Lesson 3

Lesson Goals

Texts

Core

• • The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Scribner, 1925

• • “Jay Gatsby: A Dreamer Doomed to Be Excluded. The Novelist Jesmyn Ward Explains.,” Jesmyn Ward, The New York Times Company, 2018

Optional

• • “Celestial Eyes: From Metamorphosis to Masterpiece,” Charles Scribner III, Princeton University Library, 1992

Materials

Tools

• Visual Analysis Tool

• Vocabulary Journal

Question Sets

• The Great Gatsby: Question Set 4.3

Editable Google Docs

• The Great Gatsby: Question Set 4.3

• Visual Analysis Tool

• Vocabulary Journal

Activity 1: View – Discuss

We will do a visual analysis of the original Cover Art for The Great Gatsby, thinking about what the images represent and mean.

Examine the original cover art for The Great Gatsby. Look closely at the images that are represented, considering the following questions:

1. Whose eyes do you think are being depicted?

2. What do you see in those eyes? What do you see under the right eye?

3. What do you think the images at the bottom of the cover depict?

4. Is this cover art one image or a set of related images superimposed over each other?

With a partner, use a Visual Analysis Tool to answer Question 4.

After recording the details you notice and the possible meanings and connections, express your interpretation of the cover art by writing a claim at the bottom of the tool about what the art represents and means.

Discuss your observations and claims as a class. Connect your discussion to earlier class discussions about the themes of the novel, its ironies, and whether or not you see it as a tragedy.

Activity 2: Read – Discuss

We will read an article about the artwork by the original publisher.

Read and annotate the article “Celestial Eyes: From Metamorphosis to Masterpiece,” written by the original publisher of the novel. After you read, discuss the following questionswith a partner or the whole class:

1. What do you see as the original purpose and perspective of this text?

2. What new information do you learn about the cover art for The Great Gatsby?

3. How does what you learn either confirm or challenge what you thought about the cover art when you analyzed it?

4. What alternative images did the artist, author, and publisher consider? Why do you think they chose what they did?

5. If you had to design a cover for The Great Gatsby, what elements and images might you include?

Activity 3: Discuss

We will examine other potential titles that Fitzgerald considered for the novel and discuss how each title suggests a particular thematic interpretation.

Step 1

In your Learning Log, suggest two alternate titles for The Great Gatsby that you might propose based on your reading and interpretation. Discuss and compare your ideas with a partner and then the class.

Step 2

Examine the following list of alternative titles that Fitzgerald and the publisher considered:

• Among Ash-Heaps and Millionaires

• Trimalchio in West Egg

• On the Road to West Egg

• Under the Red, White, and Blue

• Gold-Hatted Gatsby

• The High-Bouncing Lover

For each of these possible titles, discuss what aspects of the narrative it might emphasize.

Step 3

Review the literary concept of allusion (a reference to another work or symbol). Follow along as your teacher presents information about allusions made in some of these alternative titles:

Trimalchio - an allusion to a character from a first-century Roman work who is originally a slave but becomes rich and extravagant in his wealth; referenced at the start of Chapter 7 (p. 113)

Gold-Hatted - an allusion to a poem that appears in some editions of the novel as its opening epigraph (Note: In the Scribner edition, this poem appears on the title page):

Then wear the gold hat, if that will move her;

If you can bounce high, bounce for her too,

Til she cry “Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover,

I must have you!”

- Thomas Parke D’Invilliers

High-Bouncing Lover - also an allusion to the D’Invilliers poem

Red, White, and Blue - an allusion to what?

As a class, discuss these alternative titles and the allusions they make to other works. Determine which themes each title might emphasize and whether they capture the ironies and themes of the novel as well as the actual title.

Make connections between what you have learned about the process of creating cover art for the original edition of the novel and Fitzgerald’s search for a title that he felt captured his intentions for the novel.

Activity 4: Read

For homework, we will read the introduction to the scribner edition of The Great Gatsby by critic Jesmyn Ward.

For homework, read and annotate the essay “Jay Gatsby: A Dreamer Doomed to be Excluded. Jesmyn Ward Explains.” Consider the following questions, which will be discussed in the next lesson:

1. In the first paragraph, what does Ward tell you? How does she relate a “first reading” of The Great Gatsby to teenage experiences?

2. Ward organizes her discussion of the novel and its central character, Gatsby, from two perspectives (both her own). What are they? How do they differ?

3. How does Ward explain her initial claim that: “It is easy for young people to see themselves in Gatsby”? Do you agree or disagree with this claim?

4. How does Ward explain her later claim that: “the experience I had while reading Gatsby as an adult was very different. I would argue my older reading was deeper, more emphatically felt”? Do you agree or disagree with the analysis she presents to support this claim?

5. Which perspective on the novel presented by Ward—her youthful interpretation or her rereading as an adult—comes closest to matching your own response to The Great Gatsby?

Write new or interesting words you encounter in your Vocabulary Journal.