
Last Page of The Great Gatsby (1997) - samclemens
http://home.sprynet.com/~eric/Gatsby.htm
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yarou
I still can't believe the people who defend Daisy's character. She's literally
the definition of an evil human being.

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aliston
I love the Great Gatsby and I was surprised that there was a second level of
understanding that comes from how it changed through the versions. There is an
early version of The Great Gatsby in print called "Trimalchio: An Early
Version of 'The Great Gatsby'", which includes some interesting changes.

One of my favorite lines that made it into the recent movie but is not in the
regular print version:

I'm only 32… I might still be a great man if I could only forget that I once
lost Daisy. But my life, old sport, my life has got to be like this… It's got
to keep going up.

~~~
Andrex
I had no idea that line wasn't in the book! It's one of the best in the entire
movie. Crazy.

(Despite all the pomp and glitz, that version is one of my favorite movies.)

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voidhorse
Man, I really have to re-read the Great Gatsby.

It's ridiculous it's assigned as high school level reading. Yes the prose is
appropriate for high school understanding, and the base themes are
comprehensible enough, but _man_ , the entire subject matter of this book
largely revolves around scenarios, concepts, and behaviors one usually doesn't
become aware of, or have any direct experience of, until adulthood.

Worse still, forcing students to read the book in high-school/ end of junior
high probably just turns them off from it, or leads them to falsely feel like
its not worth as much as it actually is because so much of it is attuned to
adult experiences teenagers can't quite sync up with yet, even if they were
born into a rich family or use the fullest powers of their imagination.

There's a tremendous gulf between the social landscapes of adults and those of
children. (Though you could perhaps argue part of the _point_ is to maybe show
this isn't the case--nonetheless, I think certain things defy comprehension
until we've experienced them ourselves, or until we've at least encountered
sufficient analogues or had enough time to synthesize a variety of other proxy
experiences into an equivalent)

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xahrepap
I have no interest in reading the book... because of exactly this: I had to
read sophomore year of highschool, it was boring, left me with no desire to
read it. And I could never understand why my teacher loved it so much.

~~~
ikeyany
I'm trying to figure out if that is a flaw, or an inherent feature, of our
educational system (assuming you went to high school in the US).

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schizoidboy
Is it fair to say that a major theme in The Great Gatsby is the decadence of
rich people? If so, I don't understand why so many people seem to like the
book, non-ironically, for the parties and the glamour. Am I missing something?

~~~
smacktoward
No, you're just an observant enough reader to be able to see past the text of
the work and appreciate the subtext.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subtext](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subtext)

Lots of people aren't, so it's not uncommon to see people whose appreciation
of some works never gets beyond the surface level.

And sometimes they're so inattentive that even _the text itself_ is lost on
them. My standard example of that is Bruce Springsteen's song "Born in the
USA," which is widely understood (in America, anyway) as a bombastic, "we're
number one!" patriotic anthem, played at political rallies and sports events
and the like. If you pay attention to the actual lyrics
([http://www.elyrics.net/read/b/bruce-springsteen-
lyrics/born-...](http://www.elyrics.net/read/b/bruce-springsteen-lyrics/born-
in-the-usa-lyrics.html)), however, it's clearly a song about how the American
system screws the little guy. But most people don't listen beyond the upbeat,
poppy chorus, so they miss Springsteen's entire point.

~~~
toyg
Same with Neil Young's "Keep on rockin' in the free world", Dire Straits'
"Money for nothing", and other songs even in other languages.

Personally, I've soured on the idea of being ironic in songs. Most people will
miss the irony, they only listen to the catchy chorus, and more often than
not, the lines you meant as absurd will be proudly paraded by the same people
you were mocking. Take the recent _" We the people"_ by A Tribe Called Quest:
the chorus, taken alone, is a bigots' anthem on a catchy tune; I bet it will
soon become a mainstay at neonazi rallies and the likes.

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aqsalose
>the lines you meant as absurd will be proudly paraded by the same people you
were mocking

You can cite centuries old examples of this.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yankee_Doodle#Early_versions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yankee_Doodle#Early_versions)

>Traditions place its origin in a pre-Revolutionary War song originally sung
by British military officers to mock the disheveled, disorganized colonial
"Yankees" with whom they served in the French and Indian War, apparently
written c. 1755 by British Army surgeon Dr. Richard Shuckburgh while
campaigning in upper New York.[13] The British troops sang it to make fun of
their stereotype of the American soldier as a Yankee simpleton who thought
that he was stylish if he simply stuck a feather in his cap.[1]

~~~
pythonaut_16
That's a rather different point though. In the case of Yankee Doodle, the
Americans new what it meant and used it as an act of defiance, where the other
poster was talking about people missing the point entirely

