The Great Gatsby

Who is Gatsby?

Jay Gatsby originally named James Gatz is the titular fictional character of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald based many details about the fictional character on Max Gerlach, a mysterious neighbor, and World War I veteran whom the author met while living on Long Island near New York City during the raucous Jazz Age. Like Gerlach, Gatsby is an enigmatic nouveau riche millionaire who lives in a luxurious mansion where he often hosts extravagant parties and who gained his vast fortune by illicit bootlegging during prohibition in the United States.

            

The character of Jay Gatsby has been analyzed by scholars for many decades and has given rise to a number of critical interpretations. Scholars have posited that Gatsby functions as a cipher because of his obscure origins, his unclear religio-ethnic identity, and his indeterminate class status. Accordingly, Gatsby's socio-economic ascent is deemed a threat by other characters in the novel not only due to his status as nouveau riche but because he is perceived as a societal outsider. The character's biographical details indicate his family is recent immigrants which preclude Gatsby from the status of an Old Stock American. As the embodiment of "latest America", Gatsby's rise triggers status anxieties typical of the 1920s era, involving xenophobia and anti-immigrant sentime.

A century after the novel's publication, Gatsby has become a cultural touchstone in 20th century America and is often evoked in popular media in the context of the American Dream—the belief that every individual, regardless of their origins, may seek and achieve their desired goals, "be they political, monetary, or social. It is the literary expression of the concept of America: The land of opportunity".Gatsby has been described by literary scholars as a false prophet of the American dream as pursuing the dream often results in dissatisfaction for those who chase it, owing to its unattainability.

The film was highly polarizing among critics; it received both praise and criticism for its acting performances, soundtrack, visual style, direction, and faithfulness to the source material. Audiences responded more positively and Fitzgerald's granddaughter praised the film, stating "Scott would have been proud."As of 2017, it is Luhrmann's highest-grossing film, grossing over $353 million worldwide. At the 86th Academy Awards, the film won in both of its nominated categories: Best Production Design and Best Costume Design.

The Cast: 

Leonardo DiCaprio

Tobey Maguire

Carey Mulligan

Joel Edgerton

Elizabeth Debicki

Isla Fisher

Jason Clarke

Amitabh Bachchan

The Jazz Age :

The Jazz Age was a period in the 1920s and 1930s in which jazz music and dance styles rapidly gained nationwide popularity in the United States. The Jazz Age's cultural repercussions were primarily felt in the United States, the birthplace of jazz.

The novel and film capture jazz Age From the publication of his 1922 collection, Tales of the Jazz Age, and beyond, F. Scott Fitzgerald has been inextricably linked to jazz. Indeed, Fitzgerald is even widely believed to have coined the term “Jazz Age,” and although the phrase predated Fitzgerald’s book, his usage unquestionably boosted its popularity immensely. The presence of jazz in his other works, perhaps most iconically in his grand novel The Great Gatsby, linked the term even more tightly to his name. Today, the moniker “Jazz Age” has come to signify, as a kind of evocative shorthand, the 1920s in both academic and pop culture. Because jazz’s lineage—difficult as it is to pin down—was tightly bound up with African-American performance, the music often came to signify black American cultural production, and so, whenever Fitzgerald invoked jazz, he was often, simultaneously, invoking blackness. Yet The Great Gatsby’s usage of jazz is complicated, as Fitzgerald was simultaneously a proponent of the then-new, race-crossing music and a writer prone to resorting to racial stereotypes when black characters appeared—a combination that, unfortunately, was far from uncommon in Fitzgerald’s day.

It is difficult to overstate the pre-eminence of jazz in the early twentieth century in America, appearing as a theme in everything from clubs to cartoons to realist fiction. “For the makers, consumers, and arbiters of culture,” the theater and music scholar David Savran wrote in 2006, “jazz was everything. A weltanschauung, a personal identity, a metaphysics, an epistemology, an ethics, an eros, a mode of sociality—an entire way of being.” It was a musical style that, with its improvised orchestration, complexity, and danceable melodies, seemed to represent, through the fusion of seemingly contrary impulses, so much of the world at the time: the dissonance of Modernism, on the one hand, with jazz’s rejection of straightforward classical music, and, on the other hand, its class-transcending popularity, whereby both rich and poor could, in theory, dance to similar music.

In the film, Scott used the term Jazz music or dance style mentioned during the party given by Jay Gatsby. The party actually given by him to impress Daisy who married Tom. The way the people were danced in the party, shows modernistic term which presented by Baz Luhrmann in the film. The cinematography. The rolling of camera upon the people and covered the entire hall was also very amazing. The man who played piano, and the other peoples who enjoyed the free party. The organization of party is also beautiful. The white chandelier also played significance role in the party that the striking light shows high prosperity of the rich-class.

The another thing is that, in the underground party while Meyer Wolfsheim, Jay Gatsby and Nick were there. The Jazz music also played in the meeting at Apartment Party. So the music also consider as how the corrupted society and through the music and dance people enjoyed their corrupted business life. And during the accident scene music also played while Myrtle's body was on air and the board which represent the eyes of God.

How did the film help to understand the characters of the Novel?

Honestly saying the Movie helped a lot to understand every single flow of the novel very well. Here are some scenes I liked the most.

The scene Where Gatsby suddenly bumped into Daisy.

As the Narrator says Gatsby is the most optimistic character in the novel movie also when he was in the pool he was expecting Daisy's call. That is not just one thing we found him most hopeful person there are lot more things that prove him full of hope person anyone could ever be.

The film help in understanding the characters of the novel:

Film is the literary tool which helps us to understand the novel. In this movie, first narrative technique is quite difficult. The narrator told the past of his life with his cousin and his lover Jay Gatsby who is the main character of the story. In film, cinematography is quite helpful to understand the characters. Sometimes we read the description about particular character but we don't understand what they think in-sightly. Like the most important character is the eyes of God which presented very silently through the rolling of camera.

The symbolic significance of 'The Valley of Ashes', 'The Eyes of Dr. T J Eckleberg' and 'The Green Light'?

The Valley of Ashes:

In the second chapter of the novel is begins with the introduction of The Valley of Ashes.Lines like,

About half way between West Egg and New York the motor-road hastily joins the railroad and runs beside it for a quarter of a mile, so as to shrink away from a certain desolate area of land. This is a valley of ashes—a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.

This paragraph shows the industrialization and how the dimly air,chimneys, rising smoke are represents the sketch of mechanism.

Occasionally a line of grey cars crawls along an invisible track, gives out a ghastly creak and comes to rest, and immediately the ash-grey men swarm up with leaden spades and stir up an impenetrable cloud which screens their obscure operations from your sight.

While this paragraph symbolized the sight of poor people like George Wilson who lived that dirty era of ashes. In the film,while Tom go to that valley area to meet his lover and wife of George, Myrtle, the way the car is pass through the black roads and presents the class like, Tom's talking with George and other people also connecting with Classicism.

The Eyes of Dr.T.J.Eckleberg:

In the film, this eyes were painted on an old advertising billboard which is stand over the valley of ashes.In the film, the accident scene was depicted the symbolization.

The Green Light:

The Green light symbolized the hope, dreams and future of Jay Gatsby. In hope may be it symbolized that Daisy will come in his life. The another things like his dreams and his future to live and to have the rich and lavish life.

Psychoanalytical study of Jay Gatsby: 

Great Gastby vision of life. Natural attraction of wealth Power,Beauty,shame,Guilt shame For he is boy from Small town Norther Farye he talk about he was shame for his lover class in his Parents Farmers Gatsby describe as Self made man start create persona change his name he believe serve in army persona of himself Against Reaction shame

Guit Feeling people feel they done something wrong Broken something moral shame feeling about selfwrong Gatsby shame about lower class upbringing and he does Lewis displays wealth psychologist says reaction for motion shame for poor People think about you The Character of Novel not feel guit for their actions.

Nick as Narrator: 

Going Beyound simple Narration how to Portray himself and others to his reades no dout he present himself more Positive sympathetic way possible this is true from the opening Sentence of the Book Nick writes in my younger and more vulnerable year my father gave some advice that I've been turning ove on my mind ever since this line is chock full of carefully chosen Language inteapnded to evoke Pathos and sentimentality,Gatsby This opening persona forms the foundational sea persona of Nick Carryway.

he's a mid western good boy always try to see The best in people very decent, good Moral carrway from his enduring awkwardness Among the crowds at Gatsby's First Party Nick Wrote about Tom ' Now he was Sturdy strawhaired man of Thirty with a rather hard mouth and supercilious manner.Two shinig arrogat leyes had established dominance. over his face and gave him the apperance at always learning aggressively very forward Nick speakva gruff husky tenor added to the impression of Peachousness be conveyed there was a touch of paternal content Problematic aspect of Nick's backstory Lerman does address it's treated as little more than a throw away time during a quick dinner montage early in the film after  this brief exchange subject is dropped completely that's for Nick and Jordan we'll there are given romantic subplot that end up playing as the fish out of water mid western guy landing the sophisticated New York girl who's out of his league it's not hard to see why Lerman would choose tools over the troubling threat of Nick is supposed to function as an audience surrogate then it's a lot easier to root for a wide-eyed under dog then an Egoitsheal cheater.

In Novel NICK's moto keep himself at arm's length from the action and consequences that take place the desired effect is for the great gutsby simple observer Nick perspective as a victim doesn't consistently help up he know about Jay and Daisy relationship.Tom asked him to see my wife he denied another was the accident victim narrative vichimized by difficult and shocking situation.

Conclusion: 

The Great Gatsby is one of the Best American Fiction novels Written by F.Scott.Fitzgerald Which is published in 1925. Set in Jazz Age.

Here is a brief blog on my understanding of The Great Gatsby.