Book Salon
The Great Gatsby
-
This month we're reading The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Our faculty host is Gavin Jones.
Listen to an interview with our Book Salon host.
"How can a novel be both a celebration and a damnation of the American dream? How can such a short book be the great American novel? Fitzgerald condenses the myths and symbols of this nation into a gem of the Jazz Age: The Great Gatsby."
About this quarter's book selection
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s most popular title, The Great Gatsby is the final selection for the 2012-2013 Book Salon season. A cautionary tale of the American Dream, The Great Gatsby has won the hearts of thousands, and is now shelved with other great American novels.
Set in the roaring twenties, WWI veteran, Nicholas Carraway, rents a modest home on the Long Island Sound next door to the Gatsby Mansion—a locale for lavish parties with a mysterious host. As Nicholas settles in, he learns more about his neighbor, Jay Gatsby, and his long ago love affair with Carraway’s cousin, Daisy Buchanan. Married to rich, but violent Tom Buchanan, Daisy finds her eye drawn to her old flame at a meet-up arranged by Carraway.
Read along as Gatsby sets out to win Daisy back, and uses any means necessary to gain his fortune and the girl-- but do not underestimate the power of jealousy harbored in Tom Buchanan.
![The Stanford Book Salon [Seriously Unstuffy]](/pgw/s20/i/banners/bannerRightBookSalon.gif)
