1. Chapter 3

3. GATSBY
In the first two chapters of the novel the reader has :
• seen Gatsby from a distance
• heard others talk about him
• heard Nick’s thoughts on him
Yet, we have not met him
Why has Fitzgerald structured the
opening chapters in this way?

4. GATSBY
“Somebody told me…….”
“Somebody told me they thought he killed a man once”
“It’s more that he was a German spy during the war”
The repetition of the conjecture about Gatsby
further adds to his mystery.

5. “GREAT” GATSBY
The title is reminiscent of a magician like
“The Great Houdini”
Emphasises the theatrical and perhaps
illusion like qualities of Gatsby’s life.

6. DREAMLIKE
“In his garden men and girls came and went like
moths”
“A tray of cocktails floated at us through the twilight”
• An air of illusion is successfully
created.
• There are lights and glitter and
status that attracts people to
Gatsby’s house.
• Moths get burned by light -
dangerous

7. CHARACTERISATION - GATSBY
Does this perhaps suggest that there
is something illusionary about
Gatsby himself ?

9. CHARACTERISATION - GATSBY
• Lots of movement before/during the party evokes
the feeling of restlessness
• motion and light – Gatsby cannot stand to be alone
with his thoughts, needs to show off his wealth now
that he has earned it.
• The servants “repair the ravages of the night
before” each day - a cycle of excitement and
destruction

10. CHARACTERISATION - GATSBY
Fitzgerald clearly creates an air of isolation
around Gatsby:
“standing alone on the marble steps and looking
from one group to another”
“Sometimes they came and went without having
met Gatsby at all”

11. CHARACTERISATION - GATSBY
The repetition of the business calls
early in the morning perhaps suggests
underworld business connections.

13. PARTY
• Fashionable and alive - “the air is alive with chatter and laughter”
• “enthusiastic meetings between women who never knew each other’s
names”
• even though the conversations and meetings are
friendly, they are superficial and no real connection
between people occurs, all is for show
• “the groups change more swiftly, swell with new arrivals, dissolve
and form in the same breath” –
• constant change and flux, restlessness

14. PARTY
• wanderers, confident girls who weave here and there among the
stouter and more stable”
• need constant and varied attention – restless
• “conducted themselves according to the rules of behavior associated
with an amusement park. Sometimes they came and went without
having met Gatsby”
• people are more concerned with having a good time
than making friends with the host, Gatsby is a symbol
and provider of the party, not a real friend or tangible
person to them

15. APPEARANCES AND DECEPTION
• Wealth covers up immoral behavior.
• Story about Gatsby’s generosity toward the girl
that ruined her dress
• Is he trying to fly under the radar?
• Gothic library – staged; meant to be looked
at, not used; a fashion statement

17. SYMBOLISM – OWL EYES
“Absolutely real – have pages and everything….they are absolutely real…It
fooled me”
• Owl Eyes is surprised to discover that the books are real and
not just empty covers and cases.
• The people of West Egg and East Egg have ornate covers too
• Outward show of opulence covers up their inner corruption
and moral decay

18. APPEARANCES AND REALITY
• pages of the books aren’t cut - Gatsby doesn’t read
the books but spent a whole lot of money to look
learned, intelligent and gentlemanly
• An illusion
• “if one brick was removed the whole library was
liable to collapse”
• The extravagant wealth and appearance of Gatsby’s
house may not be as stable and secure as it seems
(danger)

19. DECEPTION AND REALITY
• The party is an elaborate theatrical production.
People do not even really like each other –
“East Egg condescending to West Egg”.
• Gatsby’s whole life is merely a show – fake
friends, pretend to like him, use him for his
parties and money

21. PERCEPTION VERSUS REALITY
“Most of the remaining women were now having fights with men
said to be their husbands”
• Alcohol distorts vision but also reality
(dangerous)
• Things are not as they seem.
• People pretend to be happy, party to
forget and get away from unfilled lives.
Restless.

23. MORE ON THE PARTY
“vacuous laughter” (empty) is heard and
costume acts are performed - the
entertainment is grand, but empty; again, no
joy is found in the connection between
people.

25. GATSBY’S SMILE
“It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of
eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across
four or five times in life. It faced - or seemed to face
- the whole external world for an instant, and then
concentrated on you with irresistible prejudice in
your favor. It understood you just as far as you
wanted to be understood, believed in you as you
would like to believe in yourself, and assured you
that it had precisely the impression of you that, at
your best, you hoped to convey.”

26. GATSBY’S SMILE AND BEHAVIOR
• It is a smile with depth, unlike Daisy’s charming though empty
laugh.
• He has charm and character and seems real, not fake like the
rest of society.
• He was an elegant roughneck in his early thirties that spoke with
excessive formality.
• Careful with his words – wanted to seem intelligent.
• He is friendly with Nick, calling him “old sport” as an
endearment
• Nick and Gatsby both served in the war together.

27. ISOLATED
• He was not drinking and instead of participating
in the debauchery
• Gatsby intentionally sets himself apart from his
guests and does not want to interact with the
general rabble; he only interacts with those
worth his time.
• Perhaps he is searching for something.

28. ISOLATED
“A sudden emptiness seemed to flow now from the windows and
the great doors, endowing with complete isolation the figure of the
host, who stood on the porch, his hands up in a formal gesture of
farewell.”
Gatsby is a lonely man, and the spell wears
off for him too.

30. CAR ACCIDENT – VIOLENCE AND
UNHAPPINESS
• Gatsby’s parties are an escape for the guests - a place
where they can forget the real world, mingle with
strangers, seeks glamour, drink themselves into a
stupor and concern themselves with fashion and
appearances.
• The spell comes to an end - unhappy marriage partners
reunite and fight, the consequences of mindless
partying are seen and there are repercussion for a lack
of responsibility (Danger)
• The real world can only be suspended for so long.

32. NICK ON LONELINESS
• Likes the racy, adventurous feel of the city - with its
enchanting lights, people and machines.
• The city is alive and in constant motion, but there’s
loneliness.
• He imagines following romantic looking women
home and perceives them smiling at him
• He says to feel a “haunting loneliness sometimes”
and he felt it in others.

33. LONELY IN A CROWD
• “Forms leaned together in the taxis as they
waited, and voices sang, and there was laughter
from unheard jokes, and lighted cigarettes outlines
unintelligible gestures inside. Imagining that
I, too, was hurrying toward gayety and sharing
their intimate excitement, I wished them well.”
• Nick is an observer, but not a
participant in life. He has no deep or
lasting human connections