis of fiction is fundamentally wrong. It is fiction. It never happened. All you are reading is the imagination of the writer. Besides, Galsworthy, Hergesheimer, Sherwood Anderson and many more were all far, far more capable fiction writers of the time. Why anyone has a bee in the bonnet for this novel is beyond me.
Love this! Reminds me of the anecdotes I discovered in my great-grandfather’s memoir about his friendship with F. Scott Fitzgerald. check it out:
https://thesecretingredient.substack.com/p/what-my-great-grandfathers-memoir
I like the perspective that the dynamism of the 20s nouveau riche’s culture was frightening and abhorrent to the old money elite class. Nick is right, we are living in a similar social climate.
Gatsby is a meretricious piece of junk writing. I read it a third time just recently 20 and 50 years after I had read it previously. Not a truthful word in the whole book. Also, sociological analysis of fiction is fundamentally wrong. It is fiction. It never happened. All you are reading is the imagination of the writer. Besides, Galsworthy, Hergesheimer, Sherwood Anderson and many more were all far, far more capable fiction writers of the time. Why anyone has a bee in the bonnet for this novel is beyond me.