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What Members Thought
This book didn't really "do" much for me, and saying that sort of thing about a classic always makes me feel as if I'm somehow uncultured. But for a story that's basically a character study (without a ton of plot to drive it), I felt like we only skimmed the surface of the characters. There were a lot of places where my interest/mind wandered, and I didn't really care enough to pull it back. The love "square" between Daisy, Tom, Gatsby, and Myrtle held my interest, but ended in a way that seemed
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As good as I remembered it, but inexplicably sadder. Rereading it when I am now the age of the protagonists- which at 16, felt a lifetime away - I feel differently about the novel. I am now even more struck by all that Gatsby has done and will do to secure Daisy's love. And 16 year old Kristen never imagined living in New Haven, or being a part of Yale. I laughed out loud at the line about the Yale Club being one of the most interminably sad places in Manhattan, because it's true. But it is as ...more
A refresh on one of my faves before the movie . . . re-reading this more than 10 years later it was interesting how little of the book I actually remembered. And I remembered it being "bigger" (i.e., longer, more complicated?) than I found it this time around. Sort of like revisiting a place from a childhood memory and realizing the scale of your memory was inflated based on childhood height/scale . . . Still loved it, though, although in different ways.
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I don't know why high schoolers are supposed to get something out of this book. I am sure that if I read it today, I would maybe have at least a little insight and understand some of the overreaching themes that apparently make this book such a 20th century American touchstone, but when I was 16?? Come on.
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