Book Review of "The Great Gatsby"

Bootlegged gin, cigarettes placed into mouths following the clicking shut of their golden cases, gowns, suits, chauffeurs. Games, double meanings, illicit affairs, fortunes made in mysterious ways, drinking to drown an awkward moment or the quiet disappointment of your life. This is the world of The Great Gastby, F. Scott Fitgerald’s 1925 masterpiece. The novel follows the young Nick Carraway as he recounts a summer in the 1920’s that he spent in New York
. It centers on his relationship with his cousin, Daisy, her husband, Tom, and how he gets drawn into the middle of Daisy’s affair with his neighbor, the mysteriously wealthy, unabashedly charming Mr. Jay Gatsby. Though at times his book comes off feeling like a tedious bore, Fitzgerald’s labors to create 1920 Long Island serve a very specific and tragic end. Early on, Nick earns the reader’s trust, and as the other characters become less honest and it becomes clear that very little they say or do is genuine, the reader can only sympathize with Nick when he begins to despise those around him. However, the payoff comes when Fitzgerald
displays the heart at the bottom of these seemingly senseless characters. Eventually, the games they play break down, making the display of true emotion--and more specifically, true desire--distinctly striking. At that point, the novel also becomes a story of consequence and ascends its prior tedium; the recklessness of these characters leads to their demise. In Gatsby, we're introduced to a doll-house. We're shown a world of glass, and though Fitzgerald makes us disgusted with what we've seen, there is something overwhelmingly tragic about watching the whole thing crumble to the ground.