Citation Needed - The Great Gatsby

Episode Date: December 20, 2023

The Great Gatsby is a 1925 novel by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. Set in the Jazz Age on Long Island, near New York City, the novel depicts first-person narrator Nick Carraway's interactions with mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby and Gatsby's obsession to reunite with his former lover, Daisy Buchanan.

and Tom, your suit is made out of gold. Classic. And we'll be like, uh, gold, right? Sure, sure. Maybe a broom halberd? No, I tried. It will not budge. It just, it's like stuck. Oh, I was worried.

Hey, guys, what's going on? We didn't get to set up our shenanigans yet. Well, I mean, it's it's this But giant ass in the ceiling. Yeah, yeah, that's what we were afraid of the show is disappearing up its own ass It is yeah, unfortunately the meta commentary the meta commentary on the meta commentary and the meta commentary on the meta commentary on the meta commentary on the meta commentary Yeah and the meta commentary on the meta commentary on the meta commentary. Yeah, you know, this is like the sort of bound to happen. That damn it.

Yeah, yeah. Talking about it is definitely making it worse. Okay, guys, we can't let our podcast disappear up its own ass. You know what happens when podcasts do that. Don't even say it! Episode paywalls? Okay, okay, so I was a big one. So yeah, that was a very big one. What do we do now? We only got one choice Give me a second clones time machine. It's getting worse

Here it is here it is. Oh a big red button. No, not just any big red button It kills the sketch. Look Eli, I know that might fix it this week, but this is a problem we have to deal with from now on. No, no, no, Cecil, not A-Sketch. The sketch. Once we push it, the show starts with music, and we don't even remember that this part of the show happened. Wow. So this part of the show is just... Over? Yep. Totally gone.

Guys, guys, I see a hole. Somebody just push the button. Just push it. I'm not pushing in. It's my part of the show. Oh, did you write this part of the show? You haven't mentioned that before. You already know what I'm saying though. Okay.

Clip-plop. Clip-plop, Tom. Do you want to push the Okay. Clip-plop. Clip-plop, Tom. Do you want to push the button? Clip-plop. But, but Clip-plop, Tom, you're from this sketch. If you push that button, you're going to. Clip-plop. But, I don't want you to leave.

Clip-plop. Clip-pl leave. Clip clap, clip, clap, clip clap. Clip clap, clip clap, citation needed. Podcasts, we choose Subject, read a single article about it on Wikipedia and pretend for your experts. Because this is the internet, and that's how it works now. I'm Cecil, welcome to our version of Book Club, which actually borrows a lot from the rules of Fight Club. So I'm joined by Jack Stumick, heart, liver, and inflame sense of rejection.

Tom, Noah, Heath, and Eli. Oh man, Cecil, in 25 years of our friendship, I have never once felt more seen than right now. I get to be the heart, because I'm the most likely to attack. Yes. Yes. And if I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times, Cecil, just because it's red and pulsing doesn't mean it's inflamed

I'm he hi he drinks all right Non patrons for as little as one dollar an episode you can make sure bitter angry people who failed high school English and Still have a grudge Also have a future. And if you'd like to learn how to join their ranks, be sure to stick around until the end of the show. And with that out of the way, tell us, Heath, what person-place thing concept phenomenon or book will we be talking about today? We're going to be talking about a book called The Great Gatsby.

Okay, I read The Great Gatsby in high school, but I don't remember it. So what was The Great Gatsby? It's a bad book. Where to fight already? That's it. Where to fight already? It's a very bad book. No, but it's also required reading for just about every single high school student in

the country. Yeah. Was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1923 and 1924, published in 1925, and it's one of several books that's considered to be the great American novel. It's not. It's not that. Now there is Moby Dick, by the way, horrible. Okay, but I'm going to go and need to scream into a closet. Guys, I'll be right. I don't know.

Moby Dick is fucking really next Mo but this is Brax just just so whole chapter on white. I would say read a book but clearly not your thing. Oh I don't like books So Is the story of F Scott Fitzgerald being a sad obnoxious alcoholic who gets rejected by women for being a sad obnoxious alcoholic? Except he's completely unaware of that, so according to him, it's actually the story of his

disillusionment with American society and culture, especially in New York City and Long Island during the 1920s. But again, it's just a whiny narration from an entitled white guy about him being shitty and also the people around him being shitty and capitalism being shitty. Let's like, jazz or something. You should just read some Bill Bryson, man, who hurt you? Who would you be?

I have no idea. Oh, there's a whole one about the kitchen. You guys should start good. Before we get into the plot of the book. I'll give you a quick background on F first of all he goes by Really bad start. Oh, he was born in Minnesota And his family was relatively poor. I don't know what's up some money from his Okay, well, he's from now on. Thank you, Tom. So Scott was born in Minnesota. His family was relatively poor, but thanks to some money from his

grandparents, young Fiscat, who was able to attend a somewhat fancy prep school in New Jersey and then Princeton University. During his time at Princeton, he met a 16-year-old debutant named Geneva King, but her parents didn't like Fiscat and the couple had to break up. He was devastated. Fiscat was so realisted in the army during World War I, planning to die in compil. You did, you.

And unfortunately for high school students ever since, that didn't happen. Instead, during basic training, he wrote a 120,000 word manuscript entitled The Romantic Egotist, hoping to become a posthumously celebrated author. Seriously, that was his plan.

But the book was very bad and also he didn't die. So that plan didn't work out. He's quietly moving of Scott up the list over Hitler and time machine assassination to our gets. All right, well, I don't know why he thought calling his opus, I'm a psychopath with a heart on wooden hammer in the might of his future readers, but it is what it is, I guess.

So as part of the not dying, the Scott got sent to Camp Sheridan in Alabama, where he met Zelda Sayer, another rich debutant, and he fell in love again. But he was sad, poor, and drunk all the time, and Zelda told him she wouldn't marry him unless he started making some money. So he moved to New York City after the war and tried to become a novelist. And he failed because being a bad writer, he failed because it's bad the writing he did. Zelda broke off their engagement and Fiscat moved back to Minnesota where he lived in the attic of his parents' house.

That's when he did a rewrite of the romantic ego-tist, renaming it this side of paradise and making it all about his time at Princeton and his tragic romantic failures. In this time, Scribner's publishing house was all the way on board. They sent him a telegram with the good news, and he ran through the streets of St. Paul, Minnesota, flagging down random cars and telling everyone that he was getting published. Merry Christmas, your wonderful all building and loan. Okay. To be clear, if someone stopped my cab to tell me they'd been published, I would

spend the rest of my life trying to run them down like I was driving the evil car from the Stephen King. I'm starting to be one over. Maxrive. Yeah, Christine. I think Christine. It's Christine. I don't like books There are multiple people One has evil cars. He needed a lot of cocaine in the 80s So this side of paradise was a big hit and with his newfound wealth This side of Paradise was a big hit, and with his newfound wealth, Fiscat moved to New York City, Wazelda, where he spent most of his time being a giant piece of shit that nobody liked in all of New York City.

He lived in luxury hotels the whole time, and the couple would spend most of their time getting drunk, and bothering every single person in the building. They'd slide down banisters and do handstands and cartwheels in a lobby, and more importantly, harass the staff at the hotel like their drunk Boston Seasill and drunk Marke Mark Eli in a scam. Just horrible. After getting kicked out of the built-more hotel, they moved two blocks down to the Commodore hotel and spent half an hour just spinning around in the revolving

door and drunkenly yelling stuff. Mostly anti-Semitic slur words if I had to guess. And after a few years of doing that, he wrote the great. Yeah. Podcast listener, he's going to exaggerate many things for the sake of tapes and chicanery on this episode, but everything he just said about Fiscat and Zelda's behavior is 100% accurate. Therefore, literally anything he says about Fitzgerald or his work is now fine. He's fine. You have to let it be fine. With the exception of the ability to do cartwheels and the quality of places he was getting

kicked out of, Heath is also describing all the shit he did when he was at age two. I'm just saying. Yes, slurs weren't. Well, they weren't anti-Semitic. True. Okay. You know, if you don't like drinking with me, they weren't anti-Semitic. True. Okay. You know, if you don't like drinking with me, you didn't have to write a long boring essay

about the great gatsby. You could have just set me a message. It's fine. I like drink arguing with you, Tom. It's the opposite. Okay, so now you got the context. He's a very bad writer and a very bad person. Okay, let's talk about his book now.

The great Gatsby starts with the narrator, Nick Carroway, telling us that he wrote the book that we're reading right now. It's clunky. It's a clunky fucking start. And then the very first thing out of his mouth is, I'm not a bigot, which is not a good sign usually. And then he tells us about Jay Gatsby, a super rich guy with a mansion whose personality is quote, gorgeous. And the story begins with Nick moving from Minnesota to New York to work in the

bond business. He rents a house on Long Island in a town called West Egg full of mostly obnoxious newvo-reached people like his neighbor Gatsby. We're supposed to feel empathy for Nick at this point. Nick, the Yale graduate who's working on Wall Street and he's able to run a house next to a gothic mansion in one of the wealthiest zip codes in the world. We don't feel okay for someone living next to not one, but two wealthy zip codes right now. You will never know my pain. He never know my pain. Paid noted. So thanks to his Yale connections, Nick knows a bunch of people in the next town over called East egg where the people with old money are living. He drives over to East egg and he has dinner with his cousin Daisy and her

husband Tom, who is in the same social club as Nick at Yale. Tom was Tom's wearing riding clothes at this moment because he's the fucking worst. And during dinner, Tom tells everyone about his favorite new book that he's reading called The Rise of the Colored Empires. It's all about eugenics and white supremacy. You know how I only had like that one time life science book in my house. This was the only book in Stephen Miller's house. This is the one.

Yeah, right. It's all together. Yeah. Wait, so this book, it starts off with a budget by a dude whose college friends are all more successful than him and he starts off hating on a book. He, they're unique. Here are where you have to tell us. I do not have to tell you. So this is when we meet a character named Jordan Baker as well. She's a friend of Daisy who's a professional golfer and she's also the absolute worst. We actually get that you said earlier, she was a golfer so kind of patient.

So Jordan looks down her nose at Nick when they meet. Like I mean, she actually tilts her head back so she can very literally look down her nose at Nick when they meet. Like, I mean, she actually tilts her head back so she could very literally look down her nose at him. So it's actually, it's really good writing in them. I'm going to. So they're all talking about mine, cough, too, or whatever it was when the phone rings. And Tom, please answer the phone. Jay-Z follows Tom into the other room. And that's when Jordan, the golfer, explains to Nick that the call is very clearly from Mertel, which is Tom's secret public mistress. Mertel lives in a poor area with a very subtle name. It's called the Valley of Ashes. And it's Gerald totally misses the opportunity to

call her Tom's piece of ash in this book. I'm not. I'm a bit of an amateur. book. He got a round. I think it's my knife. He's been a bit of an amateur that Fiscat, yeah. Exactly. Yeah. The word play. Thank you, everybody. So Tom and Daisy come back into the dining room after their messy whisper fight. And everyone finishes dinner.

And as Nick's leaving at the end of the night, Tom and Daisy tell him to start dating Jordan, the snobby golfer. And he's like, great. Love that idea. This is fantastic. He tell him to start dating Jordan, the snobby golfer, and he's like, great, love that idea. This is fantastic. He drives home, and as he's getting out of his car, he sees Gatsby standing in the giant yard by himself, reaching his arms out toward the water.

We're going to find out he's doing that for a metaphor or a symbolism or some other book thing, whatever. Oh, yeah, he's a hard agree here. Symbolism and metaphor very stupid. Literature should actually just read like vacuum cleaner instructions. That would actually help. Thank you. You're a rich or a fine, you're a great rule.

Finally, just say what you mean with your words. Learn to communicate. They are weird liars. Yeah, it's liars. It's a bunch of liars. Both of you guys are kind of reaching your arms out over a pond at each other. Right now, it's liars. It's a bunch of liars. Both you guys are kind of reaching your arms out over upon to each other right now Cecil's gas loading is right now. So apparently this It is so, it is so apparently this moment is also a physical display of yearning for Daisy by Gatsby.

The water is a bay in the Long Island Sound that separates East egg and West egg, so he's reaching toward Daisy on the other side, but Nick doesn't know that yet. Right now, he just sees a green light out in the distance and his weird millionaire neighbor is trying to grab the green light. And according to my high school teacher, that green light is going to be a fucking sweet metaphor about wanting stuff or something. Nobody cares, whatever. Keith, if you brought up this English teacher of yours in therapy yet, because you might want to spend a lot of time. Well, to be fair, Fitzgerald didn't have a meta podcast supposed to do things subtly like we do today. Thank you inside out girl,

little girl. Thank you. Exactly. What the fuck is happening right now? Disappearing up our own ass. disappearing up our own ass. I stopped button one more time, Clopop. So now we're going to check out the Valley of Ashes. Nick and Tom ride their commuter train into Manhattan. And on the way, Tom makes Nick get off at one of the stops in the Ash Valley. And it's literally a town of Ash. Now they just pile the garbage as tall as people

on the side of the street before they actually see you. Exactly, yeah. Well, I guess they were doing it with Ash back in the day. Apparently, New York City manufacturers a good deal of Ash and they dump it in this one town. So the whole place is physically the color gray because of the Ash. Most of the people who live there have a job as

a shoveler of ashes. I guess they move it around or something. And this is where we get another very important metaphor. There's a giant billboard for an eye doctor. We used to have a practice in the Valley of Ashes. And his big, unblinking eyes are constantly watching over the value of ashes and the metaphor is God because the watching. Mm hmm. They said, I just want to remind you, Heath, this was written in 1924. Large swaths of New York City were definitely ash trays in 1924. It was believed in the part of the book.

That and a rich guy's an asshole, most believable parts of this book. Hey, sometimes I don't want to shovel, but I just reminds myself to stop wanting to get off my ass, you know, there had to be some some good puns going on in the valley. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, definitely. I do like that. I'm sorry. Yeah.

But play that up if you're the writer for Scott, get on your fucking game. You're on your phone call your sports team, the ass. The girls, I mean, there's so much. So, but thank you. if you're the writer for Scott get on your phone game. You're on your phone call your support team the assakers. I mean, there's so much. So many. Thank you. Lazy nighting. So many opportunities.

So busy on courteous. So they're in the valley of ashes. And Tom takes Nick to see Mertle, his mistress. She lives with her husband, George, who has a used car garage. Also a metaphor. Yes. Exactly. What does that

metaphor do? It doesn't matter. George is, I won't understand even if you tell me, like, I'll be like, that's you. So George is one of the few people in town who, I guess, doesn't move ashes from one pile to another as his job. Tom starts the interaction with George by haunting George with a fake offer about selling a car, which was weird. And when George walks away for a second, Tom tells Mertle to hop on the train with them to Manhattan to do some affair stuff. So they do that. They get into the city, Mertle at this moment buys a dog from a random guy on the street who has a basket of loose puppies for sale. That happens. And then they head over to Tom's extra apartment that he keeps for the affair. Nick wants to split up at

this point and presumably go to his job of work that he has, but Tom insists on having him hang out for a while. I'm not holding your girlfriend's new puppy and watching you guys talk. I know what that is. I know what that was leading to. Yeah. I mean, depending on the puppy, it doesn't matter. So now it's time for a nice little day drinking party. And I actually enjoyed this part of the book. This was. No, you. Not just because of the day drinking. It's basically just a long description of being at a party for hours and hating every single person.

Okay. And also pro tip, if you're this guy, stay home. You're not fun or interested. Just stay home. Don't go to the party. What I do, Tom. Thank you. No, that's all time.

No, that's all time. It says I'm staring our podcast. The party. But since I'm staring our podcast apart, everybody's gonna be like, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha of his mouth the whole time and Nick cannot stop staring at the spittle with silent rage, just smoldering the whole time. But then the book goes right back to terrible at the end of the night when Tom slaps myrtle in the face and breaks her nose and rather than do anything about that, Mr. McKee and Nick just leave. So that was extremely upsetting. But according to the fucking book people,

we get two very important literary elements here. One is that people are bad, fascinating. And the other is a rumor about Gatsby that we learn during the party. He might be the nephew or perhaps the cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm. So now we're intrigued. And now we've come full circle. The spittle on the side of the mouth of English teachers all across the country is the great Gatsby. That's a metaphor. Don't punch me, Heath. I'm sorry. I didn't

need it. Yeah. No, Heath hates metaphors like never mind never mind. I know you were about to do a simile. Yeah, I was going to say never know. So the next day Nick gets an invitation to attend one of Gatsby's famous lavish parties at his mansion. And that evening he walks over the big mansion and he tries to mingle at the party. But everyone sucks because of course it's a bunch of rich people on Long Island. Eventually Nick runs into Jordan, the golfer, and they walk around the party trying to find the mysterious host.

They finally do meet Gatsby briefly and he also sucks. He tries to sound smart and like formal or whatever, saying per se all the time for no reason. And he calls everybody, old sport talks kind of like that. And this is the 20s. So I imagine everyone was talking like that, which means Gatsby was talking normal, but with like extra obnoxious tone somehow. They didn't like it either.

I like the idea of him just turning around and being like, ah shit, sorry, turns out the host of the party's an incorrect, correction email everybody. We should bounce back. Burbans only in Kentucky. So the party finally ends and Nick walks back to his house. He sees two drunken idiots who try to drive home and they immediately ran their car into a ditch. That was fun. And then he feels bad about just morality in general. So he starts narrating to rationalize himself to the readers of this book

that might be judging him in this moment. He explains that he's very deep and complex actually. If you think about it, he doesn't just attend parties with bad people. He enjoys walking and he's had texts with a woman. He actually tells us both of those things for real. And then we learn that he's dating Jordan, that snooty golfer. And then he adds, yeah, she cheated in her first professional golfer tournament.

But I still really like her. I'm actually the most honest person though. Reader, okay, right? Reader, that's locked in that I'm honest, great. And that's the end of the chat. It occurs to me at this point that my protagonist might not be likeable. Oh, so I'll have him tell the reader

that he is, in fact, likeable. He's done. It's gonna happen. Yeah, you laugh Noah, but that fooled 74 million people in 2021. No, no. Yeah, what? Well, prepared that fooled 74 million people in 2020. What? What? Prepared them for it.

Tom, what book? Exactly. Yeah. What book indeed. Yeah, Trump voters weren't reading. But from there, Nick tells us about the time he went to lunch with Gatsby in the city one time. On the ride, Nick tries to learn about this mysterious millionaire guy,

but everything Gatsby says is a very obvious lie. Gatsby claims to be from a rich family in the Midwest, but when Nick asks what part, Gatsby says San Francisco. Gatsby also claims to be an Oxford scholar, an international jewel baron, a big game hunter, and a spy hero during World War One. He's going to get expelled from Congress any second.

No, this is not going well. He's actually really close on Long Island to like where can I fucking say this from? Yeah. Yes, but he's actually on cameo now. You can pick him up on cameo. I was making a fortune on cameo. I'm so mad. I also got Eli a gift of Cammy. Oh,

yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Look up for our new show, Cammy. Oh, no, you did it. It's the worst title ever. Click clop. You want to hit the button real quick, one more time. All my ideas are killed by the money. That's a different button. That's a different button. I have that one at my house. Oh, God. So they get to the city for lunch. And during lunch, Gatsby introduces Nick to a guy named Meyer Wolfshime, who helped rig

the 1919 World Series. I wonder what religion that guy is. That's a legend. Wow, we don't know. I wonder what religion that guy is. That's a dead man. It's a religion. Yeah. Wow, we don't know. I don't know.

No idea. No, very clearly meant to be a reference to Arnold Rothstein, but like, Jewisher in the name. And this whole thing is meant to tip us off that Gatsby's wealth might be derived from his ties to the mob or to the globalist, the luminati with the New York sense of humor. It's just some mild anti-Semitism during mid 1920s. It's no big deal. What's the worst?

Not a big deal. After lunch, Nick meets up with Jordan and she tells him that Gatsby gave her some hot gossip during the party. Gatsby, it turns out, is in love with Daisy. They met in Kentucky when Gatsby was stationed at an army base, party. Gatsby turns out is in love with Daisy. They met in Kentucky when Gatsby was stationed at an army base, but then Gatsby got shipped off to the war and Daisy married Tom. And the whole reason Gatsby bought a mansion in West Egg was to be near Daisy again and try to get her back.

Gatsby actually has a plan for that. He wants Nick to invite Daisy over for tea, and then Gatsby can ambush Daisy, but with love, it's a love ambush plan. Well, why we try to figure out if love ambush is a real thing or just a metaphor for cheating a tennis, we're gonna take a quick break for a little apropos of nothing. NIC! Thanks for coming, old boy! Yeah, um, thanks, thanks for your name, right? Ah, have you met Mollermillak? It's all about Stux, my boy! Stux and Bonn!

It's insane way to introduce yourself, um, hi, um, NIC. No time, NIC! And this is the lovely Sheridan Square! Not on this boat, right? I ain't. Oh, Sheridan, you never know with him. Sorry, can people see me? I feel like you all have lines prepared? Nick, can't see me.

Please come with me out to the patio. Literally just walked into the house. What do you know of love, Nick? Oh, okay, well, in terms of love, I would say you know as a man looks over life, you're just talking again, right? One begins to wonder how a man takes a claim of a situation. What do I'm saying? And I do suppose that my intention has only been one place where that heart lands on the boat ridge. You catch my meeting, Nick. You know what? I'm going

to go. That heart is landed with Daisy. if you can. Oh, he's gone. Oh, hi, I'm Lauren and I'm Chandler and we're the hosts of Pop Apologist Podcast, a weekly podcast devoted to celebrity gossip, Hollywood deep dives, real housewives drama, and anything and everything Taylor Swift. We're two sisters who make no apologies for our love of pop culture in the fact that A-listers might be more to us than each other. Join us on your favorite podcast app every Wednesday for pop apologists. Pop apologists, your new favorite sister and celeb podcast.

Be the country bumpkin! Not now, Sheridan! Skawnt candle! Oh, he left off. We were learning about the exciting life of fictional golfing races that cheetah 1920 and the 2000s. We just elect them president. So what happened next? Yeah. All right. So Nick gets home from lunch in the city with Moishi Hanukkah Bagel or whatever it was. Jesus Christ. And he's walking into his house and Gatsby jumps out of nowhere and starts offering a bunch of favors and invitations.

Gatsby's obviously buttering up Nick before asking the favor about setting up the love ambush. Nick eventually does agree to help and then we cut ahead to the day of the big meeting for T. Gatsby's waiting inside Nick's house at this moment, but when Daisy shows up, Gatsby is gone. But then there's a knock on the front door. Gatsby ran out the back, went around the side of the house in the rain, and now he's at the front door, stopping wet, and he's just, quote, stopping

over by chance. And when he comes inside, he's all nervous for this big meeting. So he almost knocks over the antique clock on Nick's mantle. And this is a pretty sweet literary moment. I'll give everybody a second to process that sweet fucking symbolism that happened just now. The clock. You guys want to come more seconds? The clock represents Gatsby's desire to go back in time.

You can let this go in. He and Daisy were a couple in Kentucky. So despite the initial awkwardness, Gatsby and Daisy end up having a very happy reunion. After a few hours of catching up, Gatsby invites Daisy and Nick back to his mansion, celebrates more, and to show off his many leather-bound books and his amazing collection of English shirts. Those are shirts from the country of England, apparently, and Daisy sweeps with joy at the shirts, confusing.

And this was not clear from the book at this point, but I guess their love is fully rekindled now and Gatsby at this moment yells hey Clipspringer come play for us who who the fuck is Clipspringer you might ask great question Some guy named something that sounds pretty Nazi lives at the mansion with Gatsby and he plays them a song on the piano called with Gatsby and he plays them a song on the piano called, ain't we got fun. And this is when Nick realizes that absolutely nobody's talking to him or even looking at him so he just slowly backs out of the room and goes home. Well, Ed, and can I say it's about fucking time. Dude is obviously trying to fuck your cousin, bro. He told you he was trying to fuck your cousin. Did you really think he wanted to invite

you to his place to see his shirt? That's bad for showing up for the shirt showing I agree that's true. I can I choose a song that clips bring her face now Oh you guys are kissing And I'm gonna get on He really got shirt shrift on that one or what? You really got shirt shrift on that one. Nice. Sure. So now we have some kind of romantic plot established. It's Gerald grinds the action to a screeching halt. Nick the narrator basically calls a fucking timeout on the book and then turns to the camera in the movie and says, wait, I've fucking forgot to explain something

that you would need to have known. All right. It's like a little kid fucking up a long-term joke, the author. And now he tells us the actual backstory of Gatsby rather than all the rumors and lies that we've heard so far. We learn that Jay Gatsby was born James Gats on a farm in North Dakota. And coincidentally, young James had the exact same childhood as the Scott Fitzgerald. So after dropping out of prep school,

James Gats was digging for clams in Lake Superior. That was his summer job, I guess. And he met a wealthy copper mogul who took James on his yacht and hired him as a personal assistant. They then traveled the world on the yacht and when the copper mogul died, he left James a big inheritance. But the rich guy's widow prevented James from ever getting that money. So James vowed to just become a rich guy to make up for that. And somehow he just made that happen. So now he calls himself Jay Gatsby instead of James Gats because it sounds more rich guy-esque.

That's my first story. Wondered about that because it feels like Fitzgerald was nine tenths of the way through a rich uncle millionaire backstory. And then Zelda was like, oh, it's pretty stereotypical is that what you're doing? And he was like, now, that doesn't happen. It happens another way is how it happened. Right. So now it's a few weeks later. And Gatsby

has another big party. And since we're well into act two, the motifs, of course, have to build. So there's a big uptick in the level of disillusionment about these parties now. Even Daisy has a bad time. Gatsby finds Nick after the party and mentions how he noticed that literary advice was really building. They both find that to be quite odd. Gatsby also wants about how Daisy hasn't ended her marriage with Tom yet.

Gatsby just wants everything to be the same as it wasn't Kentucky when they first fell in love. And Nick at this point explains to Gatsby that it's impossible for Daisy to live up to the rosy memories and that you can't turn it to camera, recreate, looking at me. And Gatsby was like, you keep looking at something, what is that? And that's the end of that. I feel like there's like 40 different times that Rod Serling could have walked out and made this an actual good story. All right. Cecil Fitzgerald had the choice of making an actual good story or making a literary classic.

He chose his path. He's a great man. Thank you. So now we move ahead to the hottest day of the summer. This is a lot like Spike Lee's do the right thing if you think about it. And Nick is having lunch in East Egg at Hamondazy's house. When he arrives, he's surprised to see

that cats being Jordan and Gopher are also there. But they explain how, you know, it's a main character lunch break with climax, so that's totally normal. So the vibes at this lunch, they're absolutely unbearable, and Daisy invites Gatsby to go into the city with her. Tom at this moment becomes fully convinced about the affair, so he says, yes, that is a great idea.

Let's all go into the city together. And they're all like, yup, we're all agreeing to this. This is great. I love this. Let's all start a podcast. Let's do a podcast. So they all go into the city to get a suite at the plaza for another dayding party at a hotel. They have mint tulips, which represent coldness, things that are cold. And it also represents Kentucky from the unrecredible past nailed it. And this is when Tom finally confronts Gatsby about the affair, and they argue for a while.

Somehow the argument makes Daisy start loving Tom again and sensing the wind, Tom sends Daisy back to Long Island with just Gatsby as like a demonstration of his dominance, I think. Why don't you take my wife home and not fuck her great if that is your real name? So, Daisy gets beleaved together and then Nick, Tom and Jordan get into another car to head back as well. On the way, they drive through the valley of ash piles and metaphors and they see a dead body on the road. Turns out it's Tom's mistress, Mertle, and a witness saw her get killed by a hit-and-run driver in a big yellow, rich guy car, so immediately they all know it was Gatsby. They get back to Tom and Daisy's house, and Nick finds Gatsby hiding in the bushes. So Gatsby

explains that Daisy was actually driving at the moment, but that he's going to take the blame for the hit and run. Then Nick goes inside to check on Daisy, and apparently Tom and Daisy are just totally cool now. They're just hanging out, eating fried chicken together. No problems. So Nick leaves, and Gatsby just stands there in the dark for a while. End of chapter. I feel like there's a bit of a hint of if only someone had been stopping traffic to tell strangers about their book getting published underlying that. So, yeah.

No! No! The self-insert. So, the next morning, Nick talks to Gatsby and tells him to give up on trying to get Daisy back. And Gatsby is like, no, no, no, no, no. And he refuses like a child, almost exactly like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no and walks outside and sees the big, unblinking eyes of the eye doctor on that billboard. Reminder, he's the God metaphor.

And the doctor's name is T.J. Eckelberg, which I don't know why I did this, but it anagrams to beg, cult, jerk. And that's a pretty good description of the God of the Bible. So I've had enough of using it anyway. George looks at the eyes of God and decides that whoever killed Myrtle must have been her lover. There's no reason for him to believe that, but he does. He also decides that God wants revenge.

So George now heads out to find the owner of the fancy yellow car and get revenge. A lot of steps, George, you're doing a lot of things. car and get revenge. A lot of steps, George, you're doing a lot of, you're doing a lot of laugh. I think we're all, yeah. So George goes to Tom's house because he saw Tom driving a car like that earlier in the day, but he assumes that Tom wasn't driving when Mertel got hit because Tom shows up at the scene right after the accident in a

different car with Nick and Jordan. So after talking with Tom, George heads over to Gatsby's house. He finds Gatsby in the pool, and he shoots Gatsby dead. And then George immediately hills himself too. According to most literary scholars, that's a metaphor about not knowing how to end a sketch. I think the whole order is it literary genius.

It's one of the other. It's one of the other. It's one of the other. It's also meant to represent how rich people like Tom and Daisy can be terrible for society and still end up getting away with murder while happily eating chicken and not there. I love how he's so in the bit now. He's making fun of Eli's literary prowess by comparing him to F. Scott,

it's fucking Jared's one of the greatest Englishers in the history of English. Agreed. Lot in common with F. Scott. I hear it all the time. Heads and Fiscat. Sure, our buddy. And Prusa lived there.

Nick finds Gatsby dead in the pool. And apparently Fiscat wanted to have Gatsby say more stuff about disillusionment and emptiness motifs, but the author had accidentally killed his own goddamn character before that could happen. But he had a clone guy, so he made a new one, and it's totally see. Sadly no, instead, not at my level. That's true, that's what I'm talking about. So instead we get Nick describing what he assumes were Gatsby's final thoughts and emotions.

Mostly it was a rumble. Gatsby also thought to himself. So it'll be mine. You know what? My life would be a great American novel. And that's the end of the story. So from there, we just do a little wrap-up. We fast-forward two years, and Nick tells us the story of the funeral he held for Gatsby. Pretty much nobody showed up because, you know, Gatsby kind of sucked. And then all that's

left is a sad little segment with Nick musing more thoughts to himself. He decides that it's a story about how cosmopolitan cities are bad and the rural Midwest is good, fucking stupid. So he moves back to Minnesota to be a wholesome Christian the end. That's seriously the end of the book. I think that's the end. That's the end of the book. So before we close it out, I'm curious what everyone thought of the book overall. Maybe, maybe I'm wrong.

What's your score from one to 10 for this book? Oh, I never read it, but lack of knowledge has never been an impediment to an opinion on citation needed. Why would it start now? I'm gonna give it a 7.5. 7.5, okay? All right, look, Keith, I'll give you a catcher in the ride.

That was easy, but Gatsby, no. What is your heart even made of? This is an 8. Seven five. Okay. Look, Heath, I'll give you Kutcher in the right. That was easy. But that's be no. What is your heart even made of? This is an 8.5 solid. Eight five. Five. Okay. Eli, did you love this book? Nine out of 10 boss next is what I would give it. Not quite podcast. There are levels of brilliance, but he gets there. There's a couple, you know, back, back, back, beat backwards towards the arc, but lots of missed pun work. So yeah, lots of missed pun work and the ashes and all that. Yeah. Heath, if you had to summarize what you learned, there's a

poor person who gets revenge, I didn't want to sense what would it be? I don't get books. I'm not a reader. I don't know. I'm sure I'm sure this is a great fucking book, whatever. I just say what you mean. I don't like it. All right. All right. To remove the HEPA filter, pull on the tab to the left. Hey, are you ready for the quiz? Sure. Why the fuck not?

All right, Keith. You obviously had some fun at the Great Gatsby's expense on this episode, but the novel contains some great lessons, which I think we shouldn't overlook. Which of the following is the most important? Hey, monogamy is stupid. Hey. That is correct. We did it everybody.

We found it. We found the great lesson behind the great and slavery. Read the ethical slot. All right, he's clearly a book where they can say what they mean. No metaphor. All right, he clearly the great gets Gatsby is, as you mentioned, a quote, bad book, end quote. So which of these terribly written lines from Gatsby is the worst? Don't do this. Hey, don't do this. So we beat on boats against the current

born back ceaselessly into the past. B, I like large parties. They're so intimate at small parties. There isn't any privacy. Nice. It's yogurt. See, the exhilarating ripple of her voice was a wild tonic in the rain. D, they slipped briskly into an intimacy

from which they never recovered. Did I wonder in which those those awful hideous, disgusting lines of, no, which, a lot of metaphors. You heard it the most. A lot of metaphors there. I didn't even understand a single thing you just said. Thank you. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no I don't have a question here, but I would just like to pause for a second and boo Tom's question if I can so so a

a B Boo see Boo or D Boo Fantastic question the answer is E all of you. Oh, you got it. Congratulations. Well done. All right, he, um, yeah, Luke just dumb. What am I ever gonna need to know any of this crap? You won't. When I'm trying to speak smart people code without being understood by the uncouth masses.

Oh, that's the one I do. B. But this doesn't even work for that. Smart, the actual smart people would be like, Oh, you're doing a high school book. Okay. B. B. But this doesn't even work for that smart the actual smart people be like oh you're doing a high school book Okay, see be going to rub when I tried to I'm not remotely going to impress see okay When I'm doing whatever the fuck job it is that Tom does where I'm sure his literature degree comes in hand When I'm trying to convince myself that F. Scott Fitzgerald would be jealous of my podcast fame Wow, what he would be

D Oh, damn it. That's correct. That's correct If you win this week you win Nice, all right next week. let's get a little note. Okay, well for Tom, Noah, Eli, and Heath. I'm Cecil, thank you for hanging out with us today. We'll be back next week, and by then, Noah, we'll be an expert on something else.

Between now and then, read a book. And if you'd like to help keep this show going, giving a per episode donation to Patreon to Consolest Citation Pot, or you can leave us a five-star review anywhere you can. Like to get in touch with us, check out past episodes, connect with us on social media,

or check the show notes. Check out citationpod.com. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ Bonds and stocks! Stocks and bonds! Like the shell of an oyster old boy! I'm stealing things! Classic Irishman. Bonds.

Clip clop, clip clop, clip clop. Crushed it. Bravo. Well done. One tank. One tank. That's amazing. That's like interpretive dance with your mouth.

Way to go. Absolutely. Bravo. And they'll get someone's gonna get it. I heard. Maybe I'm not leaving. Maybe I heard. We all heard it.

So good. It's important is that you know, that's right. Snubbed for the Oscar this year, Tom. If you don't get it, fucking snubbed. right snubbed for the Oscar this year, Tom, if you don't get it, fucking snubbed.