by Rory Read
Task: Using the following headings, explain how James Gatz transformed himself into Jay Gatsby. Make sure that for each heading, you use direct examples (quotations) from the text.
The Costume
“They’re such beautiful shirts…It makes me sad because I’ve never seen such — such beautiful shirts before”
In the book when Gatsby has taken Daisy for a tour of his home and he shows her the wardrobe, he is busy talking about how he gets new clothes from a man in England at the beginning of each season. And he is waving them around in all their different materials and styles…. Daisy is quite taken aback at this showing off and puts her head into them and cries.
I think this shows how fake he is by nature and how he thinks he can win Daisy back by showing all this off to her. Gatsby is arrogant and likes to display wealth. I think he covers up how sad and lonely he is by wearing flash clothes.
By the way Gatsby dressed – he wanted to portray the illusion of being wealthy and having enough money to be able to buy those type of clothes. It all started when Gatsy first received the sailing clothes from Dan. That was when he started on his journey of wanting to give good impressions from what he wore, and in turn he hoped to impress Daisy as she liked that stuff. He quickly realised the importance of looking good and wanted to do the same with his style of clothes. He constructed himself to appear as though he wore these type of clothes all the time and it was completely normal for him, as though he had been brought up like that and it was his natural way of life. Gatsby liked to come across as a very posh and educated young man. He used his clothes to make him look wealthy, by dressing like this he felt he was superior and it made him look the part.
The Prop
“On weekends his Rolls-Royce became an omnibus, bearing parties to and from the city, between nine in the morning and long past midnight, while his station wagon scampered like a brisk yellow bug to meet all trains. “
Gatsby’s car was used to pick up guests and drop them to and from his house for parties… he liked to be noticed. I think by getting. a bright yellow car which in those days would have been quite a bold colour to have for a car – it made him stand out more than other people. It sort of said ‘look at me’… Gatsby’s car was always turning heads and the centre of attention which he wanted. He wanted to impress people and have them think he was wealthy and could afford a luxury like that. This was another one of the illusions he created about himself. He hadn’t really grown up with things like his car but it made people think he had. He was quite a false person. Again constructing an image that wasn’t really behind the scenes.
The Setting of the ‘Stage’
“The one on my right was a colossal affair by any standard – it was a factual imitation of some Hotel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden”.
Gatsby’s copied French mansion apparently shows how he lives a high lifestyle. Gatsby buys this mansion with his new money trying to duplicate the lavish lifestyle he missed out on. Making people think he had been like that all his life and had not come from a poor beginning. Again constructing himself to having everything around him of great wealth and stature. Gatsby brings Daisy to his house to show off all the things Daisy could’ve had and what it would’ve been like if she chose Gatsby a few years back. He wants her to take notice of how successful he is.
The Speech and Dialogue
“I was looking at an elegant young roughneck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd“
Nick was onto Gatsby, he totally picked up that he spoke strangely and something was a bit off. Gatsby – gave himself away by the way he talked. He went a bit over the top, the way he spoke and that made people think it wasn’t real and sounded false.
It didn’t come naturally for him to speak like that, so it could come out forced and unnatural. Saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and using words that people didn’t really use.
He had trained himself to talk in a certain manner creating the illusion he may have come from a wealthy family and been educated at a posh school. I think because he couldn’t do it very well, that people realised he was faking it.
When he spoke about going to Oxford in the book it says he sort of choked on his words. He couldn’t say things right so people realised he was making stuff up.
The Backstory
“He had changed it at the age of seventeen and at the specific moment that witnessed the beginning of his career—when he saw Dan Cody’s yacht drop anchor over the most insidious flat on Lake Superior. “
This is the bit when he went from being James Gatz to Jay Gatsby, this was his turning point, instead of being just a nobody ie as James Gatz walking on the beach to someone ie Jay Gatsby who said they could help Dan with his boat and offer to help him. It made him look knowledgeable and like he was around those types of things all the time.
‘James Gatz’ was the son of very poor farmers. But this didn’t stop Gatsby from becoming wealthy and successful. After Dan Cody took Gatz under his wing, Gatsby and learnt how the rich people lived and how they worked. Dan Cody left his money for Gatsby but it was taken by his ex-wife. Gatsby had the manners and knowledge of the rich but no money to back him up and he also did not have the upbringing. Gatsby went away to war and met Daisy before he got deployed. Since Gatsby was in his military uniform there was no way of telling if he was poor and he had the manners of the rich so she assumed he was rich. He created the perfect illusion… he was so believable from the way he conducted himself. Gatsby then had to fulfil this by creating this lavish lifestyle with cars, houses, clothes and manners to make him appear he had always been like that. In the end, he was a lonely man with nothing. It was all a facade and not real. He had spent so long creating a fake life, he actually came to believe it all. A sad and lonely way to be.
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