The Great Gatsby - Chapter 5

'The Great Gatsby' Reading Log - Chapter 5

Key Events

- Gatsby meets Nick and they arrange for Daisy to come to tea

- Gatsby offers Nick a business proposition and he declines

- Gatsby and Nick prepare for Daisy’s arrival – cut the grass, flowers, cake

- Gatsby nearly leaves – he is impatient – waited 5 years for this moment

- Awkward atmosphere when Daisy arrives and sees Gatsby – Nick leaves in hope it will make the encounter less awkward

- Nick comes back and Daisy and Gatsby look happy

- They go over to Gatsby’s house and Daisy realises she could have been with him

- Daisy and Gatsby talk about the green light and it becomes less significant

- Klipspringer is rude to Gatsby and plays the piano

- Nick leaves and leaves Daisy and Gatsby alone

Significant moments

- Gatsby meets Daisy for the first time in 5 years

- Gatsby doesn’t want to talk about his past and slips up with his fascade

Scenes and places

- Gatsby’s house – ‘Well, suppose we take a plunge in the swimming-pool? I haven’t made use of it all summer’ – wealth is just for show – he doesn’t use it as he only wants to impress Daisy and use his money to reach his dream

- ‘wandered through Marie Antoinette music-rooms and Restoration salons’ -associated with wealth – Marie Antoinette – gold embellishments and colourful patterns that exemplify grandeur – Restoration – English style with Dutch and French influences focusing on exotic and ornate detailing – very wealthy and cultural

‘ghostly laughter’ – foreshadowing – Daisy and Gatsby meet and death is being referred to again

‘period bedrooms’ ‘new flowers’ ‘dressing-rooms and poolrooms’ ‘bathrooms with sunken baths’ – first time Nick has ever been here and actually went around with Gatsby – shows extravagance and the things that new money can buy – materialistic – all for Daisy

- ‘His bedroom was the simplest room of all – except where the dresser was garnished with a toilet set of pure dull gold’ -  contradiction – could be said that his room is simple as he has only come into money recently and has not yet understood what to do with his money – he hasn’t completed his dreams yet

‘In the morning’ – Ain’t we got fun – song Klipspringer is playing – ironic – song is about working class unrest – Gatsby and Daisy are rich

- Nick’s House – ‘there was a sharp line where my ragged lawn ended and the darker, well-kept expanse of his began’ – could show the difference between Gatsby and Nick’s houses – Gatsby can afford it, Nick can’t - even though he isn’t poor, it shows that Gatsby is much more extravagant

- ‘greenhouse arrived from Gatsby’s’ – his house looks uninviting and by adding materialistic things, it will make his house fit into the area more

- The setting for the reunion of Daisy and Gatsby…