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The Great Gatsby Quotes

Browse 83 quotes about The Great Gatsby.

The Great Gatsby Quotes

“A Reclusive Invitation by Stewart Stafford In a mansion crouched at the forest's edge, Gargoyles perched on a Jericho hedge, Lived Samuel Keane, with millions at least, Welcomed the locals to his Christmas feast. Self-imposed exile of wealth's solitary scene, On that evening, time for connection pristine, An alabaster white suit in a chessboard hall; Legions of armour and battle scars to recall. "Come, gather round, let camaraderie ignite! On Christmas Eve, a dream-come-true night!" Perkins, the grey butler, in reluctant festive red, Gestured them toward Keane's banquet spread. Their gracious host took his place at the end, A throne chair helped into place with a bend, Beaming, he clapped and food was brought in, To gasps and applause at the goblets of gin. A succulent feast at a baronial ball; Roasted goose, boar, a tall glass highball, Stories grew taller, just like each drink, Songs and jests sent them over the brink. Enjoyment and melody's atmosphere bright, Fleeting warmth shared in lush candlelight. Dawn looms, Les Misérables adore company: "Why does hangover guilt crave chablis?" A Father Christmas event once a year, Guests departed, a loud triple cheer, A fading smile of a host so grand, Adrift, nothing elaborate planned. The fireworks faded, the last ember died, Keane shut his mansion with secrets inside. A portcullis closed slowly on a seasonal high, A gothic arch door shut 'neath morning star sky. © 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”

“They saw me. Milton's smile curled off his face like unsticky tape. And I knew immediately, I was a boy band, a boondoggle, born fool. He was going to pull a Danny Zuko in Grease when Sandy says hello to him in front of the T-Birds, a Mrs. Robinson when she tells Elaine she didn't seduce Benjamin, a Daisy when she chooses Tom with the disposition of a sour kiwi over Gatsby, a self-made man, a man engorged with dreams, who didn't mind throwing a pile of shirts around a room if he wanted too. My heart landslided. My legs earthquaked.”

“Every nation can be summed up by a single book or play, or by a particular author. America is perhaps perfectly encapsulated by F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. The Great Gatsby is a book about luxury, enchantment, glamour, magic spells, aspiration, a vulgar Wonderland, insecurity, pretentiousness, bluffing, soullessness, fakes, phonies, emptiness, desperation, regrets, and impossible dreams. “Her voice is full of money,” says the narrator about the beguiling muse Daisy Buchanan. Could this not serve as the epitaph for the American Dream itself as it is finally laid to rest?”

“He came back from France when Tom and Daisy were still on their wedding trip, and made a miserable but irresistible journey to Louisville on the last of his army pay. He stayed there a week, walking the streets where their footsteps had clicked together through the November night and revisiting the out-of-the-way places to which they had driven in her white car. Just as Daisy's house had always seemed to him more mysterious and gay than other houses so his idea of the city itself, even though she was gone from it, was pervaded with a melancholy beauty. He left feeling that if he had searched harder he might have found her—that he was leaving her behind. The day-coach—he was penniless now—was hot. He went out to the open vestibule and sat down on a folding-chair, and the station slid away and the backs of unfamiliar buildings moved by. Then out into the spring fields, where a yellow trolley raced them for a minute with people in it who might once have seen the pale magic of her face along the casual street. The track curved and now it was going away from the sun which, as it sank lower, seemed to spread itself in benediction over the vanishing city where she had drawn her breath. He stretched out his hand desperately as if to snatch only a wisp of air, to save a fragment of the spot that she had made lovely for him. But it was all going by too fast now for his blurred eyes and he knew that he had lost that part of it, the freshest and the best, forever.”

“Jay would return to New York one day. When he did, he would make something of himself--not by way of luck or happenstance, but by means of his own industry. One day he would make New York his own. This indisputabe fact was his inescapable destiny. Only, he wasn't quite ready for that--not yet.”

“Some read to remember the home they had left behind, others to forget the hell that surrounded them. Books uplifted their weary souls and energized their minds…books had the power to sooth an aching heart, renew hope for the future, and provide a respite when there was no other escape.”

“If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life, as is he were related to one thousand miles away. This responsiveness had nothing to do with that flabby impressionability which is dignified under the name of the "creative temperament" - it was an extraordinary gift of hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again.”

“Bei dieser Passage gibt es nur ein einziges Problem: Es stimmt nicht. »Der Mensch« hat keineswegs den Atem angehalten angesichts dieses Kontinents, denn wenn wir uns »den Menschen« als die gesamte Menschheit vorstellen, dann hat »der Mensch« die Gegend schon gekannt, ja bereits seit Zehntausenden von Jahren bewohnt. Die Verwendung von »der Mensch« verrät uns am Ende viel darüber, wen genau der Erzähler als Person anerkennt und von welchem Standpunkt die Geschichte erzählt wird.”