Chapter Three

Character: Jay Gatsby
Character Quote: "It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four of five ties in life." (48). This quote describes the first impressions that we get about Gatsby. He is a rich man who also is modest and what people notice about him is his smile. It is genuine and you can tell that so far, he is probably the happiest person with their life. Not because he has a bunch of money and can buy whatever he wants and throw parties, it's because he can help people and is not self absorbed.
Character qualities: Although we have just been introduced to Jay Gatsby, there are many things that we are able to know about his personality. He has many good qualities from what we have read so far. We can tell that he is a rich man, he seems very happy with his life, he is genuine, he is friendly (throwing all these parties and talking to his guests), he is not self centered (he doesn't throw parties so that he can be the center of the party, in fact he is fairly withdrawn), he is nice to Nick and is taking him on a trip. We don't really know any bad qualities of Gatsby yet. We know that he is somewhat mysterious (being so withdrawn) which could end up leading to something bad in the end. Other than that, we don't know enough about him to negatively judge him. This is interesting because for most of the other characters, our first impressions of them is that they are bad people. With Gatsby, we clearly get a different impression.
Character role: Gatsby has a very large role in the book (it is called the Great Gatsby) but so far, we have only just been introduced to him. He was definitely a main role in chapter three. He is someone that everyone looks up to. He is rich and is able to throw all these parties where people can come and have a great time. He is a nice guy who likes to sit back and watch his guests enjoy themselves. He seems to be like a figure that is higher than everyone else, or at least everyone seems to want to be like him, idealizes him. We can tell that his part is going to increase throughout the book, but from what we know so far, he is just a semi-modest man that people look up to.
Significant quote: "I see I have given the impression that the events from three nights several weeks apart were all that absorbed me. On the contrary, they were merely casual events in a crowded summer, and, until much later, they absorbed me infinitely less than my personal affairs." (56) -Nick. This quote is different from the significant quotes that I chose in other chapters. When I read this quote I thought of the discussion we were having in class about whether or not we could trust Nick. This quote just kind of proved the point that these views might be effected by something that happens later in the book. By Nick saying this, he is saying that the importance of these events in the moment changed over time. This quote makes me think a lot about whether or not I trust that Nick is telling the truth.
Sightings: "...And pastry pigs and turkeys bewitched to a dark gold." (40) This quote has to do with the color gold. Here I believe that Nick is describing roasting animals and the color that they become. This quote is taken from a passage where Nick is describing one of Gatsby's lavish parties.
"Most of the time I worked. In the early morning the sun threw my shadow westward as I hurried down the white chasms of lower New York to the Probity Trust." (56) Here, the description is of Nick's job. He is some sort of clerk. I thought this quote was important because it was a clear description of Nicks job, which gives us another view on his life. Obviously he doesn't just attend lavish parties all day/night.