Literary Criticism

Group 7

Eka Iriyanti Made (1318351060)

I.G.K Sumarajaya (1601542006)
I Komang Aryadi (1601542007)
Indra Marioni Mbado (1601542015)
Rizkyta Putri (1318451003)
Introduction
Scott Fitzgerald's novels, The Great Gatsby, follows Jay
Gatsby, a man who orders his life around one desire: to be
reunited with Daisy Buchanan, the love he lost five years
earlier. Gatsby's quest leads him from poverty to wealth, into
the arms of his beloved, and eventually to death. Published in
1925, The Great Gatsby is a classic piece of American fiction. It
is a novel of triumph and tragedy, noted for the remarkable way
Fitzgerald captured a cross-section of American society.
Plot
First Act: Nick spends the First Act being introduced to high
society, with varying levels of success. He hangs out with his
cousin Daisy and her brutish husband Tom, is introduced to
Tom’s ill-fated relationship with the mechanic George Wilson
and his bombshell wife Myrtle, and meets his own fling Jordan
Baker. Gatsby doesn’t show up in the First Act, but his presence
looms large as the light among lights in this glittering
landscape. We particularly get the sense of a history between
Gatsby and Daisy.
Rising Action: Nick arranges a reunion between Gatsby
and Daisy, and Jordan tells Nick about Daisy and
Gatsby’s history. Gatsby and Daisy fall back in love, and
Gatsby tells Nick one version of his life story. Many of
the stories Gatsby tells about himself turn out to be lies or
half-truths. The fantastic nature of his stories gives
Gatsby’s history a mythical quality, which reinforces the
sense of him as a tragic hero.
The climax of the novel comes when the group is driving
back from New York in two cars, and Myrtle, Tom’s
lover, mistakes Gatsby’s car for Tom’s and runs out into
the street and is hit and killed. The car that kills Myrtle
belongs to Gatsby, but Daisy is driving. After this, the
action resolves quickly. Gatsby takes the blame in order
to protect Daisy, and Myrtle’s husband, George, kills
Gatsby (and then himself) as revenge.
Resolution: After the funeral, Nick distances himself
from the East Egg crowd. Blinders now removed, he finds
little to appreciate in the city life he once loved. He
decides to return home, but not without officially ending
his relationship with Jordan and confronting Tom. He
revisits Gatsby’s house, where the grass is now
overgrown, and he once again compares Gatsby, with his
sense of wonder and hope, to the cynicism and selfishness
of the world that destroyed him.
Character

 Nick Carraway
 Jay Gatsby
 Daisy Buchanan
 Tom Buchanan
 Jordan Baker
 Myrtle Wilson
 George Wilson
 Owl Eyes
 Klipspringer
 Meyer Wolfsheim
Point of View
The Great Gatsby is written in first-person limited
perspective from Nick’s point of view. This means that
Nick uses the word “I” and describes events as he
experienced them.
Theme

 Money and Materialism

 The American Dream
 Love, Desire, and Relationships
 Morality and Ethics
Biography of F.Scott Fitzgerald
F. Scott Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1896. He
attended Princeton University, joined the United States Army
during World War I, and published his first novel, This Side of
Paradise, in 1920. That same year he married Zelda Sayre and
for the next decade the couple lived in New York, Paris, and on
the Riviera. Fitzgerald's masterpieces include The Beautiful and
the Damned, The Great Gatsby, and Tender Is the Night. He
died at the age of forty-four while working on The Last Tycoon.
Fitzgerald's fiction has secured his reputation as one of the most
important American writers of the twentieth century.
Critical Reviews
Arthur Mizener wrote that Almost for the first time Fitzgerald
created with that voice an image of The Good American of our
time in all his complexity of human sympathy, firm moral
judgment and ironic self-possession. We can now afford to turn
our attention to such things – because, whatever disagreements
we may have over Fitzgerald’s work as a whole, there remain
few doubts of the greatness of Gatsby or of its imaginative
relevance to American experience.
We do agree with him because In the Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald
present two distinct types of wealthy people : people who born
wealthy( Old money) and people who are not(new money).