Chasing the Green Light

(photo/brandonsneed.com)

When I think of the American Dream, Mr. Jay Gatsby pops into my head as an individual who chased the dream, yet never reached the finish line. Of course, Gatsby is a fictional character in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s great American novel, “The Great Gatsby.” Yet, I’m sure there were many people during the Roaring ‘20s who wanted the fame, wanted the jewels and money, but failed tragically in the process. 

For my Topics in Fiction course, we are focusing the semester on great tragic heroes in literature. So far we have read: “Oedipus the King” by classical playwright Sophocles; “Hamlet” by the Bard, William Shakespeare; “The Mayor of Casterbridge” by Thomas Hardy; and, now a more contemporary tale, “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald. 

F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" (photo/Kasy Long)

My discussion handout and lesson plan. (photo/Kasy Long)

Tragedy is often very easy to center a story around in two-hundred pages, though it may be more complex than you think. For my Advanced Poetry course, I had the pleasure of teaching the class today. I played professor as I led our discussion on my favorite poet – Emily Dickinson. I centered our discussion on tone and theme in poetry. These two pairs work together for readers to interpret a text. Theme is composed of the elements of fiction and poetry. You can’t figure out what a text is saying without considering the style of the words, the images presented, and the interesting twist of emotions. 

I enjoyed teaching my class—so much that I’m considering becoming a creative writing professor. I always wanted to be a teacher when I was younger, but when I fell in love with writing and literature, I didn’t think I could teach. Now I know I can in fact teach—become surrounded by young writers, like myself, who are eager to grasp the knowledge to become better writers.

It would be very cool if I inspire students someday to try different genres, just like my professors have inspired me.

I look at Gatsby, and this is the fifth time I have read the novel (which shouldn’t be too surprising since I’m an English major), and I see a tremendous hope. Nick Carraway, the narrator and, what many critics believe, the Fitzgerald voice in the book, beautifully summarizes Gatsby’s dream in the final closing passages of the novel:

“Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther…And one fine morning—.”

Fitzgerald is summarizing the American Dream. He is saying that people reach out for the hope; they reach for the dream farther and farther each time. But then he ends the novel by saying:

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

An excerpt from "The Great Gatsby." (photo/Kasy Long)

Beautiful.

I get chills each time I finish Fitzgerald’s masterpiece. He is saying that no matter how hard you try, no matter how far you stretch out your arms for the American Dream, it won’t work. You will always fall back into the past. You are who you are supposed to be, and that is a compelling way to end a novel.

No wonder the novel has remained the great American novel. So even though I just finished it for the fifth time, I would most definitely read it again. As I said in my poetry discussion, you always pick up on more information about the text each time you read. 

My annotated copy of Emily Dickinson's poetry. (photo/Kasy Long)

I never considered Emily Dickinson to be the fly in “I heard a fly buzz—when I died,” but some readers do, and that’s okay. We each are allowed to our own interpretation. That’s the beauty of literature. 

Long live literature!

-KJL-