The Great Gatsby
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Regarded as one of the great American novels, The Great Gatsby centers on Nick Carraway, his cousin Daisy Buchanan, and the man obsessed with winning her back: Jay Gatsby. This novel grapples with wealth and its relationship to greatness, the limits of the power of the American dream, and where happiness comes from.
Major thematic elements: the American Dream, social class and the shortcomings of the upper class, love.
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IB Literature and IB Language and Literature Connections
Place of publication: United States
Language: English
Era: 20th Century
Genre: Fiction
Author: Male
Readers, writers and texts | Time and space | Intertextuality: Connecting texts
Identity | Culture | Creativity | Communication
Perspective | Transformation | Representation
Full text, basic summaries, and overviews
The Great Gatsby | Full text
We found three different PDFs of The Great Gatsby; they vary slightly in formatting, but are otherwise the same.
PDF from Planet eBook | PDF from Universidad de La Laguna | PDF from WSFCS
The Great Gatsby | Audiobook
Three audiobook choices, all available on YouTube: Jake Gyllenhaal reads The Great Gatsby (by Wecast) | The Great Gatsby, narrated by Frank Muller (by Creators Mind Audiobooks) | The Great Gatsby - Full audiobook with rolling text (by Michael Davis).
The Great Gatsby Study Guide | Spark Notes
This guide includes chapter summaries, character overviews, literary devices, key quotations and more.
Read more | VideoSparkNotes The Great Gatsby Summary (summary only)
The Great Gatsby Study Guide | Course Hero
Course Hero’s guide is available in text and video (complete) form, and includes discussion questions, quotes, and more.
Read more | Study Guide on YouTube
Like Pale Gold - The Great Gatsby Part 1: Crash Course English Literature #4 | YouTube | 11:42
Crash Course has several videos on The Great Gatsby. This one summarizes the text, characters, and context and guides students towards understanding what the novel is about.
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The Great Gatsby | Wikipedia
Wikipedia’s article is very detailed, covering plot and characters, writing and production, critical reception and analysis, adaptations, and more.
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About the author
F. Scott Fitzgerald | Britannica.com | Biography
This biography includes Fitzgerald’s youth, relationship with his wife Zelda, alcoholism, and writing.
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F. Scott Fitzgerald | YouTube | Various Sources
We’ve selected three video biographies of F. Scott Fitzgerald, all of varying lengths but of equal quality.
F. Scott Fitzgerald: Great American Writer - Fast Facts | History | YouTube | 3:54
F. Scott Fitzgerald: The Genius Behind The Great Gatsby | Biographics | YouTube | 24:06
BBC Sincerely F Scott Fitzgerald | YouTube | Karin Ek | 58:51
A Brief Life of Fitzgerald | University of South Carolina
This page, part of USC’s library page, includes a biography, chronology, bibliographies, and voice clips of Fitzgerald.
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10 Things You May Not Know About F. Scott Fitzgerald | History.com
An easy-to-read article, covering a lot of the same material that’s in the biographies.
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The Great Gatsby: Historical Context and Introduction | CUSD80 | PDF
This PDF of a PowerPoint presentation is 41 pages long and has information about Fitzgerald, context and reception of The Great Gatsby, and more.
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Articles, essays, and videos about The Great Gatsby
The Roaring 20’s: Crash Course US History #32 | YouTube | 13:11
In this video, John Green teaches about the 1920s—the economy, social changes, and more.
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Was Gatsby Great? The Great Gatsby Part 2: Crash Course English Literature #5
This video continues where Part 1 (listed in the ‘Novel’ section above) leaves off, focusing on character motivations and actions in the text.
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Bloom’s Guides: F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby
This 144-page PDF contains a biography of Fitzgerald, the context of the novel, characters, summary and analysis, and eleven critical essays on The Great Gatsby that focus on a range of topics.
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Introduction to The Great Gatsby (Wordsworth Editions) | Guy Reynolds, University of Kent at Canterbury
This is the introduction that would have preceded the novel in the Wordsworth publication of the novel. This is a lengthy (15 pages) article, that gives nice background, and—what we like even more—discussion of the style of Fitzgerald’s writing.
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Nearly a Century Later, We’re Still Reading — and Changing Our Minds About — Gatsby | The New York Times | Parul Sehgal, December 2020
This article examines the status The Great Gatsby has achieved in American Literature and whether or not it’s deserved.
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How Flappers of the Roaring Twenties Redefined Womanhood | History.com | Sarah Pruitt | April 2021
This article includes discussion of the word ‘flapper’ and its origins; what defined a flapper; the role of women in the 1920s; women as a part of mass consumer culture; Zelda Fitzgerald and the Roaring Twenties; and the continued spirit of flappers in today’s society.
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The Great Gatsby and The Obscene Word | SMHS.org | Barbara Will
From the introduction: What matters to Gatsby is what matters to ‘us’; Gatsby’s story is ‘our’ story; his fate and the fate of the nation are intertwined. That Gatsby ‘turned out all right in the end’ is thus essential to the novel’s vision of a transcendent and collective Americanism.
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The Great Gatsby and the Struggle for Wealth, Purity, and the Pursuit of Identity | California State University | Shani Jeanpierre | 2013
From the introduction: “After closely examining both [Fitzgerald’s] life and the connections that are often found in Gatsby and paying lose attention to how the people and events are represented in his novel, it seems that Fitzgerald’s purpose in creating such connections was to criticize the materialistic society and attitudes of the 1920s.”
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Dust and Dreams and the Great Gatsby | The Johns Hopkins University Press | John Fraser | 2016
Fraser questions something that John Green brings up in his Crash Course videos: whether we’re meant to like the characters in The Great Gatsby, and if it’s even possible to consider reading the novel an enjoyable activity.
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Fitzgerald’s Use of the Four Elements in The Great Gatsby | Eastern Illinois University: The Keep | John Philip Hawkins | 1979
We’re sorry to say that the font this essay is written in is Courier New, which we know students don’t love. But—the thesis of this essay is really interesting: East Egg represents air; the valley of ashes, earth; West Egg, water; and New York City, Fire. It could be the beginning of some fun group work, close reading, etc.
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‘Good girls’ and ‘bad girls’ in The Great Gatsby: An Analysis of the portrayal of Daisy, Jordan and Myrtle | Karlstads University | Linn Karlsson
The title page and abstract are in both English and Swedish, but the essay is in English. The essay discusses the different way Fitzgerald portrays women and how Daisy, Jordan and Myrtle all embody different versions of “The New Woman.”
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Lesson plans and other teaching resources
The Great Gatsby | Study and Reader’s Guides
We found lots of different reader and study guides for The Great Gatsby. Below are our favorite options. Most of them have some historical or literary context, chapter summaries, and discussion questions. Most are geared towards teachers, but some are designed to be printed off for student use.
NEA Big Read | Reader Resources | The Great Gatsby | PDF
What we like: “About the Book” (page 3), “Historical and Literary Context” (page 5), “Discussion Questions” (page 9)
Shmoop Literature: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
What we like: quotes from the text organized by theme (wealthy, memory, dissatisfaction, etc.), long list of themes with explanations and discussion questions for each theme.
The Great Gatsby | WJCC Schools | PDF Study Guide
What we like: analysis of style (pages 10-11), excerpts from critical writing about the novel (14-19)
The Great Gatsby | eNotes
What we like: hyperlinked table of contents, quiz questions for each chapter, 16 different essays and criticism about the novel.
Lit Charts: The Great Gatsby
What we like: pages 3-4 identify four key themes in the novel. Key quotes (organized by chapter) track which themes apply to each quote.
The Great Gatsby: Student Study Guide | English 11 Regents | 2014
What we like: key vocabulary (page 7), anticipation guide (page 9), close reading activities for every chapter (page 11)
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: Book Discussion Questions | TSCPL.org
What we like: discussion questions for characters and literary aspects like symbolism, setting, author intent.
Chapter 1 Close Reading Activity | Sharpschool.com
This activity includes excerpts from chapters 1 and 7 with short analysis questions following, requiring evidence from text.
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Teachers Notes, Level 5 | Penguin Readers Teacher Support Programme | The Great Gatsby
Page 3 begins a list of activities and discussions that could be used to teach the novel, all organized by chapter.
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Library of Congress Lesson Plan | The Great Gatsby: Primary Sources from the Roaring Twenties
This lesson focuses on how primary sources can be used to interpret life in the 1920s, illustrate aspects of the novel, and confirm historical events described by the novel. Hyperlinks to resources are included.
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The Great Gatsby Treasure Hunt | HuffEnglish.com
This page asks questions about The Great Gatsby and its historical context, and provides hyperlinks to pages where answers can be found.
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The Great Gatsby Unit Plan | Katherine Blumenstein | Katherinelohman.weebly.com
In this unit plan, Blumenstein outlines what students know, her theoretical approach, objectives, and activities and assessments, organized by class periods/days.
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The Great Gatsby Activity Packet | PCMAC.org
If you need a print-and-go activity, this will do the trick. Important note: question difficulty doesn’t hit very high on Bloom’s Taxonomy. There is some analysis of character, setting, and literary devices, but probably not enough to meet the needs of an IB or AP Literature course.
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Shopping List
Texts and other resources you may find helpful.
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The Great Gatsby
Paperback on Amazon.com
The Great Gatsby
Hardcover on Amazon.com
The Great Gatsby (Dover Thrift Edition)
Paperback on Amazon.com
The Great Gatsby (Film, 2000) DVD on Amazon.com
Tender is the Night (1934)
Paperback on Amazon.com
This Side of Paradise (1920)
Paperback on Amazon.com
Some Sort of Epic Grandeur: The Life of F. Scott Fitzgerald
Paperback on Amazon.comLink
The Great Gatsby (Film, 2013)
DVD on Amazon.comBack to Browse by Title | Browse by Author
