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THE GREAT GATSBY. Chapter 1
The aim of the lesson is to teach you to select information that may enable the reader to anticipate not only the coming events but also the author’s attitude to them. You’ll also learn to comment on the means the author uses to render his attitude to events and people.
1. “America has been a land of dreams. A land where aspirations of people from countries cluttered with rich, cumbersome, aristocratic pasts can reach for what once seemed unattainable. Here they have tried to make dreams come true. The American Dream was the most accurate way of describing the hopes of men in a country where the impossible was thought only slightly less attainable than the difficult. The gods in this America are those of gross materialism and compulsive consumerism. There is no vision, no divine personality informing the commandments printed out in advertisements…”
Sum up the essence of the piece of information and add a few sentences explaining how chapter 1 reflects the ideas expressed.
2. What may the following phrases suggest? (pp. 5-6):
a) Nick Carraway is a self-consciously honest man and he “reserves judgement”.
b) “Gatsby turned out to be all right.”
c)”Gatsby possessed “an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness.”
What other phrases may seem just as suggestive? Explain.
3. Sum up thefinal paragraph of the introduction (p. 6, from “When I came back from the East…” to the end of the passage: “…elations of men”), so as to make it clearer to your fellow- students what the book is about.
4. At the beginning of his story Nick Carraway mentions the two wealthy Long Island communities: the West Egg and the East Egg, which are practically the same, consisting of the newly rich and of the financial aristocracy. The allusion to “ Gulliver’s Travels ” is quite obvious.
Give a summary of the chapter, keeping in mind the allusion. You may make use of the following scheme:
The story is narrated by Nick Carraway, a young man of good family, who… The novel focuses on Jay Gatsby, who has risen from obscure beginnings … The action in the novel is supposed to alternate between two wealthy Long Island communities - East Egg, bastion of traditional wealth, … and West Egg, the showcase of the newly rich… Beyond the rich Long Island Eggs lies the Valley of Ashes, a low middle class Waste Land… The neighborhood is dominated by a huge pair of sightless staring eyes behind enormous spectacles…
5. Do you think the narrator, Nick Carraway, is likely to be but a patient observer of the events, or an active participant? How much do we come to know about Nick’s background and personality? (Is he rather reticent or outspoken on the subject? What is his predominant attitude to life and to his fellow-creatures? Is he to be trusted as a recorder of events?)
6. Formulate your first impression of the book in a few terse, informative sentences: Judging by the first three chapters, it is a book that ……..(you may comment on the epoch it portrays, the tone, the events, the general manner, etc.)
THE GREAT GATSBY. Chapters 2-3
The aim of the lesson is to teach you to select information that may enable the reader to anticipate not only the coming events but also the author’s attitude to them. You’ll also learn to comment on the means the author uses to render his attitude to events and people.
1. “Gatsby’s Dream might be described as the American dream of success. It is the dream of rising from rags to riches, of amassing a great fortune that will assure a life of luxuriant ease, power, and beauty in an ideal world untroubled by care and devoted to the enjoyment of ever-lasting pleasure with nothing to intervene between wish and fulfillment. It is a naïve dream based on the fallacious assumption that material possessions are synonymous with happiness, harmony and beauty. The dreamer overlooks or is unaware of the fact that the fullest kinds of pleasure come from the cultivation of sensibilities, the development of understanding and the refinement of taste. Indeed, it is generally the case that the man who devotes all his energy to making money is deficient in those very qualities that make the life toward which he aspires desirable. The nouveaux riches, too newly rich to have had the leisure for self-cultivation, are frequently vulgar displayers of their newly-won material possessions, lacking in culture, sophistication, and refinement.”
Sum up the essence of the information and add a few sentences explaining how chapters 2-3 reflect the ideas expressed.
2. What may the following images suggest?
a)”…a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens…” (p.26)
b) “… The eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg are blue and gigantic… and look out of no face but instead from a pair of enormous yellow spectacles that pass over a nonexistent nose. (p.26)
c) “The orchestra is playing yellow cocktail music.” (p.43)
What other images may seem to the reader just as suggestive? Explain.
3. Give a summary of the chapters.
4. What makes you think there’s something amiss when the author describes Nick’s meeting with the Buchanans? Give a description of the characters. (Sum up the most salient features that give away the nature of this or that character. Use the author’s vocabulary – paraphrasing it, if necessary, but rely on your memory instead of reading things out from the text!) Report the events that take place during the dinner. Comment on the possible implications. Give your own conclusion as to the reader’s anticipation of the story.
5. The protagonist of the book, briefly mentioned by the storyteller in the introduction, appears but for a few seconds at the very end of Chapter 1. What impression does this fleeting presence produce? Even at the party the host, Gatsby, is not immediately in evidence. Before actually appearing in the garden scene, his figure is outlined by an aura of wild rumours spread by his pleasure-hunting guests. Does the fact contribute to the effect the author is trying to achieve? Explain.
SUPPLEMENT
Compare the original and its translation. Say what devices the translator resorts to and whether she (E.Kalashnikova) is successful. Then practice back translation.
| I graduated from New Haven in 1915. | Я окончил Йельский университет в 1915 году. |
| Everybody I knew was in the bond business, so I supposed it could support one more single man. | Все мои знакомые служили по кредитной части; так неужели там не найдется места для еще одного человека? |
| All my aunts and uncles talked it over… | Был созван весь семейный синклит… |
| I had a dog – at least I had him for a few days until he ran away… | Я завел собаку, - правда она сбежала через несколько дней … |
| …and then drifted here and there unrestfully wherever people played polo and were rich together. | …потом долго скитались по разным углам Европы, куда съезжаются богачи, чтобы вместе играть в поло и наслаждаться своим богатством. |
| Is she from New York? – From Louiseville. Our white girlhood was passed together there. Our beautiful white -- | Она из Нью-Йорка? – Из Луисвилла. Подруга моей юности. Моей счастливой, безмятежной юности… |
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