Sunday 25 October 2015

What is unique about the party in Chapter V of The Great Gatsby?

This social gathering isn't so much a party as it is a reunion between Gatsby and Daisy, disguised as an invitation from Nick, her cousin, to tea. Gatsby has asked Jordan to ask Nick to invite Daisy over for tea, and so he has. Daisy is supposed to arrive, alone, at four o'clock, and—at two minutes to four—Gatsby panics that she's not coming. When she does, and Nick lets her in, they return to his...

This social gathering isn't so much a party as it is a reunion between Gatsby and Daisy, disguised as an invitation from Nick, her cousin, to tea. Gatsby has asked Jordan to ask Nick to invite Daisy over for tea, and so he has. Daisy is supposed to arrive, alone, at four o'clock, and—at two minutes to four—Gatsby panics that she's not coming. When she does, and Nick lets her in, they return to his living room, where he finds that Gatsby has vanished. Gatsby then knocks, and "glar[es] tragically into [his] eyes" from the front door. He attempts to appear nonchalant, an attempt which fails miserably and nearly results in the breaking of Nick's clock.


It is odd that, even though Gatsby wanted this meeting with Daisy, he begins to feel that it is a "'terrible mistake'" because it is awkward. Nick forces Gatsby to return to the room while he waits outside in the rain, and when Nick comes back in, Daisy's face is stained with tears and Gatsby "literally glowed," just like the sun that has managed to come out despite the awful rain earlier. They seem to have established that they each still love the other. The three of them then, awkwardly, go to Gatsby's house because he wants to show it off to Daisy but seems not to want to be alone with her yet.

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