What it’s About:
Set in the 1920’s on Long Island – think mansions, millionaires and mayhem – The Great Gatsby tells the tale of Nick Carraway’s arrival to the New York seaboard and his subsequent emersion into its glitzy, superficial society. Nick befriends his cousin Daisy and soon also finds himself in the company of his dark and mysterious neighbour, Jay Gatsby. Little do they all realise that the interweaving of their lives will extort threads from the past, resulting in incomprehensible devastation.
Why Read it?
It’s a beautifully written book with descriptive passages that bring the characters and the Jazz Age to life. I recommend having a dictionary to hand though as it’s quite wordy in places- fortunately it’s a relatively short book (c. 100 pages) so it’s manageable and really worth the effort. Baz Luhrmann is releasing a movie version of the book in 2012, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, so now is a good time to read it!
Favourite Quotes:
"I married him because I thought he was a gentleman...I thought he knew something about breeding, but he wasn't fit to lick my shoe."
"They were careless people, Tom and Daisy--they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money of their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made."
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