Resumen
Resumen de The Great Gatsby
Para quién es
For readers who love sharp, short fiction, mysterious millionaires and stories of wealth, love and illusion. Students and book clubs will find rich themes in Gatsby's parties, his hopes and the American dream.
De qué trata este libro
The Great Gatsby is a short novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, published in 1925. It is set on Long Island and in New York City in the summer of 1922, when the United States is rich, loud and sure that the good times will last. Fitzgerald wrote it after his early success, drawing on the parties he had seen and on his own mix of longing and doubt about money and status.
The story is told by Nick Carraway, a young man from the Midwest who comes east to sell bonds. Next door to his rented cottage stands a huge mansion where a man named Jay Gatsby gives parties that hundreds of people attend. Nobody seems to know who Gatsby is, where his money comes from, or why he gives the parties at all. Nick slowly finds out, and what he finds is smaller, sadder and more human than the legend.
In about fifteen minutes you will get the shape of the whole book: its people, its places, its main symbols, and the ideas readers have argued about for a century. You will hear the story up to the point where it begins to close, and no further. Let us begin where Nick begins, with his move to New York and the cousin he visits across the water.
En este resumen
- 1Nick Carraway moves east and meets the BuchanansFree
- 2The Valley of Ashes hides Tom's secret life
- 3Gatsby's parties fill the summer with strangers
- 4Nick learns what the lights are for
- 5A rainy afternoon brings Gatsby and Daisy together
- 6Old money and new money begin to collide
- 7Gatsby's dream is about the past, not the present
- 8Wealth makes people careless and shields them
- 9Nick tells the story with care and doubt
Idea clave 1 de 9
Nick Carraway moves east and meets the Buchanans
Nick Carraway comes from a comfortable family in Minnesota. He fought in the First World War, and when he returns home he finds the Midwest too slow and too small. In the spring of 1922 he moves to New York to learn the bond business. He rents a modest house in West Egg, a village on Long Island, for eighty dollars a month.
His little house sits between two worlds. Beside it stands a vast mansion, built like a French town hall, with a tower, a marble swimming pool and a garden the size of a park. Across the bay lies East Egg, where the older and more fashionable rich live. West Egg is home to the newly rich, and Fitzgerald makes this quiet difference in class an idea that runs through the whole novel.
Nick drives across to East Egg to dine with his cousin Daisy and her husband, Tom Buchanan. Tom is a huge, powerful man who was a football star at Yale and who has money from his family in Chicago. He keeps polo ponies, speaks in a loud, bullying way, and repeats half-understood ideas he has picked up from books about race and civilization. Daisy is light, charming and playful, and her voice seems to promise something exciting to everyone who hears it.
At the table sits Jordan Baker, a young professional golfer with a cool, bored manner and a careless way with the truth. Nick finds the house beautiful and the people uneasy. A telephone call interrupts the dinner, and from the awkward hush that follows he understands that Tom has another woman. Daisy keeps smiling, but the smile does not quite hide that she already knows.
Later that night Nick walks home and sees his neighbor standing alone on the lawn, looking at the dark water. The man stretches out both arms toward a small green light at the end of a dock across the bay. Nick almost speaks, then thinks better of it, and when he looks again the man has gone. It is the first sign that the host next door is after something far larger than a good party.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Who’s who
- Nick Carraway
- A Midwestern bond salesman and the narrator, Nick is Daisy's cousin and Gatsby's next-door neighbor.
- Jay Gatsby
- Nick's mysterious, wealthy neighbor throws lavish parties and longs to renew his earlier romance with Daisy.
- Daisy Buchanan
- Nick's charming cousin and Gatsby's former sweetheart, Daisy is married to the wealthy Tom Buchanan.
- Tom Buchanan
- Daisy's domineering husband is a wealthy former football player whose confidence rests on inherited social privilege.
- Jordan Baker
- Daisy's poised friend is a professional golfer who grows close to Nick during his summer out east.
- Myrtle Wilson
- George's restless wife lives near the valley of ashes and yearns for a more glamorous social world.
- George Wilson
- Myrtle's weary husband runs a garage near the valley of ashes and hopes to improve their circumstances.
- Meyer Wolfsheim
- A gambler and business associate of Gatsby, Wolfsheim suggests the murky connections behind his friend's wealth.
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 50,000 words
- Reading timeAbout 3 h 20 min
- Listening time5 h 35 min
- FormatseBook, large-print eBook, audiobook, 15-minute summary; paperback, hardcover and large print at cost
- LanguagesEnglish and 14 other languages
Questions about The Great Gatsby
What is The Great Gatsby about?
It is about a young narrator, Nick Carraway, who moves to Long Island in 1922 and becomes entangled with his mysterious neighbor Jay Gatsby, whose lavish parties hide a single hope. It studies wealth, love and the American dream.
What does the green light mean in The Great Gatsby?
The green light sits at the end of Daisy's dock across the bay from Gatsby's house. It stands for his hope and longing, and for a future that always seems just out of reach.
Who is Nick Carraway and why does he tell the story?
Nick is a young Midwesterner who works in bonds and rents a cottage next to Gatsby. He is both friend and observer, and his careful, doubtful voice lets readers see events through a mixture of admiration and judgment.
When was The Great Gatsby written and is it a true story?
Fitzgerald published it in 1925, and the story is fiction set in 1922. It draws on the author's own observations of wealthy Long Island society and his own feelings about money and ambition.
Is The Great Gatsby hard to read?
No. It is short, with nine chapters and plain, lyrical prose. The story is easy to follow.