The chapter provides backstory on Gatsby's origins. He was born as James Gatz and came from a poor family. Through sheer determination, he worked hard physically and reinvented himself as the wealthy Jay Gatsby. The party at Gatsby's mansion is livelier than before, though Tom attends with Daisy this time. Gatsby's idealism and love for Daisy are revealed as he remains convinced that he can recapture the past with her.

1. The Great Gatsby Chapter 6

2. Who is Dan Cody? A newspaper reporter Gatsby’s assistant A wealthy copper mogul Gatsby’s father

3. How does Gatsby reveal his lack of social graces to Tom? He accepts an insincere dinner invitation He gets drunk He yells at a crippled old man He mixes soda in his champagne

4. According to Nick, how did Gatsby make his money? He inherited it from his late employer He was a bootlegger He owns a chain of drug stores Nick is not certain

5. Why is Gatsby upset after the party? Someone spilled wine on his tux He learns that he has lost money in the stock market Daisy does not have a good time Tom confronts him about Daisy

6. Where was Gatsby born? San Francisco A farm in North Dakota Eltham His birthplace is never revealed

7. Characterisation Look again at pages 94-96: “James Gatz...” up to “...the shallows alongshore”.

8. Characterisation “ For over a year he had been beating his way along the south shore of Lake Superior as a clam-digger or a salmon fisher or in any other capacity that brought him food and bed. His brown, hardening body lived naturally through the half-fierce, half-lazy work of the bracing days.” James Gatz – a ‘noble savage’? How does the physical health of the young James Gatz contrast the moral corruption of the East?

9. Characterisation “ The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself” According to Plato, true reality lies in an ideal realm, beyond the material world that we encounter through our senses. For Plato, the ‘real’, everyday world, is merely the shadows on the inside wall of a cave, cast by the ideal forms outside the ‘cave’. Gatz, on the other hand, believes that he can transcend the limitations of his material circumstances, and create himself anew.

10. Characterisation “ He was a son of God – a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that – and he must be about His Father’s business, the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty.” In Chapter 6, when Nick finally describes Gatsby’s early history, he uses this striking comparison between Gatsby and Jesus Christ to illuminate Gatsby’s creation of his own identity. Fitzgerald was probably influenced in drawing this parallel by a nineteenth-century book by Ernest Renan entitled The Life of Jesus. This book presents Jesus as a figure who essentially decided to make himself the son of God, then brought himself to ruin by refusing to recognize the reality that denied his self-conception. Renan describes a Jesus who is “faithful to his self-created dream but scornful of the factual truth that finally crushes him and his dream”—a very appropriate description of Gatsby. Fitzgerald is known to have admired Renan’s work and seems to have drawn upon it in devising this metaphor. Though the parallel between Gatsby and Jesus is not an important motif in The Great Gatsby, it is nonetheless a suggestive comparison, as Gatsby transforms himself into the ideal that he envisioned for himself (a “Platonic conception of himself”) as a youngster and remains committed to that ideal, despite the obstacles that society presents to the fulfillment of his dream. “ the rock of the world was founded securely on a fairy’s wing.” – Daisy?

11. Scenes and places pp.98-100 – East Egg versus West Egg. Fitzgerald continues to explore the theme of social class by illustrating the contempt with which the aristocratic East Eggers, Tom and the Sloanes, regard Gatsby. Even though Gatsby seems to have as much money as they do, he lacks their sense of social nuance and easy, aristocratic grace. As a result, they mock and despise him for being “new money.” As the division between East Egg and West Egg shows, even among the very rich there are class distinctions.

12. Scenes and places - the party pp.100-105 “Tom was evidently perturbed at Daisy’s running around alone, for on the following Saturday night he came with her to Gatsby’s party.” How does Nick’s description of this particular party contrast with the previous party scenes? What has changed?

13. Gatsby’s idealism Read from p.105 – “I stayed late that night.” – to the end of the chapter.

14. It is easy to see how a man who has gone to such great lengths to achieve wealth and luxury would find Daisy so alluring: for her, the aura of wealth and luxury comes effortlessly. She is able to take her position for granted, and she becomes, for Gatsby, the epitome of everything that he invented “Jay Gatsby” to achieve. As is true throughout the book, Gatsby’s power to make his dreams real is what makes him “great.” In this chapter, it becomes clear that his most powerfully realized dream is his own identity, his sense of self. It is important to realize, in addition, that Gatsby’s conception of Daisy is itself a dream. He thinks of her as the sweet girl who loved him in Louisville, blinding himself to the reality that she would never desert her own class and background to be with him.

15. “‘ Can’t repeat the past?’” he cried incredulously. ‘Why of course you can!’” He looked around him wildly, as if the past were lurking here in th shadow of his house, just out of reach of his hand. ‘ I’m going to fix everything just the way it was before,’ he said, nodding determinedly. ‘She’ll see.’”

16. “ ...One autumn night, five years before...” “ At his lips’ touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.” What is the importance of this final section of the chapter?