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Original poster

To not get The Great Gatsby?

131 replies

MudAndGlitter · 01/12/2011 16:29

I heard brilliant things and the writings nice and all but I just felt a bit let down. Or am I a twat who needs to be more cultured?

OP posts:
Bucharest · 02/12/2011 07:16

mummytime- the syllabus is literally "literature from Beowulf to present day"
They do the lot in 3 years of high school. And by and large, it kills any love of reading/literature they might ever be likely to have.

I am on my 3rd member of the same family- (doing Keats) and she laughs about her older cousin (now graduated and teaching biologicalsciences herself)"Francesca still talks about that bloody vase"

Bucharest · 02/12/2011 07:17

(and the 5th years have from now, until May to do everything after the Romantics!)

Kayano · 02/12/2011 08:49

Who mentioned 'waiting for Godot?'

You twat Grin I didn't get it! It was awful and pointless crap!
Are you reading 'The Waves' for Virginia Wolfe Confused That was another one that annoyed me.

CalatalieSisters · 02/12/2011 08:57

Not read thread but agree with OP. I read it over the summer, because DS1 was reading it as an A Level text. And I thought it was a flat, overlong short story. The only interesting idea in it was the idea (like in the film Cool Hand Luke) of people leeching on the perceived strengths of a faintly cryptic Other, whom they ultimately leave to pick up every tab.

That is a good idea, and would have worked well as a short story, but stretched out to a short novel I felt that it needed much more characterization, which you don't get with Gatsby. He is just rather stupid and dishonest.

Actually, come to think of it, Gatsby is Jeffrey Archer -- rich, dishonest about his background, and throwing big parties. Reading a novel about Jeffrey Archer isn't that much more satisfying than reading one by Jeffrey Archer.

Tender is the Night is a million times better I think.

hackmum · 02/12/2011 09:31

It's years since I read The Great Gatsby. I had high expectations of it, but was really disappointed. I suppose it might be different if I read it now.

When I read Alan Hollinghurst's The Line of Beauty, it was exactly as I'd imagined TGG to be before I read it, iyswim.

hackmum · 02/12/2011 09:35

Oh, and I didn't like Tender is the Night either. V. dull.

Thinking about it, I have a problem with American literature generally. I know that sounds absurdly sweeping, and there are exceptions (e.g. Henry James, Edith Wharton), but broadly it's true. I don't know why that is.

swanriver · 02/12/2011 09:57

I love this thread. You have all cheered me up ! I'm off to reread after 25 years. P.S. The Good Soldier is a v. interesting read. Haven't read it for ages, but it has just come back to me in American Lit vein. Also enjoyed Tender is the Night, but can't remember a thing about it except was it about Zelda going mad? And at one point she recoils from a woman who doesn't wash her clothes enough (amnoniac whiff - I remember that) Dick Diver was he called...

must press on.

swanriver · 02/12/2011 09:59

Now Custom of the Country (E Wharton) is an amazing book. Read it last year, and so appalled and fascinated by it.

claig · 02/12/2011 10:46

'Are you reading 'The Waves' for Virginia Wolfe That was another one that annoyed me.'

No I haven't read that and will now give it a very wide berth. Thanks for warning me.

This is a great thread, MN literary critcism - trenchant, perceptive and to the point - none of the pretentious, professional literary supplement stuff.

claig · 02/12/2011 10:48

'It's years since I read The Great Gatsby. I had high expectations of it, but was really disappointed. I suppose it might be different if I read it now.'

Don't do it! It only gets worse with time, that seems to be the consensus. Wink

claig · 02/12/2011 10:51

'Dick Diver was he called...'

That sounds a bit too close to 'Ben Dover' for comfort. I think I will give that one a miss too.

muffinino82 · 02/12/2011 10:55

I haven't read Gatsby for years and I'm not sure I really got it when I was 15. Must read again and have an opinion.

Its not as bad as The Heart of Darkness though. Man I hated that book.

This. Jesus. Wept. I hated that book, what a shower of shite. Had to read it in University and almost gave up hope! I refused to watch Apocalypse Now for ages because of it but turned out to be a rare occurence of the film being better than the book (I'm aware it's not a direct adaptation but still).

swanriver · 02/12/2011 11:04

I hate Josef. I failed my English A level because of H of D. And VW.
A recipe for an amazing iced Edwardian pudding prepared by his wife appears in the Fruit Book by Jane Grigson Grin

cookingfat · 02/12/2011 11:06

The Great Gatsby is my favourite novel. You are being vvvv U.

I had to read Bleak House for A-level. Actually thought I was going to die of boredom. All I can remember about it is coal.

swanriver · 02/12/2011 11:09

I love Bleak House. I love love love it! I want to read it again. I can still remember the fog. Now that's what teenagers like to read, a bit of melodrama.

I just looked up Tender is the Night on Wiki. Yes, it was Dick Diver Shock I wonder whether that's where the Mad Men name came from. I cannot believe I understood a word of it at the age I first read it, but now of course, it might make sense Wink

claig · 02/12/2011 11:18

swanriver, agree about 'Bleak House'. Dickens is he master of English literature. I doubt he will ever be surpassed. Dicken's characters had great names - Pumblechook, Gradgrind, Periwinkle etc etc.

But 'Dick Diver'? I'm sorry, but I refuse to read filth dressed up as literature Wink

Jdub · 02/12/2011 11:22

No - not overly impressed with The Great Gatsby here either (English A'level 1988) But LOVED The Go-Between, and To Kill a Mockingbird (O'level 1986)
And as for I Claudius - it nearly made my eyes bleed, and I still have a recurring nightmare now, 23 years on, that I am entering my exam without having read all the books!

Bucharest · 02/12/2011 11:26

My kids have to do Mrs Fucking Dalloway. Their essay is on the day she goes to buy some flowers for some party. Then they have to watch the fucking Hours and then some short story about some woman who thinks her husband is dead, and she';s glad, then he turns out not be and she drops dead with shock. . (sounds more like Eastnders than V Woolf)

Of course,I get to do the best around Easter time. DH and his phallic spires.

I had to watch Apocalypse Now for A level General Studies. Then I read HoD because I was in lurve with a boy who was doing his dissertation on it and I wanted to impress him.

I'm also plodding (tho it'sOK actually compared with the above) Romeo and Juliet and Hard Times (which is not OK- shawls and chimneys, urgh)

muffinino82 · 02/12/2011 11:33

You think Bleak House is bad, I had to read Hard Times for my SATS! Shock I've hated Dickens ever since, apart from The Muppet's Christmas Carol, obviously.

CalatalieSisters · 02/12/2011 11:37

Bleak House is the most masterly novel I have ever read. It isn't my favourite novel, because I guess the people and the themes aren't the most interesting in the world, but in terms of sheer craftsmanship it is stunning. If I remember rightly, there is an opening description (either opening the book or opening an early chapter) of an urban scene through which fog is spreading, and the fog is Dickens: it joins all the disparate parts of the scene by touching each of them. Just like Dickens touches each of a huge array of different people and stories, bringing them all into unity by spreading himself across them. You get a strong impression that Dickens knows how masterly and godlike he is in the world he has built, and revels in it. Really brilliant.

CalatalieSisters · 02/12/2011 11:41

(Also, it is a rompingly good read. I loved it.)

droves · 02/12/2011 11:43

Didnt enjoy Great Gatsby , or any Dickons if im honest .

Did quite like TH`s Far from the madding crowd , given that was written as a serial for a newspaper , i think its an olden day version of corrie iykwim ? If you take it in the way it was writen its quite entertaining. It was never ment to be a great work of lit ...

Also dislike to killl a mokingbird , death of a salesman , and all george oswell .

Like Oscar Wilde .

But I have utter utter hatred for " The Remains of the Day ". Kazuo Ishiguro why ? . Its the most boring tedious book ever. How it ever won the man booker prize i will never know .
Talk about a hard slog to an anti climax .....come to think of it , thats rather the point of it . ...if only stevens and miss K had managed to shag it would have been over in about half the time and been a lot more intresting.

swanriver · 02/12/2011 11:43

I was watching Sam and Joe's version of English Patient with soft toys. It is hilarious.
However, the Muppets Dickens is from the heart.

claig · 02/12/2011 11:46

'Its the most boring tedious book ever. How it ever won the man booker prize i will never know .'

Most probably because it was so boring.

That's why I prefer MN literary criticsm. No pretentiousness, no pomp, no ostentation, just honest literary education.

swanriver · 02/12/2011 11:47

Droves but that is what so heartwrending about R of D. Life is like that. No shag. Just unreconciled yearning for what could have been...
I like R of D. Floating W is good too. And as for the Clones! Yay!

That's what is good at Dickens. He doesn't mind the plot thickening. He rumbles and grumbles and bellows, and hangs you over the cliff occasionally.

Hate TH. utterly depressing. Too realistic for its own good.