Gatsby: Introducing Nick Carraway

"'Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,' he [my father] told me, 'just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had'" (The Great Gatsby, 1).

I haven't quite decided whether I should endow Nick Carraway or Mr. Jay Gatsby with the title of "protagonist" quite yet, but Nick is certainly the narrator. This quote from his father -- the idea that "a sense of the fundamental decencies is parcelled out unequally at birth" -- is central to Nick's character. Although the vastly wealthy people around Nick don't behave very respectably, our narrator reserves judgment, which opens him up to the deep secrets of other characters like Mr. Gatsby.

I really like Nick's character, partly due to his modesty. Around his wealthy acquaintances, Nick admits, "'You make me feel uncivilized, Daisy.'" Calling himself uncivilized among a house full of extremely hypocritical, racist, materialistic, and impulsive characters (more on that in my next post) is modest, in addition to being ironic. I'm very fond of Nick's voice; his sarcasm is very witty and thoughtful, and it goes way over the heads of the Buchanans. "'Do you want to hear about the butler's nose?' 'That's why I came over to-night'" (13).

One of Nick's iffy spots would probably be his incredulity. "He [Gatsby] looked at me sideways -- and I knew why Jordan Baker had believed he was lying" (65). At one point, he was so disbelieving that he had to restrain laughter at Gatsby's story. But everything becomes true to Nick when he sees physical proof: Gatsby's war medal and picture from Oxford. In my opinion, even his skepticism is likable -- in Nick's defense, he's around a bunch of secretive wealthy people, so being suspicious is no crime.

Fun fact: this Christmas, while Leonardo DiCaprio will be portraying Mr. Gatsby, Tobey Maguire will be taking the role Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby! Your friendly neighborhood Spiderman.

"And lying, she knew, was a sin."

"Zoe came up, slow, from behind and gave him a shove. His arms slipped forward, off the railing, out over the street. Beer spilled out of his bottle, raining twenty stories down to the street" ("You're Ugly, Too," 194).

But don't worry -- she was just joking! It reminds me of a certain Kenny who points a gun at a certain Tub to play a joke on him, but that one is a little bit more extreme.

I learned the different between verbal irony and sarcasm when I read the preface to one of the poetry units. Much like the difference between situational irony and coincidence, nobody seems to know it. I'm not even sure that I know what the difference is, but here it is. Verbal irony is any general instance of saying one thing but meaning another. Sarcasm is more specific and is sometimes a type of verbal irony; however, it's more abrasive or offensive. The difference between the two is easily observed (sorry about the passive voice -- I'm on a tight schedule) in the character of Zoe.

"She used to insist it was irony, something gently layered and sophisticated, something alien to the Midwest, but her students kept calling it sarcasm, something they felt qualified to recognize, and now she had to agree. It wasn't irony" (6). I'm here to argue that while sometimes she is definitely sarcastic, there are times when she is just being ironic.

When Zoe says that an "ultrasound" sounds like "a really great stereo system," she is not being sarcastic because her words are not harsh (57). Really, once the funny part is over, it's just kind of a sad statement. On the other hand, the joke about "you're ugly, too" is sarcastic (66). And since somebody is offended in sarcasm, it's that much funnier.

I'm not sure what else I wanted to cover in this post. Oh, yes. I think the point of the story could be to point out when humor goes too far, and I quoted the most concrete example of that in the story at the beginning of my post.

Does humor ever really go too far, though?

Mm, cheese . . .

"'And do you suppose' -- I said this gently, without a hint of sarcasm -- 'if we're driving all that way, we should think about calling in on Tommy? Seeing his centre's just down the road from where this boat's meant to be?'" (Never Let Me Go, 216).

Kathy's discussion with Ruth in chapter eighteen revealed her to be a dynamic character. When she was a teenager, she was very sarcastic (as I quoted in an earlier post):

"'It didn't hurt, did it? When I hit you?' 

'Sure. Fractured skull. Concussion, the lot. Even Crow Face might notice it. That's if I ever get up there'" (Never Let Me Go, 14).

Additionally, the two of them were able to talk without any quarreling. The mature conversation effectively demonstrates that the characters are no longer children or teenagers but adults. Even Ruth, now, is comfortable reflecting on the past without trying to pretend it didn't happen.

I also want to point out another euphemism in the book: Kathy said that donors "complete" rather than die. I feeeeel like that was the exact same word used in Brave New World to describe death, but I might be wrong about that.

Speaking of being comfortable reflecting on the past, there's one thing I forgot to include in an earlier blog. One of the veterans talked about how "eating cheese late at night always disturbed your sleep" (189); it reminded Kathy of Hailsham, but it reminded me of how I always eat cheese late at night. The word "always" in that sentence was not a hyperbole.

"But if you really want to share secrets . . ."

"'It didn't hurt, did it? When I hit you?'

'Sure. Fractured skull. Concussion, the lot. Even Crow Face might notice it. That's if I ever get up there'" (Never Let Me Go, 14).

In A Separate Peace in your pants, I remember reading about the dangers of sarcasm. "It was only long after that I recognized sarcasm as the protest of people who are weak." Often, I'm a fan of sarcasm, but in this case, it reveals weakness in Kathy. Tommy is being super apologetic and sincere, and instead of returning that, she hides behind a shield of sarcasm. She also denies Tommy's sincerity at the end of chapter two -- "'Don't talk rubbish, Tommy'" (24) -- so their characters are at odds with the whole issue of sarcasm versus sincerity.

There's something that's been bothering me in these first two chapters, and I think it's a setting thing. Kathy keeps introducing a place as "where you go to have private conversations" and then moving to a different private setting every five pages. I'm nooot quite sure why we can't just stick to one or two; maybe it's really important, like a motif. Really important that I know the characters can have private conversations in the pavilion (6), in the dorm (15), in the Great Hall (22), by the lake (24), in a box, with a fox, in a plane, or on a train. Not those last four, but it still seems excessive to me.

Mmm, I can't read about the Great Hall without at least posting a picture of it: