Gatsby Chapter 3 — Your turn (pt. 2)
Ok. Here’s another passage. This one is about Gatsby himself:
He smiled understandingly—much more than understandingly. 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 an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just so 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. Precisely at that point it vanished—and I was looking at an elegant young rough-neck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd. Some time before he introduced himself I’d got a strong impression that he was picking his words with care.
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Okay, so if we look at this from a narrow-minded standpoint, it’s just a smile. Nick spent almost a third of a page describing Gatsby’s smile, which seemed like way too much for me.
However, there has to be some sort of method to this madness. My first thoughts while rereading this passage were that Nick simply wanted to give the impression that Gatsby is different from the other people in the story. He didn’t get introduced with annoying, pointless dialogue like some of the other characters. Rather, this smile of his, which is described as being full of trust and compassion, is what is first written of Gatsby. This automatically gives the impression that Gatsby is a fellow that might actually care about someone other than himself.
Nick also says that Gatsby seems to be picking his words with care. Woo-hoo! Finally, someone in the story isn’t just blabbering on and getting their nose broken for it. This makes me want to pay more attention to what Gatsby has to say. Or, perhaps Nick wrote this to point out that Gatsby is very egocentric and wants to make certain that people like him. Either way, I still want to pay attention to what he says because it seems like Nick wants to as well.
So, back to the smile. In reality, it’s just a smile. It’s obvious that Nick sees something peculiar in Gatsby; otherwise he wouldn’t have written so much about it.
Or maybe I’m way off, who knows! This is a refreshing break from Levine’s homework.
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Nice work, Joseph. I definitely agree that Nick is in a state of awe at Gatsby’s presence–and at this point he doesn’t know anything REAL about him. It’s all impression.
And Nick does like Gatsby. He wrote a whole book about him… and gave him the title (a title, “Great,” reserved for only the most amazing of kings).
And you have one extremely important observation: “Gatsby is a fellow who might actually care about someone other than himself.” Hold on to that. It’s a keeper.
Keep up the great posts!
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I LOVED LOVED LOVED THIS PASSAGE!!! I wholeheartedly agree with Joey’s analysis. To be honest, the a bit after the beginning of the novel was getting sort of boring to me, but then I read this and thought, “WOW, this guy is so mysterious that I NEED to keep reading to see why he is so “great”! It also shows how Nick isn’t so superficial to just see a man smiling, but a hardworking man who deserves that smile for years of dedication and sacrifice to his belief in the “American Dream”…
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Andrea, you bring up a good point about the “boring” feeling coming from chapter 2. Lots of people (including some teachers) really get turned off in chapter 2 b/c it’s so ugly. Well, my question for all of you, then, is why does Fitzgerald put it in there? Really, is chapter 3 so very different from chapter 2? Why are we so interested in chapter 3 & Gatsby? I mean he says nothing–NOTHING–of substance. He can’t even tell a good joke, or introduce himself properly. Yet, we’re enthralled. Maybe Fitzgerald is trying to hit upon one of our common (but less noble) features of human nature. Any thoughts?
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It isn’t unnatural for books to start out boring. However, I think Fitzgerald uses the “boringness” to show that Nick only gets to the surface of knowing what Gatsby I like. The quote that you supplied shows a quality of Gatsby. It shows that he is caring and it provides a sense of understanding between Nick and Gatsby and Gatsby and the reader. It allows us to relate to how Nick feels when Gatsby gives him this smile. (Especially when you have had the experience.) It makes the reader keep on reading so that they will find out more about Gatsby and to understand him. It also provides a sense of curiosity for the reader. Such as Andrea said, “‘this guy is so mysterious that I NEED to keep reading to see why he is so “great”!’”
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Personally, I think Nick’s only in awe because Fitzgerald needed someone to finally express Gatsby’s “Greatness”, otherwise, it wouldn’t really be called “The Great Gatsby”, now would it? Whilst Fitzgerald can add to Gatsby’s mysterious without bluntly stating it (although it was pretty blunt for me), he most likely wanted to keep the job simple. Or maybe just add even more to the power of Gatsby’s name, or in this case, his image. Throughout the story, Nick describes him in a way that almost makes him…god-like. He literally approves and disapproves of groups at his parties. Let’s not forget that Fitzgerald literally merges Gatsby with the darkness. It’s not that it’s “boring” (although it is), it’s simply the fact that most people today consider a “couple” times of hearing someone’s name, or how great they are a little too much. So it gets redundant, and I think we can all agree redundancy is boring. It’s apparent Fitzgerald really wanted to drill the greatness and marvel of Gatsby into the reader, and he really did that. Especially when you consider that most of the time, when Gatsby is around, Tom is as well. When you take something great and place it adjacent to something vile, the thing that looks great looks even greater. The same applies with people.
-Anthony
P.S. Why is the anti-spam word always “blog”? It defeats the purpose of “anti-spam”.
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Throughout this novel, Nick has seemed obsessed with Gatsby in various levels. Nick seems to be infatuated…not romantically of course (he isn’t gay, remember?). It seems more like an infatuation with his personality and with the lifestyle. Gatsby’s exterior image is that of a lavish man who is in his position because he is somehow better than those (like Nick) who are not. Nick covets this…which is why he seems so enthralled by Gatsby’s smile.
I must point out though that once we learn about Gatsby’s true nature, the halo that Nick has constructed around him suddenly vanishes. Interesting…perhaps ignorance really is bliss?
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ooooo…interesting! i never noticed that. i did however sense a VERY opinionated “I see” from Nick after Gatsby said that he was from the San Franciscan part of the Mid West.
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