The Great Gatsby Flashcards
Chapter 1 quotes
Nick
‘I’m inclined to reserve all judgements’
‘I decided to go to East Egg and learn the bond business’
‘eyesore’ - his house compared to Gatsby’s
Gatsby
‘there was something gorgeous about him’
‘it was an extraordinary gift for hope’
‘more than forty acres of lawn and garden’
‘a figure had emerged from the shadow of my neighbour’s mansion’
‘he stretched out his arms’
‘he was trembling’
‘he had vanished and I was alone in the unquiet darkness’
Daisy
‘her face was sad and lovely’
‘a brute of a man, a great, big, hulking specimen’ - about Tom
‘a best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool’
‘I’ve been everywhere and seen everything and done everything’
‘Sophisticated- God I’m sophisticated!’
Tom
‘two shining arrogant eyes’
‘always leaning aggressively forward’
‘the enormous power of that body’
‘I’ve got a nice place here’
‘civilisation’s going to pieces’
‘it’s up to us, who are the dominant race, to watch out or these other races will have control of things’
Jordan
‘throwing her body backwards at the shoulders like a young cadet’
‘A slender, small breasted girl, with an erect carriage’
Chapter 2 quotes
Nick
‘Tom Buchanan and his girl and I went up together to New York’
‘pulled me back, as if with ropes, into my chair’
‘I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life’
Tom
‘I want you to meet my girl’
‘broke her nose with an open hand’
Myrtle
‘Mrs. Wilson’
‘her eyebrows had been plucked’
‘he wasn’t fit to lick my shoe’ - Wilson
‘artificial laughter’
‘despairing figure on the couch’
Wilson
‘spiritless man, anaemic’
‘damp gleam of hope’
Chapter 3 quotes
Nick
‘men and girls went like moths’
‘I was one of the few guests who had actually been invited’
‘I began to like New York, the racy, adventurous feel of it at night’
‘I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known’
Gatsby
‘he killed a man once’
‘German spy during the war’
‘Absolutely real- have pages and everything’
‘one of those rare smiles’ that ‘you may across four or five times in life’
‘he was an Oxford man’
‘standing alone on the marble steps’
Jordan
‘she was incurably dishonest’
Chapter 4 quotes
Gatsby
‘Gatsby’s gorgeous car lurched up’ - C.F
‘handsome to look at and a perfect gentleman’ - Meyer Wolfsheim
‘She’s not to know about it’
‘invite her to tea’
Jordan
‘they were so engrossed with each other’ - narrator (about G + D)
Chapter 5 quotes
Nick
‘you’re acting like a little boy’ - to Gatsby
Gatsby
‘Let’s go to Coney Island, old sport. In my car.’
‘dark signs of sleeplessness beneath his eyes’
‘caught’ the clock ‘with trembling fingers and set it back in place’
‘Five years next November’
‘my house looks well, doesn’t it?
‘he hadn’t once ceased looking at Daisy’
‘shirts of sheer linen and thick silk and fine flannel’
‘house glowed full of light’ - artificial - link to green light?
‘colossal vitality of his illusion’
Daisy
‘They’re such beautiful shirts’ she sobbed
Meeting
‘pouring rain’ - start of the day
‘it’s stopped raining’ - in the middle of meeting
‘it began to rain again’
‘a pink and golden billow of foamy clouds above the sea’
Chapter 6 quotes
Nick
‘an unpleasantness in the air, a pervading harshness’ - Gatsby’s party
Gatsby
‘James Gatz of North Dakota’
‘torn green jersey’
‘a pair of canvas pants’
‘his parents were shiftless and unsuccessful farm people- his imagination had never really accepted them as his parents at all’
‘a clam-digger and a salmon-fisher’
‘You can’t repeat the past’ - ‘why of course you can!’
Chapter 7
Nick
‘I was feeling a little sick and I wanted to be alone’
‘I’d had enough of all of them for one day’
Tom
‘tears were overflowing down his face’
‘The God-damned coward!’
Myrtle’s death
‘mingled her thick dark blood with the dust’
Chapter 8 quotes
Nick
‘something to warn him about’
‘he was clutching at some last hope and I couldn’t bear to shake him free’
‘I didn’t want to leave Gatsby’
‘They’re a rotten crowd’ ‘You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together’
‘It was the only compliment I ever gave him, because I disapproved of him from beginning to end’
‘I know I didn’t care’ - after Jordan
‘chauffeur, butler, gardener and I hurried down to the pool’
‘the holocaust was complete’
Gatsby
‘many men had already loved Daisy- it increased her value in his eyes’
‘committed himself to the following of a grail’
‘I loved her, old sport’
‘he stretched out his hand, desperately’
‘paid a high price, living too long with a single dream’
Myrtle
‘Myrtle Wilson’s tragic achievement was forgotten’
Chapter 9 quotes
Nick
‘we were close friends’
‘they used to go there by the hundreds’ - e.g. parties
‘I decided to come back home’
‘yes, you know what I think of you’ - refusing to shake hands with Tom
‘they were careless people’ - Tom and Daisy
‘Gatsby believed in the green light’
Gatsby’s father
‘old man, very helpless and dismayed’
‘his grief began to be mixed with an awed pride’
‘nobody came’
Meyer Wolfsheim
‘I am tied up in some very important business’
‘I hardly know where I am when I hear about a thing like this’
Last line: ‘so we beat on boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past’
Context
Jazz Age: The inter-war period known as The Roaring Twenties put pressure on the American industries- more jobs were created and more employment resulted in economic booms
1920s America: The decade of consumption. With all the money that the economic booms, consumption and consumerism were born. Brands and companies started to advertise more + people were influenced by advertisements. High consumption meant that whilst the American economy was healthy, it trapped individuals in debt.
Illegal activities: Because of the 1919 Prohibition Act, many people acquired their wealth through bootlegging (gangsters sold alcohol in secret bars called ‘speakeasies’ for a great profit). People also gambled and there was a lot of violence and mafia involvement
Immigration: In 1924, the Immigration Act was passed. This restricted a number of southern and eastern Europeans moving to the USA. It also prohibited any Asian to come to the US. There was a lot of prejudice against ethnic minorities: Wolfsheim + the treatment of African Americans in the novel
