Great Gatsby Essay (FINAL Draft)

Too much descriptive imagery in a work of literature can make the setting and
people feel unreal or fictitious. You’re too aware you’re reading a book, rather than
being pulled into the world, because there’s too much detail going on. Understanding
how much detail to use separates narrative from informational text. The details
Fitzgerald uses in The Great Gatsby creates a reality to the novel’s setting.

Fitzgerald has done well writing Nick describing the party and its guests because
he doesn’t go overboard. There are many descriptions, but they’re evenly spaced, and
as the reader you’re able to take in the information without exiting the narrative.
Fitzgerald describes the tables at the party as, “garnished with glistening hors d'oeuvre,
spiced baked hams crowded against salads of harlequin designs and pastry pigs and
turkeys bewitched to a dark gold.” (Fitzgerald, pg. 44) Fitzgerald’s word selection
illustrates his ability to provide imagery that isn’t overwhelming. Fitzgerald then leaves
us with this depiction, “The groups change more swiftly, swell with new arrives, dissolve
and form in the same breath” (Fitzgerald, pg. 44). We’re able to vividly picture the party
goers and their movement, while not feeling engulfed by detail.

Fitzgerald writes, “Her face was sad and lovely with bright things in it, bright eyes
and a bright, passionate mouth” (Fitzgerald, pg. 12). Character descriptions like this
help us to shape who Daisy is. My brain responds much more easily to these
descriptions, rather than when authors physically describe someone. “She was beautiful
and had an airy voice,” for example, is a type of description that I can’t latch on to. I
need obscure metaphors, I need to know what type of object this person’s voice sounds
like, I need to understand the way this person goes about their day when they’re
hungry, or what they act like when they’re tired. What in their life has caused their face
to move in the way it does? With these descriptions, we are fully able to not just see
Daisy, but experience her. We are able to have Daisy be standing in front of us and
speaking directly to us, giving us her attention, as opposed to us glancing at her from
thirteen feet away.

The valley of ashes. The words even sound dry. The reader is able to physically
feel how dreary and dust-enveloped it is, just by looking at the title. Fitzgerald writes, “A
fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens
where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke” (Fitzgerald, pg.
26). With this imagery, we can practically feel the ash around us as we breathe. He
finishes with, “and finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and
already crumbling through the powdery air” (Fitzgerald, pg. 26). The ash appears to
take over everything that passes through it, and almost seems to create people who are
made out of the dust that surrounds them.

The valley of ashes also houses a very prominent character in the story, The
Eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg. Doctor Eckleburg’s Eyes create a feeling, for the
characters and for the reader, of not being alone, but not exactly in a pleasant way. The
Eyes take a feeling of being watched quite literally. “They look out of no face but,
instead, from a pair of enormous yellow spectacles which pass over a nonexistent nose”
(Fitzgerald, pg. 27). The Eyes appear throughout the story - peeking over the ash to
stare at Nick, Jordan, and Tom, while notifying Nick of Myrtle Wilson watching the group
from her window - but play a large part in the change of tone that occurs near the end of
the book. In Chapter 8, it is revealed to Michaelis and the reader that George Wilson
attempted to stop Myrtle from leaving him by taking her to the window, showing her The
Eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg, and telling her, “You may fool me but you can’t fool
God” (Fitzgerald, pg. 170). It seems he truly believes The Eyes are God, and are
invariably watching.

Fitzgerald’s attention to detail is concise yet saturated. He describes characters,

scenery, and normally mundane situations in a way that makes them overflow with
reality. Telling us that Daisy’s voice is, “full of money” (Fitzgerald, pg. 128) shaped the
way we view her more than any physical characterization could. Fitzgerald’s writing
makes us feel like we are seeing what he is seeing, and understanding what he is
understanding. We somehow know exactly what that means, even if we’ve never
experienced it. Descriptive imagery, in any kind of writing, allows the reader to visualize
the characters and the setting, amongst other aspects, which would not be possible
without detail.