读书笔记文档格式.docx

1、书 目 名 称 The Great Gatsby 起 止 页 码 001-194 姓 名 邓林 班 级 2014级英语2班 学 号 1410010406 指 导 教 师 陈珩 所 在 学 院 外语学院 2015年6月 On Cross-cultural Communication The narrator of The Great Gatsby is a young man from Minnesota named Nick Carraway. He not only narrates the story but casts himself as the books author. He be

2、gins by commenting on himself, stating that he learned from his father to reserve judgment about other people, because if he holds them up to his own moral standards, he will misunderstand them. He characterizes himself as both highly moral and highly tolerant. He briefly mentions the hero of his st

3、ory, Gatsby, saying that Gatsby represented everything he scorns, but that he exempts Gatsby completely from his usual judgments. Gatsbys personality was nothing short of “gorgeous.” In the summer of 1922, Nick writes, he had just arrived in New York, where he moved to work in the bond business, and

4、 rented a house on a part of Long Island called West Egg. Unlike the conservative, aristocratic East Egg, West Egg is home to the “new rich,” those who, having made their fortunes recently, have neither the social connections nor the refinement to move among the East Egg set. West Egg is characteriz

5、ed by lavish displays of wealth and garish poor taste. Nicks comparatively modest West Egg house is next door to Gatsbys mansion, a sprawling Gothic monstrosity. Nick is unlike his West Egg neighbors; whereas they lack social connections and aristocratic pedigrees, Nick graduated from Yale and has m

6、any connections on East Egg. One night, he drives out toEast Egg to have dinner with his cousin Daisy and her husband, Tom Buchanan, a former member of Nicks social club at Yale.Tom, a powerful figure dressed in riding clothes, greets Nick on the porch. Inside, Daisy lounges on a couch with her frie

7、nd Jordan Baker, a competitive golfer who yawns as though bored by her surroundings. Tom tries to interest the others in a book called The Rise of the Colored Empires by a man named Goddard. The book espouses racist, white-supremacist attitudes that Tom seems to find convincing. Daisy teases Tom abo

8、ut the book but is interrupted when Tom leaves the room to take a phone call. Daisy follows him hurriedly, and Jordan tells Nick that the call is from Toms lover in New York. After an awkward dinner, the party breaks up. Jordan wants to go to bed because she has a golf tournament the next day. As Ni

9、ck leaves, Tom and Daisy hint that they would like for him to take a romantic interest in Jordan. When Nick arrives home, he sees Gatsby for the first time, a handsome young man standing on the lawn with his arms reaching out toward the dark water. Nick looks out at the water, but all he can see is

10、a distant green light that might mark the end of a dock. “I hope shell be a foolthats the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Halfway between West Egg and New York City sprawls a desolate plain, a gray valley where New Yorks ashes are dumped. The men who live here work

11、at shoveling up the ashes. Overhead, two huge, blue, spectacle-rimmed eyesthe last vestige of an advertising gimmick by a long-vanished eye doctorstare down from an enormous sign. These unblinking eyes, the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg, watch over everything that happens in the valley of ashes. Th

12、e commuter train that runs between West Egg and New York passes through the valley, making several stops along the way. One day, as Nick and Tom are riding the train into the city, Tom forces Nick to follow him out of the train at one of these stops. Tom leads Nick to George Wilsons garage, which si

13、ts on the edge of the valley of ashes. Toms lover Myrtle is Wilsons wife. Wilson is a lifeless yet handsome man, colored gray by the ashes in the air. In contrast, Myrtle has a kind of desperate vitality; she strikes Nick as sensuous despite her stocky figure. Tom taunts Wilson and then orders Myrtl

14、e to follow him to the train. Tom takes Nick and Myrtle to New York City, to the Morningside Heights apartment he keeps for his affair. Here they have an impromptu party with Myrtles sister, Catherine, and a couple named McKee. Catherine has bright red hair, wears a great deal of makeup, and tells N

15、ick that she has heard that Jay Gatsby is the nephew or cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm, the ruler of Germany during World War I. The McKees, who live downstairs, are a horrid couple: Mr. McKee is pale and feminine, and Mrs. McKee is shrill. The group proceeds to drink excessively. Nick claims that he got

16、drunk for only the second time in his life at this party. The ostentatious behavior and conversation of the others at the party repulse Nick, and he tries to leave. At the same time, he finds himself fascinated by the lurid spectacle of the group. Myrtle grows louder and more obnoxious the more she

17、drinks, and shortly after Tom gives her a new puppy as a gift, she begins to talk about Daisy. Tom sternly warns her never to mention his wife. Myrtle angrily says that she will talk about whatever she chooses and begins chanting Daisys name. Tom responds by breaking her nose, bringing the party to

18、an abrupt halt. Nick leaves, drunkenly, with Mr. McKee, and ends up taking the 4 a.m. train back to Long Island. On Cross-cultural Communication One of the reasons that Gatsby has become so famous around New York is that he throws elaborate parties every weekend at his mansion, lavish spectacles to

19、which people long to be invited. One day, Gatsbys chauffeur brings Nick an invitation to one of these parties. At the appointed time, Nick makes the short walk to Gatsbys house and joins the festivities, feeling somewhat out of place amid the throng of jubilant strangers. Guests mill around exchangi

20、ng rumors about their hostno one seems to know the truth about Gatsbys wealth or personal history. Nick runs into Jordan Baker, whose friend, Lucille, speculates that Gatsby was a German spy during the war. Nick also hears that Gatsby is a graduate of Oxford and that he once killed a man in cold blo

21、od. Gatsbys party is almost unbelievably luxurious: guests marvel over his Rolls-Royce, his swimming pool, his beach, crates of fresh oranges and lemons, buffet tents in the gardens overflowing with a feast, and a live orchestra playing under the stars. Liquor flows freely, and the crowd grows rowdi

22、er and louder as more and more guests get drunk. In this atmosphere of opulence and revelry, Nick and Jordan, curious about their host, set out to find Gatsby. Instead, they run into a middle-aged man with huge, owl-eyed spectacles （whom Nick dubs Owl Eyes） who sits poring over the unread books in G

23、atsbys library. At midnight, Nick and Jordan go outside to watch the entertainment. They sit at a table with a handsome young man who says that Nick looks familiar to him; they realize that they served in the same division during the war. The man introduces himself as none other than Jay Gatsby. Gat

24、sbys speech is elaborate and formal, and he has a habit of calling everyone “old sport.” As the party progresses, Nick becomes increasingly fascinated with Gatsby. He notices that Gatsby does not drink and that he keeps himself separate from the party, standing alone on the marble steps, watching hi

25、s guests in silence. At two oclock in the morning, as husbands and wives argue over whether to leave, a butler tells Jordan that Gatsby would like to see her. Jordan emerges from her meeting with Gatsby saying that she has just heard something extraordinary. Nick says goodbye to Gatsby, who goes ins

26、ide to take a phone call from Philadelphia. Nick starts to walk home. On his way, he sees Owl Eyes struggling to get his car out of a ditch. Owl Eyes and another man climb out of the wrecked automobile, and Owl Eyes drunkenly declares that he washes his hands of the whole business. Nick then proceed

27、s to describe his everyday life, to prove that he does more with his time than simply attend parties. He works in New York City, through which he also takes long walks, and he meets women. After a brief relationship with a girl from Jersey City, Nick follows the advice of Daisy and Tom and begins se

28、eing Jordan Baker. Nick says that Jordan is fundamentally a dishonest person; he even knows that she cheated in her first golf tournament. Nick feels attracted to her despite her dishonesty, even though he himself claims to be one of the few honest people he has ever known. He had one of those rare

29、smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. Nick lists all of the people who attended Gatsbys parties that summer, a roll call of the nations most wealthy and powerful people. He then describes a trip that he took to New York with Gatsby t

30、o eat lunch. As they drive to the city, Gatsby tells Nick about his past, but his story seems highly improbable. He claims, for instance, to be the son of wealthy, deceased parents from the Midwest. When Nick asks which Midwestern city he is from, Gatsby replies, “San Francisco.” Gatsby then lists a

31、 long and preposterously detailed set of accomplishments: he claims to have been educated at Oxford, to have collected jewels in the capitals of Europe, to have hunted big game, and to have been awarded medals in World War I by multiple European countries. Seeing Nicks skepticism, Gatsby produces a

32、medal from Montenegro and a picture of himself playing cricket at Oxford. Gatsbys car speeds through the valley of ashes and enters the city. When a policeman pulls Gatsby over for speeding, Gatsby shows him a white card and the policeman apologizes for bothering him. In the city, Gatsby takes Nick to lunch and introduces him to Meyer Wolfshiem, who, he claims, was responsible for fixing the 1919 World Series. Wolfshiem is a shady character with underground business connections. He gives Nick the impression that the source of Gatsby