Gatsby: Out of the Cave
First, take a look at THIS and maybe also THIS.
Both are cartoon explanations of one of the foundational ideas of Western Thought: the Allegory of the Cave. You may have encountered the idea in previous classes, but a review of a key concept is always welcome, especially when one is about to see it twisted back upon itself, as we will see with Gatsby.
You see, Plato's Allegory was about a sacrificial philosopher (literally: lover of wisdom) who refused to accept the manacles offered him, broke free from the shadows which we see as reality, and found the true reality, the world of forms--a reality more real than any we can experience while shackled in a cave. A truly selfless philosopher, he comes back to the cave and sacrifices himself in an attempt to free his fellow creatures, people who would rather not be challenged, people who would rather gaze at the shadow on a cave wall than see the bright beauty without.
James Gatz, the given name and identity of the entity which was to become Jay Gatsby, got part of this down. He started out as a dreamer. Like many of us (the changeling fantasy is a common one) he "never really accepted [his parents] as his parents." He left home and fantasized a "universe of ineffable gaudiness." And fully believed that what he stared at in front of him day by day was not "real." Indeed, "these reveries provided an outlet for his imagination; they were a satisfactory hint of the unreality of reality."
Yes, "the unreality of reality."
Plato proposed that the quest for this World of Forms, the true reality and unchangeable essence of things, was a quest to be achieved with reason and rhetoric. There is a place for imagination in this, but only a PLACE. For Gatsby, the imagination is the whole thing.
James Gatz was a lovely young man with a "brown, hardening body" who "knew women early." He was, in short, an adolescent pretty boy and his own personal "World of Forms" is the world of ideas which an adolescent pretty boy would invent in his fantasy world. All of us can relate to the selfish, self-serving ideas and ideals of such a young one: lots of money, a big fast, fancy car, loud parties, huge house, flashy clothes. These are all things and all flow from the wellspring of money. The big secret of money is that if you are ruthless in your pursuit of it, you'll more than likely get it.
The last bit of the puzzle, though, is the hardest to obtain: a significant other to share the vision. Human beings are notoriously uncooperative when it comes to such things, often because they are pursuing their own fantasies which differ in type and in scale. When Jay Gatsby chose Daisy Fay (who later, upon marrying Tom, became Daisy Buchanan), the tragedy began.
His heart beat faster and faster as Daisy's white face came up to his own. He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning fork which had been struck upon a star. Then he kissed her. At his lips' touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.
The diction in the above excerpt is oddly ecclesiastical; in other words, it sounds like church. Words like "God" and "incarnation" leap out. How is it that the mind of God "romps"? Well, what does God do? God creates--a mind that romps created the platypus and the stink bug. What is incarnation? The word would have been familiar to Fitzgerald, raised in the Catholic church. It means "made flesh," and applies to God made flesh--in Jesus. This is a deep and holy concept and whether or not you are at all religious, the idea of Jesus as savior of the world is a beautiful one.
The idea of Daisy is not.
Gatsby can get the house, the car, the money--easy to make a fantasy become real. Daisy is the embodiment of woman in his fantasy world. It is entirely selfish and, in the end, destructive.
It is possible to note how this fits in with the ideas of Modernism--utter meaninglessness, a creation of one's own purpose, and the possible empty tragedy which might ensue.
Both are cartoon explanations of one of the foundational ideas of Western Thought: the Allegory of the Cave. You may have encountered the idea in previous classes, but a review of a key concept is always welcome, especially when one is about to see it twisted back upon itself, as we will see with Gatsby.
You see, Plato's Allegory was about a sacrificial philosopher (literally: lover of wisdom) who refused to accept the manacles offered him, broke free from the shadows which we see as reality, and found the true reality, the world of forms--a reality more real than any we can experience while shackled in a cave. A truly selfless philosopher, he comes back to the cave and sacrifices himself in an attempt to free his fellow creatures, people who would rather not be challenged, people who would rather gaze at the shadow on a cave wall than see the bright beauty without.
James Gatz, the given name and identity of the entity which was to become Jay Gatsby, got part of this down. He started out as a dreamer. Like many of us (the changeling fantasy is a common one) he "never really accepted [his parents] as his parents." He left home and fantasized a "universe of ineffable gaudiness." And fully believed that what he stared at in front of him day by day was not "real." Indeed, "these reveries provided an outlet for his imagination; they were a satisfactory hint of the unreality of reality."
Yes, "the unreality of reality."
Plato proposed that the quest for this World of Forms, the true reality and unchangeable essence of things, was a quest to be achieved with reason and rhetoric. There is a place for imagination in this, but only a PLACE. For Gatsby, the imagination is the whole thing.
James Gatz was a lovely young man with a "brown, hardening body" who "knew women early." He was, in short, an adolescent pretty boy and his own personal "World of Forms" is the world of ideas which an adolescent pretty boy would invent in his fantasy world. All of us can relate to the selfish, self-serving ideas and ideals of such a young one: lots of money, a big fast, fancy car, loud parties, huge house, flashy clothes. These are all things and all flow from the wellspring of money. The big secret of money is that if you are ruthless in your pursuit of it, you'll more than likely get it.
The last bit of the puzzle, though, is the hardest to obtain: a significant other to share the vision. Human beings are notoriously uncooperative when it comes to such things, often because they are pursuing their own fantasies which differ in type and in scale. When Jay Gatsby chose Daisy Fay (who later, upon marrying Tom, became Daisy Buchanan), the tragedy began.
His heart beat faster and faster as Daisy's white face came up to his own. He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning fork which had been struck upon a star. Then he kissed her. At his lips' touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.
The diction in the above excerpt is oddly ecclesiastical; in other words, it sounds like church. Words like "God" and "incarnation" leap out. How is it that the mind of God "romps"? Well, what does God do? God creates--a mind that romps created the platypus and the stink bug. What is incarnation? The word would have been familiar to Fitzgerald, raised in the Catholic church. It means "made flesh," and applies to God made flesh--in Jesus. This is a deep and holy concept and whether or not you are at all religious, the idea of Jesus as savior of the world is a beautiful one.
The idea of Daisy is not.
Gatsby can get the house, the car, the money--easy to make a fantasy become real. Daisy is the embodiment of woman in his fantasy world. It is entirely selfish and, in the end, destructive.
It is possible to note how this fits in with the ideas of Modernism--utter meaninglessness, a creation of one's own purpose, and the possible empty tragedy which might ensue.
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