The Great Gatsby
F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Great Gatsby
11 chapters
3.93from 6,124,646 ratingson Goodreads
Nick Carraway takes a small house on Long Island next door to a mansion where a man nobody has met throws enormous parties every weekend. Jay Gatsby has built all of it — the money, the shirts, the name — to be looked at from across the bay by a woman who married someone else five years ago, and who lives close enough to see the light on his dock.
About the book
Published in 1925, The Great Gatsby is narrated by Nick Carraway, a Midwesterner who moves to New York and rents a small house in West Egg. His wealthy neighbour, Jay Gatsby, is famous for lavish parties and persistent rumours, while across the bay Nick’s cousin Daisy lives with her husband Tom in the established wealth of East Egg. F. Scott Fitzgerald sets the novel amid the money, drinking and social mobility of the Jazz Age. Through Nick’s observations, glamour repeatedly sits beside carelessness and loneliness. Gatsby’s fixation on a remembered relationship gives the story its emotional centre and raises questions about reinvention, status and the desire to make the past available again.
Characters
Jay Gatsby — Mysterious millionaire
Nick’s wealthy neighbour, known for extravagant parties and a carefully guarded personal history.
Nick Carraway — Narrator
A young bond salesman from the Midwest whose position between social circles makes him their observer.
Daisy Buchanan — Nick’s cousin
Nick’s wealthy cousin, charming and restless, living across the bay with her husband Tom.
Tom Buchanan — Daisy’s husband
Daisy’s rich, physically imposing husband, secure in his social position and openly domineering.
Jordan Baker — Golfer
A professional golfer and friend of Daisy whose cool self-possession attracts Nick’s attention.
Myrtle Wilson — Tom’s mistress
The wife of a garage owner in the valley of ashes, dissatisfied with the limits of her social position.
George Wilson — Garage owner
Myrtle’s husband, a struggling garage owner living and working in the valley of ashes.
About the author
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) was an American novelist and short-story writer who named the Jazz Age and then wrote its best obituary. The Great Gatsby appeared in 1925, sold modestly, and was still in print largely as a curiosity when he died at forty-four believing himself a failure; it is now among the most widely read American novels. He wrote about money and class from close up — the wanting, the having, and the difference between the two. His other novels are This Side of Paradise, The Beautiful and Damned and Tender Is the Night.