Five Star Amazon Review For The Gatsby Reader

gatsby reader


It has been said that reading F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel The Great Gatsby is a mysterious experience—something like eating a bowl of whipped cream and, once you are done, feeling totally full and satisfied. This may be due several reasons: the characters are simultaneously exaggerated and real; both the story and the situation capture an essentially American experience, one replete with longings, triumphs, and failures; and then there is, of course, the luminosity of Fitzgerald’s prose. For almost thirty years, as a student and professor of American literature, I have sought to unravel the mystery of this book and have resolved to teach it as often as possible until I get my lectures just right. This has yet to happen.

Nevertheless, Neal Abbott’s insightful examination of this most American of texts brings me closer to this gold ring: his perspicacious reading calls into question some of the most established assumptions of the story, about who killed Myrtle Wilson and even who killed Gatsby himself. Also, once he lays out his argument that Gatsby is on a grail quest, it seems so obvious that one wonders why it wasn’t seen before, let alone why it isn’t one of the more popular and established readings of the book.

Again, I have tried for many years to perfect my teaching of The Great Gatsby and, because of Mr. Abbott’s little book, I feel I am much closer to that goal.


Dr. Eddie Tafoya

Professor of Creative Writing and American Literature

New Mexico Highlands University


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Published on June 03, 2014 09:07
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