The Great Gatsby

By F. Scott Fitzgerald

“Chop Suey” – Edward Hopper (1929)

Do Now: What does this painting suggest about society in the 1920s?

“The Lost Generation”

• A term coined by poet Gertrude Stein• Refers to a group of American artists during the

1920s who had become disillusioned with their own society and chose to live in Europe (specifically Paris).

• I.E. Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Steinbeck, Pound.• Works may or may not have been set in America, but

often centered around social criticism of American society.

• For more, see p. 303 of A Handbook to Literature.

Francis Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)• Born in St. Paul, MN into an upper middle class Irish Catholic

family.• Failed to graduate from Princeton.• Married Zelda Sayre; the two became a prominent couple in

New York high society.• Spent a good deal of time in Paris.• This Side of Paradise (1920), Tender is the Night (1934).• Most famous novel = The Great Gatsby (1925).• Was writing The Last Tycoon when he died of a heart attack in

1940.• “A better just plain writer than all of us put together. Just words

writing.” –John O’Hara• For more, see p. 742 of Prentice Hall.

So who is Jay Gatsby, anyway?

For your group’s assigned chapter, answer thefollowing questions:1. What is learned about Gatsby in the chapter?2. How do we as readers discover this

information?3. Should we believe it? Why or why not?

*Be sure to include any important quotes!

Gatsby Article Jigsaw

For your article, answer the following questions:

1. What is the main thesis of the article? List three pieces of evidence used to support this thesis.

2. Did the article make you think about the novel in a new way? Explain.

Literary Criticism

• Formalist• Historicist/New Historicist• Feminist• Marxist• Post-modernist• Deconstructionalist• Queer