The Great Gatsby By: Ashley Williams Setting In the first quarter of this book the setting is evenly split between two different places, West Egg, NY and New York City. The author described his new town on page 10. “Twenty miles from the city a pair of enormous eggs, identical in contour and separated only by a courtesy bay, jut out into the most domesticated body of salt water in the Western hemisphere, the great wet barnyard of Long Island Sound.
” This gives readers a beautiful image of where Nick’s house is located. His house is found on the West Egg where he is neighbors with Mr. Gatsby. His house was small enough but compared to Mr.
Gatsby’s, it was tiny. “As I didn’t know Mr. Gatsby, it was a mansion inhabited by a gentleman of the name. My house was an eyesore, but it was a small eyesore, and it had been overlooked, so I had a view of the water, a partial view of my neighbor’s lawn and the consoling proximity of millionaires. ” As it is said in the book most of the houses on these two eggs were extraordinary and occupied by millionaires, one that happened to be Nick’s cousin once removed, she lived on the East egg with her husband Tom.
That is when the setting switches to New York when Nick and Tom go together for business.They went to Tom’s mistress’s apartment while in New York, as it is described on page 31. “The apartment was on the top floor – a small living room, a small dining room, a small bedroom and a bath. The living room was crowded to the doors with a set of tapestried furniture entirely too large for it. ” When Nick returned to the West Egg the author described the setting of the parties that his neighbor, Mr.
Gatsby, held. “The bar is in full swing, and floating rounds of cocktails permeate the garden outside, until the air is alive with chatter gotten on the spot, and enthusiasm meetings between women who never knew each other’s names. These are the main locations of this novel at the moment; I am sure as the chapters continue there will be more settings that will be described in great detail. Literary Devices The literary devices used in The Great Gatsby helps the writing flow better and make the text more descriptive which is obviously needed in a novel so the reader can have a better visual of what should be happening. F. Scott Fitzgerald uses writing techniques like evocative language, imagery, foreshadowing and similes.
He also uses formal and extremely descriptive diction for his writing in The Great Gatsby.The point of view in this book comes from the eyes of the narrator, Nick Carraway. The first simile that he uses is on page 8 and is about Mr. Gatsby himself. “If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life, as if he were related to one of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away. ” In this quote the narrator is comparing Gatsby to a complicated machine that not many people understand, this lets the readers know that Gatsby’s personality is complex.
In this book Fitzgerald uses imagery as him most common literary device, everything that he describes is put into such great detail, it feels like as if you were there. One example of imagery is when he described the character of Tom Buchanan on page 12. “Now he was a sturdy straw-haired man of thirty, with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner. Two shining arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. ” Just by this short explanation you can tell that Tom is a rough, confident man.
A slight example of foreshadowing appears on page 14 when Nick Carraway first lays eyes on Miss. Baker. “Miss. Baker’s lips fluttered, she nodded at me almost imperceptibly, and then quickly tipped her head back again … Again a sort of apology arose to my lips. Almost an exhibition of complete self-sufficiency draws a stunned tribute from me.
” By reading this passage it is almost immediately noticeable to me that there will be a future with Nick Carraway and Miss. Baker, even though it doesn’t directly say that it is hinting to future events in the novel.The way that the author demonstrated evocative language was the situation with Mrs. Wilson and Tom Buchanan were fighting about whether or not it was acceptable for Myrtle to say Daisy’s name on page 39. “‘Daisy! Daisy! Daisy! ’ shouted Mrs. Wilson ‘I’ll say it whenever I want to! Daisy Dai-’ Making a short deft movement, Tom Buchanan broke her nose with his open hand.
” This quote evokes an emotional response from readers, by making them upset about a man hitting a woman. The literary devices that F. Scott Fitzgerald uses advances the plot or makes things more clear when reading the book.
