Hello and welcome to "Read it and (Don't) Weep," the podcast that will help you breeze through your high school literature classes. Are you tired of struggling to understand the themes and characters in classic works of literature? Do you wish you could just read the condensed version and be done with it? Well, I’ve got you covered! I am your host, Jackey Taggart, and I taught high school English for almost 20 years. 

Join me each episode as I dive into the world of high school literature and break down the essential elements of each work. From Shakespeare to Steinbeck, I'll cover it all. My goal is to give you valuable insights and analysis on some of the most popular high school literary texts, as well as tips and tricks for acing your tests and essays.  Let’s start reading!

Hello, and welcome to this episode of Read It and (Don’t) Weep.  In this episode I will be discussing Chapter 2 of The Great Gatsby.  Hopefully you have already read and listened to the episode on Chapter 1, so let’s continue reading!

In Chapter 1, we read about the Fabulous Eggs – West Egg and East Egg, the land of wealth and prosperity.  But you can’t have wealth without poverty, so in Chapter 2, we are introduced to the valley of ashes, which is located about halfway between West Egg and New York City. Fitzgerald uses imagery to describe the valley of ashes – “a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens, where ashes take the form of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.”  Wow, sounds like a great place for a summer house, doesn’t it? Of course, I am kidding, but the details here are key to the themes in the novel.  “Fantastic farm” refers to an agrarian, or agricultural society, but these farms have grown into “grotesque gardens” with houses and chimneys as opposed to farmland. This is a reference to the Second Industrial Revolution and the negative impact of rapid industrialization during the post World War I era. These images also symbolize the decay and moral corruption that lies just beneath the surface of the wealthy characters' lives. Think about what we read about Tom and Daisy in chapter 1 regarding their wealth, and their lifestyle, as you read about George and Myrtle Wilson in chapter 2. 

And hanging over this valley of ashes is this giant, half completed billboard advertisement, like we might see today on a highway, of two large eyes behind a pair of glasses, the eyes of Dr. T. J. Eckleburg. No face, just eyes and glasses staring out, watching your every move! Make a note of this as this will be an important symbol later in the novel. 

So, as I mentioned a moment ago, in this chapter we meet two new characters, George and Myrtle Wilson.  George owns a garage in the valley of ashes, and his wife, Myrtle, is also Tom Buchannan’s mistress.  While it is never stated, readers are led to believe that Myrtle was one calling Tom during dinner in chapter 1. George is described as “blond, spiritless man” relatively handsome, but he has been beat down by life.    He is tired from years of hard work and financial insecurity while trying to support his wife.  Myrtle is described as in her mid-thirties and she “carries her surplus flesh sensuously”.   This is a nice way to say she is plus sized, as opposed to the fair and petite Daisy Buchanan.  I also find it interesting that she is the only character whose age is mentioned.  Myrtle is naive about the world but wants to be treated like she is of a higher social status. She is infatuated with Tom because of his wealth and status and thinks he will leave his wife and marry her so she can live a life of wealth and luxury.  George is blind to the affair and is therefore viewed as a fool for not seeing what is happening right under his nose. 

Nick and Tom are heading to New York for the day, and Tom encourages Myrtle to join them while George is off grabbing chairs for the guests.  Quick time reference, it is “a few days before the Fourth of July,’ so it has been almost a month since the dinner party at Tom and Daisy’s house in East Egg.  As they travel by train to New York, Tom doesn’t even sit near Myrtle, adding to her excitement about the affair.  

Quick side note, do you see anything wrong with this situation? Besides the affair?  Tom doesn’t want to be seen in public with Myrtle, so what is the likelihood that he has true feelings for her?

Once they arrive in New York, the anonymity of the big, crowded city, where no one will recognize them together, they head to the apartment Tom has rented.  She gets her gossip magazines and tells Tom she wants a dog.  Seriously, a dog!  What are they going to do with a dog?  Neither can take it home.  Who is going to feed it, take care of it, take it outside for a walk?  Neither consider this.  The dog is just another “possession” that Tom can acquire because of his wealth.  In the end, the elevator boy at the apartment is the one to find bedding and food for the poor animal. 

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Let’s focus on the apartment for just a moment.  It is small and filled with furniture that does not fit the size of the room. It is all too big relating again to Tom’s wealth and Myrtle’s desire for nice things.  It is their escape from the outside world, and like West and East Egg, is a direct contrast to the valley of ashes.  It symbolizes Myrtle’s desire to be a part of the upper class. In the apartment, she can pretend she is rich, that Tom is her husband, and they throw fabulous parties.  

Myrtle invites her sister, Catherine, and some friends, Mr. & Mrs. McKee, over for a party at the apartment.  This is another direct contrast to the dinner party at Tom and Daisy’s house in chapter 1.  They all get drunk, and Tom and Myrtle disappear to the bedroom for a while leaving Nick to awkwardly make small talk with the other guests.  Myrtle changes into a ‘cream colored dress” which can be compared to Daisy’s white dress. This is symbolic because Myrtle can pretend to be Daisy all she wants, but she will never match Daisy’s social status; she will always be less than. 

As the party continues, Nick hears his first rumor about Gatsby – that he is a nephew or cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm, the former emperor of Germany who abdicated at the end of World War I marking the end of the German Empire. Sounds like a tall tale to me, but feel free to believe anything you want about Gatsby at this point because we haven’t even met him yet. But the conversation moves quickly away from Gatsby and back to Myrle and Tom.  Nick is surprised to hear that his cousin, Daisy, is Catholic and that is why Tom can’t get a divorce.  Spoiler alert – Daisy is not Catholic.  Just another lie Tom tells Myrtle to string her along in their fantasy world. Fitzgerald characterizes Tom in a way to show readers that he is not interested in a real relationship with Myrtle. He is just in this relationship until he gets bored and moves on to someone else, like he has done multiple times in the past. 

The party get wilder as they all continue to get drunk, and Myrtle continues to belittle her husband saying things like, “I thought he was a gentleman,” “he wasn’t fit to lick my shoes,” “I knew right away it was a mistake to marry him,” and so on.  So, what does this say about Myrtle’s character? Well, readers should see that she is arrogant and self-centered, she feels intellectually superior to her husband, and she is not as sophisticated as she would like to appear to her friends and Nick. 

Nick’s focus seems to drift as he continues to get drunk as he can’t seem to keep track of the time, so here we can question his reliability as an unbiased narrator as his judgment is clearly impaired.  However, he does remember the altercation that occurs between Myrtle and Tom when Myrtle refuses to stop staying Daisy’s name, so Tom slaps her so hard he breaks her nose.  This mirrors Daisy’s comments in chapter 1 where she calls Tom “hulking.” This draws the reader’s attention back to Fitzgerald’s description of Tom having a “cruel body.” Tom would never physically harm Daisy (except maybe that little bruise on her finger), but he has no issue physically abusing Myrtle and breaking her nose when she does not do as Tom demands. 

Nick escapes the situation by continuing to drink until he blacks out and cannot remember how he got into Mr. McKee’s apartment or back to the train station to head back to West Egg. 

So, what is the purpose of this chapter? Readers should compare the two parties – the elegant dinner party at the Buchannan’s home and the drunken brawl at the apartment in the city.  One displays sophistication, evoking feelings of an upper class, high society event, while the other merely mimics elegance, a cheap imitation attempted by the working-class. However, both share a common desire to momentarily escape from a bleak reality.

What are your thoughts on Tom and Myrtle’s affair or the drunken brawl that occurs in the apartment?  Take some time to jot down a few ideas in your reading journal before continuing to the next chapter. 

Thanks for listening to this episode of Read it and (Don’t) Weep. Be sure to subscribe to the show so you will be notified when new episodes are released. If you liked today’s show, please leave a review so others can discover my show.  If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for future episodes, drop me an email at readitanddontweep@gmail.com, or reach out to me on social media. I would love to hear from you. The links are in the show notes.  

Thank you for listening.  I am Jackey Taggart and remember to read it and don’t weep. 

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