The Great Gatsby - motifs

The Green Light

- Represents Gatsby's entire dream of Daisy and status
- Green = jealousy, money, new beginnings/growth, abundance
- Permanent, unmoving object (physically static) -> dream was never in reach?
- Gives cyclical structure (mentioned beginning, middle and end), makes plot complete
- "The flowers were unnecessary, for at two o'clock a greenhouse arrived from Gatsby's" - she shows Daisy his dream
- Loses significance as he obtains Daisy or as he realises his dream is futile? 'diminished by one'
- Mysterious, not sure where its coming from
- Prove they exist in the same world and class barriers are just a man-made barrier, foreshadows struggles to reconcile relationship
- Acts as a warning: deep revive between real and imagined Daisy
- Pursuit of his dream on the spiritual level is incompatible with the social environment

The Green Light - key quotes

"He stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling" (C.1)

"the colossal significance of that light had now vanished forever...His count of enchanted objects had diminished by one" (C.5)

"Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us" (C.9)

Colour

- Gatsby's persona is yellow symbolising wealth, happiness, connected to Daisy: in reality he is blue as he is hollow, sad and alone
- Daisy represents metallics, especially gold: she emanates wealth
- Daisy is associated with white, her name is a white flower, image of purity but has a hollow interior (Gatsby's dream is elusive and worthless)
- Tom is represented by red: he is bold and characterised by anger and dominance, large sexual appetite shown through affair with Myrtle
- Grey rules whole novel: Valley of Ashes links to Elliot's poem 'The Waste Land', in a world of money shows how people have become spiritless
- Gatsby killed by a fantastic ashen figure
- TJ Eckleburg is a symbol of yellow: people worship money, like an idol
- Yellow autumn leaves symbolise death and decay: Gatsby's persona breaks down

Colour - key quotes

"golden girl"

When Daisy was 18 she wore "white and had a little white roadster"

"He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it."

"a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat"

"The little dog was sitting on the table looking with blind eyes through the smoke"

"they stood on my shelf in red and gold like new money"

"bloody towels" after Tom punches Myrtle

Cars/automobiles

- 1920s cars were a luxury and seen only fit for wealthy people
- Tom's blue car: blue blood of the aristocracy
- George is a mechanic but will never own a car like Tom's or Gatsby's: touching the dream but out of reach
- Death vehicle caused the tragedy, exaggerated description is a form of foreshadowing
- Daisy does not have a current car mentioned: she does not have property as is now the property of Tom

Cars/automobiles - key quotes

At 18 Daisy had a "little white roadster"

"rich cream color, bright with nickel, swollen here and there in its monstrous length" "labyrinth of wind shields that mirrored a dozen suns" "With fenders spread like wings we scattered light through half Astoria"

"blue car, a coupe"

"When are you going to sell me that car?"

"we drove on toward death through the cooling twilight" (Nick)

Weather/nature

- Progresses from spring -> summer -> autumn -> winter, acts as a time frame
- Summer class-dependant nature: rich go away for a season and have freedom, poor work through heat
- When Daisy and Gatsby reunite (C.5) the weather reflects his varying emotions: ominous/anxious -> romanticized calmness -> obtained dream
- C.7 hottest day of the year: heat and tensions rise simultaneously, collostophic atmosphere, producers tend to cover actors in water to exaggerate, desert heat as Daisy is a mirage
- Myrtle's death: natural progression of seasons shows was always going to happen, staff preparing for winter shows a sense of finality, marks end of dream
- Funeral: full circle as we have followed Gatsby's life, still romanticized language showed failed to come to a realisation vs religious rebirth

Weather/nature - key quotes

"There was music from my neighbours house through the summer nights" (C.3)

"relentless beating heat" (C.7, hottest day of the year)

"The night had made a sharp difference in the weather and there was an autumn flavour in the air" (C.8)

"When we pulled out into the winter night and the real snow, our snow, began to stretch out beside us and twinkle against the windows" (C.9)

Moonlight/sunlight

- Large spectacle of the night
- Traditionally associated with romantic imagination
- Individual experience of solitude, desire for an unattainable ideal
- Moon has connotations of destiny and fate
- The sun is a source of life/power/divinity
- Daisy represents the sun in the centre of Gatsby's universe, as the novel transitions from summer -> winter, the sun moves further away

Moonlight/sunlight - key quotes

"came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars"

"A wafer of the moon was shining over Gatsby's house"

First view of Gatsby under "the silver pepper of the stars"

"Standing there in the moonlight watching over nothing"

"the last sunshine fell with romantic affection upon her flowing face"

"two rows of brass buttons on her dress gleamed in the sunlight"

"Daisy, gleaming like silver and proud above the hot struggles of the poor"

Time

- Simultaneous desire of Gatsby to reach his future but relive the past
- Living life in an idealised past is no life at all, he is trapped by time
- "Time" mentioned 87 times, related words 450
- Rewinding time becomes his only goal, leads to perpetual unfulfillment
- Daisy is the opposite: moves fast, living on impulses
- Carelessness is common in the upper classes and unsurprising in East Egg
- Nick and therefore Fitzgerald control time through the narrative: not always chronological, creates empathy for Gatsby
- Nick is content with the inevitability of aging, doesn't let it control him: thirties are a decade of loneliness
- Time is an obstacle of fear for Myrtle as she realises her dreams of success and wealth are drifting away: justification of infidelity

Time - key quotes

' "You can't repeat the past! Can't repeat the past? He cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!" '

"he was running down like an overwound clock"

C.5 "two-oclock" "five-oclock" "four-oclock"

"the clock took this moment to tilt dangerously at the the pressure of his head"

"I love you now - isn't that enough? I can't help what's past"

"the formidable stroke of thirty died away with the reassuring pressure of her hand"

"you can't live forever" (Myrtle)

Water

- Barrier to love: physical barrier between West and East Egg, linked to green light, blurred vision as dream fades in rain
- Emblematic of class and tragedy: Daisy's inevitable rejection of Gatsby: rain during reunification forebodes ending
- Death within pool symbolises a sense of baptism/rebirth, even death romanticised as Myrtle is still sexualised in death
- Represents how 1920s American society allegedly offers new beginnings
- Daisy finds letter from Gatsby in the 'tub', lets it dissolve ending their relationship
- Only religious element of Gatsby: symbol of purification
- Met Dan Cody on yacht: rebirth into new identity, American Dream
- Synonymous with Gatsby and Daisy's relationship

Water - key quotes

"Blessed are the dead that the rain falls on"

"A damp streak of hair lay like a dash of blue paint across her cheek and her hand was wet with glistening drops"

"[He] stretched his arms toward the dark water"

"so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past"

"I've never used that pool all summer"

Setting/mansions

- East vs West Egg: Old vs New money
- Valley of Ashes: place where dreams go to die, between the Eggs and Manhattan so have to pass through, gothic terrain
- Mansions were a display of wealth
- Red and white of Tom and Daisy's mansion: represents them both
- Myrtle's apartment is seen in same respect at Gatsby's mansion: hollow and flashy
- Long Island/New York location: height of American Dream
- Real estate called Habour Hill modelled on the Hotel De Ville
- Nobody in The Great Gatsby is happy with their lot in life

Setting - key quotes

"factual imitation of some Hotel De Ville in Normandy"

"My own house was an eyesore, but it was a small eyesore"

"a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat"

"I lived at West Egg, the—well, the less fashionable of the two"

"furniture entirely too large for it" (Myrtle's apartment)

TJ Eckleburg

- Vision and blindness
- Fitzgerald worked in advertising before writing
- Advertising someone that promises to help people see but Nick suspects closed down -> eternal blindness
- Eyes of an indifferent God
- Wilson looks at after finds out about Myrtle
- Widespread moral blindness and a lack of religious beliefs
- Myrtle anomaly in a sea of grey

TJ Eckleburg - key quotes

"The eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg are blue and gigantic—their retinas are one yard high"

"under Doctor Eckleburg's persistent stare"

"Standing behind him, Michaelis saw with a shock that he was looking at the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg"

NAMES

Daisy Faye - childish playful, rhymes with Jay (tries to make himself compatible), fairy like

Jordan Baker - play on two major American automobile manufacturers of the time: the Jordan Motor Car Company and Baker Motor Vehicle (masculine, bad driver ironic)

Nick Carraway - common name, everyday quality to make him relatable to the reader, Carraway seed used in cooking = exaggerates/romanticizes story

Jay Gatsby - blue jay known for being loud and aggressive, Gatsby similar to gaudy showing flashy persona

Tom Buchanan - surname has underlying privilege, roots in Scottish aristocracy, Tom is common showing his arrogance and deluded self-importance