Great Gatsby Reading Blog #2 (Chapters 4-6)

Meyer Wolfsheim doesn't take on a big roll as far as we've seen. His character is never developed so we know he can't be too important, but we do find out some things about him that also pertain to Gatsby's past. Wolfsheim appears to be caught up in some shady business that Gatsby is also a part of. This is a big step for the book because until now, we don't know a great deal of what Gatsby's real past was like. Nick finds out through meeting Wolfsheim about how Gatsby is in some business that could be seen as tainted and mysterious.When he offers Nick a "business gonnegtion" that could have made him some extra cash, it seems by the way he's talking about the business that it's illegal. In this sense, we as an audience start to associate Gatsby with this kind of risky business and provides an inference we must make about Gatsby-whether he's a nice guy in a bad business or that he's a little shady himself.
As we are provided with the past of Gatsby and Daisy, we start to feel more connected to Gatsby. The story of a boy falling in love with a girl before he goes to war- a perfect love story. However, while he is gone, the girl runs off to marry another man for his money. In any setting, an audience would feel bad for the boy. The boy is Gatsby and we all think of Daisy as a selfish girl. We side with Gatsby and become emotionally connected to him because he is now the victim in this situation. As we find out, he is still helplessly in love with Daisy and goes to extremes to try to win her back. We see Gatsby now as a romantic, sweet man and he immediately becomes the hero where we are all rooting for him. With Tom as an awful husband who cheats and beats Daisy, we are all waiting for that right moment for Gatsby to sweep Daisy off her feet and carry her into the sunset.
The rest of Gatsby's past story gives us the impression that he's not as perfect as he may appear to be. Rather than growing up in a rich family and inheriting a wealthy fortune, he was very poor.This changes our opinion of Gatsby yet again because we see that he has not been honest with Nick in telling him the past before we find these things out. This makes the readers wonder if we can trust anything else Gatsby has told us and we wonder how reliable of a person he really is.
My overall impression of Gatsby changes throughout these three chapters. Even though we see that he has lied about many things, I find him to be a generally nice human being with good goals and ambitions. We are able to see what a sweet man he is because he spent his whole life building up an image that Daisy would want to see and he becomes someone she would want to be with. This shows us that his love for Daisy overpowers everything. Although at times, he may do things to the extreme and may choose to do things on impulse, overall he has good intentions and he cares about Daisy more than anything else. This, to me, proves that he has a genuinely good heart and is a good man.

Jelly Roll Morton "Black Bottom Stomp"

This song is very upbeat and sounds like an old dancing song being played on a record player. I could see this at one of Gatsby's parties; everyone would be outside on a patio-like dancing floor with lights all around and a live jazz band playing. This song would be the song that everyone would be dancing to while some of the older sophisticated men stood around and talked while watching. Gatsby would be one of these men and they would be silently judging the people as they came and went. There would be little waiters all dressed up coming around and serving the people champagne and little tasty bite-sized food so the people were kept occupied. This song sounds like it would be the last song to play before everyone headed out for the night.

Great Gatsby Reading Blog #1 (Chapters 1-3)

Having only read the first three chapters of The Great Gatsby, it was difficult to pinpoint what "title" each character possessed. However, the description of the main characters allowed us to be conscience of what traits they displayed and what attitudes they expressed. Nick appears to be our reliable narrator from the very beginning. This would allow us to automatically categorize him under the "hero" subtitle. Not only do we recognize him as reliable, but we see him as a good-hearted man and kind. Tom, however we see as a villain. He isn't kind and he's very rude and arrogant. He's having an affair and just doesn't seem like the type of man you would call your "friend". On page 7, Nick describes Tom as "a sturdy straw-haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner. Two shining arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. Not even the effeminate swank of his riding clothes could hide the enormous power of that body....it was a body capable of enormous leverage- a cruel body." This shows how he establishes his higher power over everyone and thinks he's better than all. This would definitely be a characteristic of a villain, considering no one likes him. However, I believe there may be a chance later in the book for him to redeem himself, then making him an antihero. I don't think we've seen enough of Daisy to know whether she's really a heroine or not; therefore, I don't see a reason to draw a conclusion to her. Jordan may appear as an antihero because she is dishonest and cheats, but the audience still likes her. This would tie in with the definition of antihero, whereas an antihero employs many characteristics of archetype but their actions contradict what society deems acceptable, but then uses vigilante justice. Our first impression of Jordan is when Nick says ""Oh-you're Jordan Baker." I knew now why her face was familiar-its pleasing contemptuous expression had looked out at me from many rotogravure pictures of the sporting life at Asheville and Hot Springs and Palm Beach. I had heard some story of her too, a critical, unpleasant story, but what it was I had forgotten long ago. (page 18)" We later find out how she cheats and lies continuously, but yet we still are fond of her. Mr. Gatsby is a very mysterious character; yet his name is the title of the book, thus giving us the idea he plays an important role in the book. I would indicate him as a hero, merely from the fact that the title is his name and he is mysterious and we as readers want to grow closer to him. This will lead us to have an emotional attachment with him. I believe that he will make some kind of extraordinary appearance and do something that will prove himself worthy of the name "hero", but for now all we can do is hypothesize.

Justin Bua

The subject matter consists of African Americans. It appears as if the pictures take place in the Jazz Age. The way the people dress suggest it takes place in the older days and they are all forming some type of music- mostly instruments seen in the Jazz Age. The colors in the piece consist of dark shades, but they are very brightly and boldly portrayed throughout the pieces. He uses curvy and smooth lines and tends to exaggerate physical aspects of the people, such as features of the face and hands.