Nick Carraway and His Moment of Moral Judgement

3/23/2020

27 Comments

In what ways does Carraway characterize West Egg, and to what extent has his experience in the East affected his perspective and character? (I have bolded some diction and selections of detail to guide your annotation process.)

Grading:
The expectation is for you to provide a literary response with a minimum of 150 words and provide comments to at least two other postings (each response should be at least 4 sentences long). Your responses should be helpful, supportive, and insightful. In order to receive full credit, your writing should be insightful and written in a professional, academic manner.

How to Post Your Writing:
First, you need to click on "comments," which will prompt you to provide your name and comment. The others (email address and website information) are not mandatory.
Once you have provided your name and commentary, simply click on "submit."
You can reply as many times as you wish, but you cannot revise an already-posted message.

"Vista de Toledo" (1596-1600) by El Greco
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 121.3 cm × 108.6 cm
Location: Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

Even when the East excited me most, even when I was most keenly aware of its superiority to the bored, sprawling, swollen towns beyond the Ohio, with their interminable inquisitions which spared only the children and the very old—even then it had always for me a quality of distortion. West Egg especially still figures in my more fantastic dreams. I see it as a night scene by El Greco: a hundred houses, at once conventional and grotesque, crouching under a sullen, overhanging sky and a lustreless moon. In the foreground four solemn men in dress suits are walking along the sidewalk with a stretcher on which lies a drunken woman in a white evening dress. Her hand, which dangles over the side, sparkles cold with jewels. Gravely the men turn in at a house—the wrong house. But no one knows the woman’s name, and no one cares.
After Gatsby’s death the East was haunted for me like that, distorted beyond my eyes’ power of correction. So when the blue smoke of brittle leaves was in the air and the wind blew the wet laundry stiff on the line I decided to come back home.
(Chapter 9)

27 Comments

Jorge Cortez

3/24/2020 14:39:24

Knowing that Nick comes from old money and lets be frank (boring money) as the book suggest. His old life was quite uneventful, but as soon as he moves to this new place everything about it is lavish and exciting. He even compared it to a painting . This sudden shift changed him for a time being. This made him more aware of his surroundings, the e vents unfolding around him. Even the many contradictions of these peoples great but terrible lives

Kay

3/26/2020 10:25:01

Educated at Yale University, Nick Carraway definitely belongs to the cultural elite of his time. As you point out, in his disillusionment with West Egg, Carraway compares its denizens to drunken, lost people who might dwell in El Greco's painting--clearly, Carraway is well versed in arts, culture, and human psychology.

Yet, hailing from a middle-class background and living in a bungalow in West Egg, Carraway is drawn to the lifestyle of the East Eggers, the de facto American aristocracy. Carraway is an outsider/ observer from the beginning to the end of the novella.

Jane Seong

3/27/2020 03:35:30

Hi Jorge! I agree that Nick was deceived by the appearance of the gorgeous West egg. I think Nick was more easily delusional because he lived a lonely life in Ohio. I like your response!

Daniel Rodriguez

3/27/2020 10:28:25

I don't think the section is suggesting that Nick is from 'Old Money,' although his nuclear family is rather well-off just not to that extent. Furthermore, it states that both the East and West Eggs are distorted places. Later, near the end, he wants to go back home. Otherwise, great response.

Samantha G. Herrera

3/27/2020 14:46:58

I agree with you that sudden change of Nick Carraway allowed him to see the horrible surroundings around him. However, I think it is important to point that Gatsby’s death led him to that point. I also like that you stated that the people surround Carraway had “great but terrible lives” because that is the sole reason Nick was amazed by New York. He believed that the people around him led great lives, however at the end of the novel he sees that it was all just a lie.

3/27/2020 18:11:52

Thank you for your articulate response. I would like to remind you guys how Nick Carraway has characterized the aftermath of Gatsby's death in Chapter 1: "No--Gatsby turned out all right at the end; it was what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men" (2).

Juan Lopez

3/27/2020 16:25:44

I do agree with your statement. A quick drastic change from his lifestyle. Coming from an ordinary humble home to an extravagant mansion with many extra items that aren't needed. Going through these circumstances he realized the problems surrounding him and the trouble people were trying to bring.

Jolene Lucio

3/26/2020 16:30:44

in the sentences,"Even when the East excited me most, even when I was most keenly aware of its superiority to the bored, sprawling, swollen towns beyond the Ohio, with their interminable inquisitions which spared only the children and the very old—even then it had always for me a quality of distortion."
Fitzgerald uses an anaphora at the beginning of this sentence. When using this literary device for a sense of repetition,it shows the reader how nick really felt about the east. Implied by the word,"distortion", as if something was off or misleading. He was being more specific about how, despite all of its positive qualities, his opinion about the east being deceptive or warped remains the same. and this is an example of syntax.

3/27/2020 03:40:24

Hi Jolene! I really like how you analyze the text from The Great Gatsby. It is interesting that the author used anaphora at the beginning of the sentence. However, it would be better if you focused more on the prompt and talked about how Nick described the West Egg. Nice Work!

Maria Manzano

3/27/2020 15:12:01

I liked how you gave a piece of the novel, and explained it well. But just focus more on what it is asking. That is about Nick and how he feels and sees West Egg plant. If it was what expected or how everything turned out at the end. Other than that the anaphora at the beginning if the sentence that you analyze was good.

3/27/2020 16:37:39

I liked how you analyzed Nick about how he felt in the East. Adding onto the statement with different literary devices

3/27/2020 18:26:21

Hi, Jolene. Thank you for applying close reading strategies in analyzing the passage.

Repetitively using the "even when" sentence structure, Carraway confides in his reader the strong draw and attraction the East has in him and his reservation about the staid life in the West ONLY TO EMPHASIZE the quality of distortion in the lifestyle of the gilded icons of Old Money.

3/27/2020 03:21:10

Because Nick is from Ohio, which was a boring and quite city for him, West egg was exceeding change for him. He even described West egg is like a “fantastic dream”. It changed Nick's boring routine into an interesting one, and he first looked at it as a positive and envious place. He likes the west egg by comparing it to a nice picture. But after Gatsby's death, he realizes that all of that is nothing more than an illusion that originated from his grand delusion. He realizes the real appearance of the west egg lately and suffers, and then returns to where he has been to escape from there. From this Nick's appearance, we can see the comfort and value of a boring everyday life, and we can see that if we only pursue the splendid appearance, we can lead to catastrophe.

3/27/2020 04:21:59

I think it is the author is trying to true side of the American Dream and try to show the historical aspect of the 1920s.

3/27/2020 18:31:30

Hi, Jane. I would like to hear more about the way you find a connection between Nick Carraway's narrative and the author F. Scott Fitzgerald's view on the American Dream.

Daniel

3/27/2020 10:42:03

Nice analyzation of the passage. Great final message that many people often overlook because they want live a unique life.

3/27/2020 14:40:00

I agree with you that Nick Carraway’s perspective of the city changed after Jay Gatsby’s death. Gatsby’s death changed Nick Carraway’s life because Nick saw the “amazing” life lived in West Egg through Gatsby. Gatsby showed Nick all the wonders that came with the lifestyle of New York through wealth and power, and yet the irony is that none of that was worth after his death. The façade of the city came crashing down after Gatsby death for Nick, which led him back to his home.

3/27/2020 15:22:49

I agree with you, because Nick was excited to see the West Egg, and had a picture a whole lot different than what was the reality. It had been a two face, because he would hear and listen to what people would say, but it wasn't anything that he was expecting. He thought everything would be amazing and it was going to be awesome his dream would finally become true, but at the end it was just a disappointed. He come to West Egg excited, and left sad.

3/27/2020 10:14:49

Nick Carraway, born to an upper-middle-class family, never got to experience either the East or West Egg lifestyles. (This can be attributed to Callaway's last line, "I decided to come back home" after stating how the East and the West Eggs were distorted.) So, Carraway glamorized the lifestyles of the rich. However, after the events leading to Gatsby's death, this illusion began to break. He sees the East egg as a dastardly place that "spared only the children and the very old." So, he moved to the West Egg. During his stay there, Carraway managed to see through the fantastical facade of the West egg because his glamorized view had already started to shift into reality. The West Egg, much like the East Egg, was a sinister place where no one cared what happened to others, as referenced by the woman on the stretcher. As a result, Carraway's view could only see the grim reality of the rich. No longer was Carraway able to deceive himself. So, he decides to go back to his old lifestyle, away from the rich.

3/27/2020 18:59:37

Unlike the de facto blue blood--Tom and Daisy--the West Eggers--Gatsby and Nick--are dreamers and idealists who aspire to join Old Money.

Since Nick Carraway often reminisces about how drunk he often was in the company of Tom and his ilk, we may even project Nick's own sense of loss and bewilderment onto the woman on the stretcher. Nick identifies with the people absurdly lost and bewildered in front of the "fantastic facade" of the grotesquely impressive mansions.

3/27/2020 14:30:46

As stated in the book, Nick Carraway comes from a wealthy background and belongs to an elite class in society. When coming to West Egg, Nick is amazed and fascinated by the life that is lived in New York, which shows the sheltered life that he lived. Before coming to West Egg, Carraway studied at Yale and his family even sent a substitute to fight the war for him, which characterizes the sheltered wealthy life given to Nick. However, as the novel progresses Nick’s perspective about West Egg changes. After experiencing events such as the extramarital affairs of Tom and Daisy Buchanan, the organized crime, and the injustice and death of Jay Gatsby. Nick begins to see the ugliness and grotesque side of the city, he experiences an “eye-opener” to the reality of life, which in result changes the way he is. From being an excited boy coming to New York, Nick Carraway leaves West Egg a sad and damaged soul, victim to the ugly reality of the world and humanity.

3/27/2020 19:10:55

Thank you for the wealth of textual support and insightful analysis, Samantha.

Your last statement carries a poignant echo, but I would like to interject another aspect of Carraway's transformation: he grows a moral backbone and finally repudiates Daisy and Tom as "foul dust."

3/27/2020 15:06:14

In the book, "The Great Gatsby", Nick Carraway was from a wealthy background, and was from an elite class in society. When he comes into the West Egg, Nick had studies at the University of Yale. His family had sent a substitute to fight the war for him. This demonstrates, the wealthy life that Nick had. As the novel continues, Nick's view point about the West Egg, changed. After he had experienced some events, such as the extramarital affairs of Tom and Daisy Buchanan, the organized crime, and the injustice and death of Jay Gatsby. Nick begins to see that the city was like a two face. He didn't know the ugly side of this city. He experienced the reality of life, which it concluded the changes the way he is. Nick went from been amaze to coming to New York , to leaving West Egg, all disappointed, in seeing the reality of the world and humanity.

Itzmaray Cerda

3/27/2020 15:21:27

The narrator, Nick Carraway lives in West Egg on Long Island and he portray West Egg as new money and less popular. Individuals in West Egg are commonly less sophisticated, and a more innocent kind of people, as they haven't been devoured by material belongings, money, and ravenousness their entire live. Most of the individuals that live in the West Egg have ethics and morals to live by, as opposed to their own money.

3/27/2020 19:23:06

We do not know any other West Eggers except Carraway and Gatsby, so we need to stay away from sweeping statements. What we can say is that Gatsby lacks cultural sophistication and Carraway's lack of money makes him an outsider in the circle of the wealthy and well-connected people of Old Money.

3/27/2020 16:18:24

Nick characterizes West Egg as a neutral modern setting. Although Gatsby's mansion, who is his neighbor stands out entirely. Compared to East Egg, it is known more for the Wealthy. They make Nick almost seem poor. West Egg and East Egg are separated by the Bay. His experiences in East Egg when he visits Tom house to change his perspectives in a moral way. At first he is not used to the substantial amount of wealth he is surrounded by when he first visits Toms's house. After his few visits with Tom and bringing Gatsby along he is more comfortable with his surroundings and he feels more at ease. Knowing Tom, he persuades Nick into doing such things he is normally not comfortable with. At one point when he is in the city he is questioning himself of where he really is and if this the right way to do things. He is not used to having these kinds of wealthy people around him.

Joaquin Villalon

3/27/2020 19:27:46

The way Carraway characterizes West Egg, and to the way his experiences in the East affect his perspective and character? West Egg, is where Gatsby lives, he is called “new money”. Meaning that he barely got his money by either an invention or stock market. East Egg, is where Daisy lives, she is “Old money”. Meaning that they got their money by inheritance, like a family fortune. How this affects Carraway is by him always living in the Old money side and not being exposed to the new money. For instance, the parties. The parties of East Egg, are elegant and formal in its nature, because that’s how they used to party in the past. In the 1920s it was a time in where there was a lot of parties but informal parties with loud music, dancers, and carelessness. That’s all of what Gatsby (West Egg) parties are all about. So, when Carraway became Gatsby’s friend he had to become more and more in the way of Gatsby was.