The Great Gatsby Flashcards
AO3: The Great Depression
- Lasted from 1929 to 1939, and was the worst economic downturn in the history of the industrialized world.
- Began after the devastating Wall Street Crash of October 1929.
- Consumer spending and investment dropped, causing steep declines in industrial output and unemployment as failing companies laid off workers.
AO3: The impact of WW1 on America and Europe
- During the war there was a massive industry boom to try and support the war.
- New technologies were developed to help deal with the necessity of so much produce.
- As the industry boomed, so did the economy.
- When the war ended, industry production began to slow, women out of jobs because of the return of men.
AO3: The American Dream
Definition: The American Dream is the ideal that the government should protect each person’s opportunity to pursue their own ideas of happiness.
- The Declaration of Independence protects the American Dream.
- In the 1920s, the Dream started morphing from the right to create a better life to the desire to acquire material things.
- This greed-driven version of the Dream was never truly attainable
- This greed led to the Wall Street Crash in 1929 and the Great Depression that followed.
AO3: The Roaring Twenties and the Changing Role of Women
People all started to buy the same things and listen to the same music to fit in with the times.
- Most iconic symbol of the roaring twenties: the flapper girl. Bobbed hair, short skirts who drank, smoked and said unladylike things. (The new woman)
- Women could vote at last, the 19th Amendment to the Constitution had guaranteed that right in 1920.
- The increased availability of birth-control devices made it possible for women to have fewer children and new machines such as washing machines and vacuum cleaners made housework more pleasant.
AO5: Dyson
“[Gatsby’s] self-centeredness masquerading as heroic vision”
Gatsby as arrogant and immoral
AO5: Mizener
“the incorruptibility at the heart of Gatsby’s corruption”
Gatsby as untainted and pure
AO5: Mandel
Daisy and Tom are “royalty completely distanced and insulated from ordinary human concerns”
AO5: Maxwell Perkins
American “land of freedom and opportunity”
AO5: Fussell
Daisy’s voice is the “typifying feature of her role as la belle dame sans merci”
AO5: Clark
“A curious book, a mystical, glamorous story of today”
The book in general.
‘today’ = of the time
Key Quote Chapter 1:
Daisy: “the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool”
Key quote Chapter 2:
Nick: “I was within and without”
Key Quote Chapter 3:
Nick: “I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known”
Key Quote Chapter 4:
Jordan: “I think he half expected her to wander into one of his parties, some night”
Key Quote Chapter 5:
(1/2)
Daisy: “Ive never seen such - such beautiful shirts before”
Key Quote Chapter 5:
(2/2)
Nick: “His count of enchanted objects diminished by one”
