DIRECTIONS: Pick 3 of the following passages. Include the following elements a well-organized explication for each. It is important that you include all of the following elements.
Speaker- identify the speaker of the passage
Event- what is going on when this passage is reported?
Literary devices & language- identify important uses of literary devices and language.
Explain- the significance and reason for usage of meaningful words in this passage.
Context- show how this relates to the rest of the book
Themes- identify relevant themes of the work.
1. “On Sunday morning while church bells rang in the villages alongshore, the world and its mistress returned to Gatsby’s house and twinkled hilariously on his lawn” (p. 61).
2. “He looked at me sideways—and I knew why Jordan Baker had believed he was lying. He hurried the phrase “educated at Oxford,” or swallowed it, or choked on it, as though it had bothered him before. And with this doubt, his whole statement fell to pieces, and I wondered if there wasn’t something a little sinister about him, after all” (p. 65).
3. “A succulent hash arrived, and Mr. Wolfsheim, forgetting the more sentimental atmosphere of the old Metropole, began to eat with ferocious delicacy. His eyes, meanwhile, roved very slowly all around the room—he completed the arc by turning to inspect the people directly behind. I think that, except for my presence, he would have taken one short glance beneath our own table” (p. 71).
4. “Then it had not been merely the stars to which he had aspired on that June night. He came alive to me, delivered suddenly from the womb of his purposeless splendor” (p. 78).
5. “Unlike Gatsby and Tom Buchanan, I had no girl whose disembodied face floated along the dark cornices and blinding signs, and so I drew up the girl beside me, tightening my arms. Her wan, scornful mouth smiled, and so I drew her up again closer, this time to my face” (p. 80).
1. “For a moment the last sunshine fell with romantic affection upon her glowing face; her voice compelling me forward breathlessly as I listened—then the glow faded, each light deserting her with lingering regret like children leaving a pleasant street at dusk” (14).
2. “He had changed since his New Haven years. Now he was a sturdy, straw haired main of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a superscilious manner. Two shining, arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. Not even the effeminate swank of his riding clothes could hide the enormous power of that body—he seemed to fill those glistening boots until he strained the top lacing and your could see a great pack of muscle shifting when his shoulder moved under his thin coat. It was a body capable of enormous leverage—a cruel body” (7).
3. “The interior was unprosperous and bare; the only car visible was the dust-covered wreck of a Ford which crouched in a dim corner. It had occurred to me that this shadow of a garage must be a blind and that sumptuous and romantic apartments were concealed overhead when the proprietor himself appeared in the door of an office, wiping his hands on a piece of waste. He was a blond, spiritless man, anæmic and faintly handsome. When he saw us a damp gleam of hope spring into his light blue eyes” (25).
4. “She had changed her dress to a brown figured muslin which stretched tight over her rather wide hips as Tome helped her to the platform in New York. At the news-stand she bought a copy of “Town Tattle” and a moving picture magazine and, in the station drug store, some cold cream and a small flask of perfume. Upstairs in the solemn echoing drive she let four taxi cabs drive away before she selected a new one, lavender-colored with grey upholstery, and in this we slid out from the mass of the station into the glowing sunshine” (27).
5. I was immediately struck by the number of young Englishmen dotted about; all well dressed, all looking a little hungry and all talking in low earnest voices to solid and prosperous Americans. I was sure that they were all selling something: bonds of insurance or automobiles. They were, at least, agonizingly aware of the easy money in the vicinity and convinced that it was theirs for a few words in the right key” (42).
6. “Instead of rambling this party had preserved a dignified homogeneity, and assumed to itself the function of representing the staid nobility of the country-side—East Egg condescending to West Egg, and carefully one guard against its spectroscopic gayety” (45).
Here are some guided reading questions for parts III through the end of "Winter Dreams."
