The Great Gatsby!

1. Describe and analyze the significance of the last line of The Great Gatsby.

The last line of The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is, "So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past." In my own words, I interpret this to mean that no matter what, we move forward in life and time, always having obstacles like the currents to push us back, but sometimes when things are hard we never fail to fall carelessly back to a place we had once been most comfortable. In another sense, we live and overcome obstacles, but in the end we inevitably return to the earth in whence we came. There is a certain everyone walks in, and many characters in the novel walk these different kinds of circles, pushing forward and bearing the past, starting over and over again.

The narrator, Nick Carraway, moved to New York in the beginning of the book. He had been bored with his life in the west after the war, so he challenged himself to find something more exciting. He found probably more than he bargained for when he moved to the West Egg of Long Island and met Jay Gatsby. He never expected to meet another man of the west, whose loyalty and ambition would perplex him. Jay Gatsby, whose real name is James Gatz as revealed in the beginning of chapter six, has a mysterious past and fortune that Nick would discover after many "lies" and not-quite truths, which are yet more obstacles in their friendship. At first, the suspicious and untrustworthy new-money aristocrat was just being judged, and by the end, Nick called himself Gatsby's close friend and was one of few to attend his funeral after trying so hard to get someone else to come too. After that, he returned home to Minnesota.

Nick's cousin and her husband, Daisy and Tom Buchanan, run in a different kind of loop. Their materialism leads them to move from the western city of Chicago to the elegant East Egg, where Daisy is eventually reunited with her past love, Jay Gatsby. Previously, in her present, she is married to Tom, but she ignores that small detail and has an affair with Gatsby anyway. In the end, she returns to her bliss of ignorance and materialistic life with Tom and leaves Gatsby to fall. Tom, on the other hand, married Daisy and cheated on her, but in the end, also returned to the same thing. In the last scene where Tom is seen in chapter nine, the materialism shows when he enters a jewelry store. Nick also describes the Buchanans as careless, because afterward they almost completely forget about the whole affair with Gatsby, though they may just be putting it in the back of their minds and ignoring it, moving on. Though Tom still seems a bit pained by the loss of his mistress, for the last thing he says in the novel is, "And if you think I didn't have my share of suffering--look here, when I went to give up that flat and saw that damn box of dog biscuits sitting there on the sideboard I sat down and cried like a baby. By God it was awful...." He is similar to Gatsby in the way that his heart is stuck in the past... and that kept his mind returning to the thought of loving Myrtle relentlessly, despite the fact that he stayed married to Daisy.

Gatsby, on the other hand, went through both a normal cycle of life and death, though a short-lived one, as well as a ring of time. This young man was on the threshold of life, rich with parties that hollow people came to and young with dreams that were so close yet so far away. He lived to the fullest and more, and in the end, having nothing left to do but die after losing the one thing he had ever wanted so dearly in his life, he died. However, his life, his mind, and his heart were trapped in a small eternity, longing to recapture the moment that a young Daisy had captured his heart. His wish drove everything he did, which created a wealthy and materialistic future for him, but after Daisy's careless ignorance and rejection, his dream crumbled some time before his body did. And at his funeral, he returned not only to the earth and heavens, he returned to being James Gatz. His father Henry Gatz gave life to him, and after he abandoned his name to be surrounded by hundreds of people he didn't even know, his father still came to his death.

So, as life goes on, so does the past in the minds of man. These four characters reached their end. It was the end of their wonder, their feelings, their memories, their lives... and ironically, with the end of the great Gatsby, their circle.

More Current Events

1) http://www.sandiego6.com/news/local/story/Sewage-Spill-from-Mission-Valley-to-Ocean-Beach/qWYuIGp6oEeMp2ZNMf20lQ.cspx
This article talks about a sewage spill that had the areas along the San Diego River and the river mouth under advisory for high bacteria levels. Quote: By the time city crews got the problem under control about an hour later, roughly 1,370 gallons of sewage had spilled into a storm drain that empties into the San Diego River.

2) http://www.kpbs.org/news/2009/oct/23/group-removes-one-million-pounds-trash-san-diego-r/
Almost 1 million pounds of trash removed from San Diego River over a course of 4 years. Quote: "We like to say that the river is clean but it's not healthy," Hutsel says. "And what that means is that we really don't have a lot of pollution coming into the river but we've re-engineered the river over the last 50 years and so it doesn't function very well."

3) http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/carlsbad/article_8c9f6629-da9f-581c-bd6e-97c49b257358.html
An article about how pipelines need an environmental assessment because they aren't actually that good or useful. Quote: Project proponents have said that the proposed plant will give the arid San Diego region a secure source of locally produced drinking water, while opponents have said that the desalination equipment will prolong the life of an aging, water-cooled power plant and cause environmental harm.

4) http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2009/11/05/environment/muck/795waterdeal110409.txt
Talks about 5 bills that would grant San Diego a 11.1 billion dollar bond package for water deals/plans/projects, 20 million going to the San Diego River if the bills are passed. Quote: One of the bond's biggest beneficiaries locally would be the San Diego River Conservancy, which works to restore the river stretching from Ocean Beach to Julian. The bond package would provide it a $20 million grant. Another $107 million would be directed to as-yet unspecified supply projects in the region.

5) http://sandiegonewsroom.com/news/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=37822:redevelopment-of-qualcomm-stadium&catid=110:city-of-san-diego&Itemid=34
Talks about redeveloping the Qualcomm stadium area as a conservatory site for preservation of the San Diego river (or at least, it's one option to use the area for). Quote: Rob Hutsel of the San Diego River Coalition emphasized that the site is prime for 40 acres of public parks which are contemplated under the community plan but don’t exist. Similarly, Kathy Keehan of the San Diego Bicycle Coalition called for the River Conservancy to preserve the site for the benefit of the San Diego River.

Environmental Current Events

http://www.kpbs.org/news/2009/oct/23/group-removes-one-million-pounds-trash-san-diego-r/

1. Summarize the event.

Almost 1 million pounds of trash removed from San Diego River over a course of 4 years. The San Diego River Park Foundation spends 30 weekends a year cleaning up, and they take 5 thousand pounds of trash each month.

 

2. What is the most important info presented in the story?

Over time, the river is being cleaned up but it's not healthy yet.

3. What info is missing?

Where exactly the trash comes from--people dumping garbage? Runoff? Where do the outrageous/bizarre things like shopping carts and slot machines come from? What other trashes are picked up, or is it just the big noticeable things?

 

4. How does this info play into your MSB work?

I'm researching about how the river is polluted and how it's cleaned up.

MSB Organizations

1. Name of organization: San Diego Clean Beach Coalition

2. Mission statement (copy/paste from their site).

SDCBC objectives include: creating awareness of the resources available for beachgoers to properly dispose of their trash during holiday celebrations, educating the community about pollution prevention through our “Don’t Forget” media campaign, increasing recycling, and educating people planning to visit the beaches about the rules and regulations at local beaches.

Pick two of the following:

3a. An important interaction with a local city or county government agency.

3b. An important interaction with a state government agency.

3c. An important interaction with a federal government agency.

 

"The coalition is a joint partnership between I Love A Clean San Diego, San Diego Coastkeeper, the San Diego Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, FreePB.org, and City of San Diego lifeguards, police, and park rangers." - http://cleanbeachcoalition.org/2009/06/25/trash-and-recycle-bins-on-local-beaches-ready-for-holiday-crowds/

Various agencies there.

Links: http://www.surfridersd.org/ , http://www.sdcoastkeeper.org/ , http://cleansd.org/ , http://www.freepb.org/

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1. Name of organization: San Diego Coastkeeper

2. Mission statement (copy/paste from their site).

San Diego Coastkeeper protects the region’s bays, beaches, watersheds and ocean for the people and wildlife that depend on them. We balance community outreach, education, and advocacy to promote stewardship of clean water and a healthy coastal ecosystem.

3. Interact with and teach schools. http://www.sdcoastkeeper.org/content/programs/education/overview.htm

"We are mobilizing citizens to support the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) and aid the State’s efforts to create a series of marine reserves along the California coast by 2011." - http://www.sdcoastkeeper.org/content/programs/marineCon/overview.htm

The Great Gatsby 2

Gatsby seems to be detached from his surroundings in the way that he doesn't really care what goes on around him. People whisper about him, they party at his house and he doesn't even know them, and he's very nonchalant about everything in general. I think that's because he only has one goal in mind--he wants to meet Daisy or have her come to his party or just talk to her. That's all he can think about, that's his motive for doing everything or anything--buying his house across the bay, having parties where anybody can attend, and befriending Daisy's past bridesmaid and cousin.

Nick is detached in the way that he acts as a neutral character in all of this. His only role is supposed to be that he knows all the characters involved in the situation, not that he's actually a part of it. He's nonchalant like Gatsby, as well as nonjudgmental--or at least, he claims to be. He also doesn't seem to care much about the characters because they're mostly strangers to him, and he doesn't care about his surroundings because he really could care less. I'd hate and neglect a shack of a home too (he describes it as an eyesore made of cardboard).

The Great Gatsby 1

1. Who is the narrator? Describe his perspective, biases, character traits, etc.

Nick Carraway. He says he's not judgmental and seems unbiased, but sometimes I feel like he's contradicting himself. Like when his friend hadn't heard of the bonds he was working in, he said it annoyed him in the narration. If he was nonjudgmental, he would have been more like, "I expected this to happen" or something. Other than that, he seems like an experienced man who isn't comfortable on an awkward subject--he's always trying to change the subject or lighten things up when things get tense.

2. What do you think F. Scott Fiitzgerald accomplishes by chooses this specific narrator versus another choice, such as a different character or 3rd person?
By telling the story from the point of view of a character not quite involved in the situation other than knowing all of the people involved. Other than that, I'd think that he does nothing to interfere. Not only that, he's pointed out that he's an unbiased person.