NORTH AMERICAN LITERATURE 2

MODERNISM: 1912- 1940 “The lost generation” New poets of the 19th Century.
They were thought to believe American culture. They reveled against it and they create
AMERICAN NATIVE LAGUAGE

Before this, poets used to make poems for people from the upper classes, people that
were well taught. This generation however wanted to write poetry for the ordinary
people, for their environment and with preoccupation for their readers. Many didn’t
accept this.

Robert Frost was one of the favorite poets of the time. His poetry was accessible, short
and with an explicit meaning.

The poets lived in cities. New York was the centre of attraction. Modern poets
expanded. New styles and techniques. The most important figure in America was Ezra
Pound: he had the obsession of make it new, make new styles, new technique ….
Forget about tradition. He adopted the language of romance poets, not the American
language. He used free verbs. Fragmentation as form and as a thing, what
characterized life.

Long poems fragmentation and discontinuity; high and low language mix.

They created a world without god and very strong skepticism.

Robert Frost wrote about rural people

W.C.W Poor people in cities

Stevin Philosophical themes in contemporary poetry

ROBERTS FROST (1874-1963?) San Francisco, when he was 10 his father dies and he
moved to New England were he became a farmer and a teacher.

He was independent to the literary movement, absent from the battles of modernism.
Traditional poetry.

He used an ordinary and simple language. Initially, academics didn’t like his poetry
because of its simplicity. It was simple and clear, avoiding traditional poetic language.
Straight, simple, colloquial style. Voice never used before

The fact that he was a farmer was very important, this lead to many typical lonely
farmer poet, that lived in isolation and that did wild things. He gave a new life and new
energy to pastoral poems. Wrote about the individual in nature (Whitman used simple
language = predecessor) Not as optimistic as him, lot of darkness in his poetry.
He had an obsession with disaster, his father dies when he was 10, his first children
died, his son and daughter committed suicide, and he had another daughter who died
during childbirth.

Draught to suicide, he himself contemplated it.

Skeptical : liberal social order believed that the world was ruled by a malicious
god

WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS

1883

He was a family bunker, from a small born in New Jersey. The town next to his, the
name of his first book of poems that made him famous. Described as a revolutionary
poet and that reinvented American poems.

He wrote mostly about industrial areas, and people considered to be unattractive to

poetry, he is famous for his poetry language, a language that is close as possible to
American day to day way of speech. He is famous for his attention to physical, visually
strong.

THE 1920’s
Period characterize by change, transformation, reinvention… These were very
important for American culture.

Scott Fitzgerald called this decade “The Jazz age” jazz music = rebellion /man for
freedom. Jazz music was popular in the north/north-west of the USA, were black
people emigrated to because of the severe racism they suffered in the south.

Fitzgerald “Tale of the Jazz age”. Rebellion against restrictive codes of behavior.
He had not interests in poetics at all, nor in politics or social reform until the 30’s.

It was the greatest, goddess, streak in history Characterized in the parties that
Gatsby gives.

Scott Fitzgerald was an important figure in the 20’s, both as a person and as a writer.
He was very handsome and represented the youth and the energy of the decade
provided a picture of this age.

1920-1930 The literature was characterized by the ex-patriots = Americans that

went abroad Paris was the capital of letters of American Writers.
Hemingway All the scenarios of his novels were outside America.

Live freely

After the World War 1 Europe was destructed, and all the Americans that went
came back and made the country extremely rich

Expatriation was freedom, artistic freedom it was a REBELION against the

puritanism, FREEDOM of religion, of expression, SEXUAL LIBERATION. They considered
the civilization to be oppressed and SEX as a metaphor to any creativity. THE DARK
ECONOMY (ban in drinking, in smoking by the puritans… this dark economy is
represented by Gatsby)

The great depression of the 30’s PROVITION was going to make America
prosperous, economically better NOT DRUNKS. Drinking was important in the
writings of the period =drinking as a reaction to the prohibition.

The great Depression started in 1929 and lasted for a decade.

3 main writers:

- SCOTT FITZGERALS
- ERNEST HEMINGWAY
- FAUKNERT

American women got the right to vote, and with this came the emancipation these
changed the roles of women forever. A new kind of femininity came out THE
FLAPPER, with short hair, didn’t care about their virginity, wore make-up, went on
dates, drank on a daily basis, drove cars… Elga Fitzgerald, was the representative
image of this new kind of style in girls.

CONCERN Hypocrisy characterizes the political leaders they became skeptical

about formulas people accepted, function of writing, words, concepts…

Hemingway, hates abstractions, he likes the precision in the language, the purity of
language aesthetic / ethical dimension.

They are the post-World War 1 generation they are called by Gertrude Stein THE
LOST GENERATION all of them were living in Paris at the time they had a naïve
style of writing. It’s an age with no sense of historical purpose. They also have no
consideration to previous writers.

Most of the novels are about the lost individuals, who lost the sense of community,
the sense that they belonged to a traditional collective life. Life is characterized by
loneliness, disillusion… They go against the convention of the next generation. LOST
found themselves in what seemed to be the end of western civilization, that “the
centre cannot hold” (Yates)

The World War 1 = “THE GREAT WAR” It has destroyed all hopes, the faith, many
people died in the war… The military tactics were old but the technology they used
wasn’t, causing great destruction these writers were shocked by this and lost faith
in everything.

WAR directly responsible of the disbelieve, impotence of the characters.

All of this was very important to the American culture the American young man
came back from the “old world” to the “new one”. Nick caraway (The great Gatsby)
=came back home restless. The soldiers were suffering from PTSD (Post Traumatic),
what at the time was known as “Shell-shock” they were coming back home for
relive but could not stand being home. It’s a constant in the veterans, they go home,
and they miss the battle, they cannot find a community, the community is in the battle
with their comrades “they died for an old bitch” (Ezra Pound) they have fought
in a battle that was not theirs. And they didn’t suffer as much as other communities,
America make fortunes of the war.

IN PARIS THEY COULD LIVE THE BOHEMIAN LIFE

They wasted their bodies in drinks, sex… No Religion, no God… They only could
believe in something like art, and they tried to make it into a religion, beautiful and
protected from the mess of the world Joyce, the supreme God for Fitzgerald, of
high art, jump of a window for Joyce (literally, while he was drunk). They pay attention
to details, make it new, back away from traditional forms, structures… Find in art a
way of saying no to a world that has become a “diminished thing”.

SCOTT FITZGERALD, 1886-1940 legend now and then. He was the

embodiment of his generation. He came from St.Paul, mid-west (Minnesota), small
town, Ambiguity about family.

Both the father’s and Mother’s family were prominent. However, the father’s family
went bankrupt, but they still had the mother’s money. Happened to many writers of
the time their families were rich and prominent and became poor. This made them
nostalgic of the last prestige of the family. They were nostalgic to recuperate the
glory of the family.

Divided heritage Ambivalence and money, social status… Intense aspiration of high
social position he knew he would never have.

Failure important, as an experience, crucial in his works… beautiful, moving failures.

EXTREME, EXTRAVAGANCE, INTENSE FAILURE what makes him famous in
American culture.

The perfect representative of the period, but an intense critique of it at the same time.
Idealization of money, romantization of sexual love…

He went to Preston failure social and intellectually. His first novel was written in
Preston “The side of Paradise”, autobiographic. He wrote it while being in the army (in
the south of the state) where he met His future wife: ELGA FITZGERALD. She was a
very interesting figure, beautiful, from a very rich family, very responsive of the
ambition of Fitzgerald. They got married, but she told him only after he became rich
and famous.

They both expended the money faster than he was earning it.

In Europe Fitzgerald met, Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein…

It was in France that he wrote the great Gatsby, in the French riviera. His intention was to
write a novel better than any novel written in America.

About ideals, the useless of ideals in the modern age: I want to write something new,
different, beautiful, simple but intricate at the same time. Not commercially successful. The
second printing was a failure whereas the first one went really well. After this it became
forgotten and became very famous during ww2 one of the novels that was given to
American soldiers to read during their free time, a mass audience.

After this the Fitzgerald’s came back to America. He spends some periods in Hollywood writing
for the movies, made to the credits in just one: “The Three Comrades”

After 1930, Zelda Fitzgerald went into a serious mental breakdown, and depression, 13 last
years of her life in hospitals.

His 4th novel, “Tender is the night” Alcoholic America psychologist and his romance with
one of his patients.

Financial status became worse, went to Hollywood died in Hollywood in 1944 of a heart-
attack.

Live fast die young

Zelda Fitzgerald continue to fight he depression during 8 years, and died in a hospital fire, to
years before that she published “Save me the Waltz“.

- This novel: critical books, essays, musical, four movies…

- Immense popularity
- themes= love and money. Is there room for romance in capitalistic America, is room
for romanticism.
 - Critical success of the novel, popular with the readers and university students. The
ability to speak both to the popular and the scholars.
- American dream, success and dream.
- His protagonist into the representative of American mythology, history.
- It’s a kind of history of America and the contradictions in America.

Jazz age: individual pleasure.

- Beauty and simplicity, very intricate structure.
- The language is easy to read, but concentrate and dense ant the same time, with a lot
of meaning.
- The consequences of the obsession and desire for Daisy.

Innocent, isolated by his obsession seeing everything through his obsession: refusal to
change, to explore different paths, avenues in life different from 8 years ago when he met
Daisy.

Romance but also a social satire.

- Critique of the shallowness of this rich people like Daisy and her husband to.
- Clash of people.
- One of the titles he contemplates “among ash-heaps and the millionaires”. He also
contemplates “Trimalchio” = character in a roman novel in satirical, lots of money… He
resembles trimalchio.
- The comparison of the east and the west.

The title,” The great Gatsby”: something like a show, like a magician, like The Great
Houdini he thinks he can achieve anything with a snap of his fingers. Houdini can
transform reality. He can make things happen because he is powerful.

Title is ironic, is it possible to become a great famous person? Is that possible in the
1920’s? The age of the lost generation the age of the antiheroes?... “Ours was a generation
grown up to find all gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man …” All the writers have
been influenced by naturalism. They don’t believe in the autonomy of the individual.

The way the novel is wrote. Why should Nick Carraway make so much effort to make
Gatsby great? What does the attraction reveal? Is nick as bad and corrupt as Gatsby? Nick
describes himself with the traditional values of the Midwest. Gatsby has been described to
represent the American dream, a study of America, of the myth of America. A famous critic
that Gatsby stands for America itself, for America and its contradictions: this split, division,
contradiction between power and the dream, materialism.

Aims. to analyze the condition of America in the first quarter of the 20 th C. He Wanted
to write about the ideals of the American nation. Most of those ideals were dying or already
death, because modern America had destroyed them. And the novel shows this situation.
 The number concludes with this brilliant passage of the capacity of the American individual to
reach the dream. The dreams of the first settlers of America, in the eastern shore of New York.
The novel shows that those original dreams had been sacrificed to the materialistic values.
What is it that makes a nation/individual great or successful? The
wealth of some people becomes the disadvantage of many other.

Nick sees the corruption in Gatsby, but he has ambivalence feeling for Gatsby loves him
and despise him at the same time.
The ideal version of the American dream, the image of the fresh green grass of the new
world, what the Dutch settlers saw, represented in Gatsby. This sense of wander, unlimited
possibilities…

Freeing yourself from the past. Gatsby reinvents himself (Chapter 6). He is
James Gatz until some day he is Jay Gatsby. This is an aspect of Gatsby that fascinates Nick.
The materialistic version of getting rich. Denies the conception that you can achieve
greatness by being good. Acquire by corruptions, not y hard works.

Nick is disgusted by the corruption of what Gatsby makes with his money. Gatsby has
reinvented himself. He forgets about his parents, and represent the American dream of self-
making, the ideas that you can scape your family background and what determents your life,
like the social class, just by inventing a new identity.

Both Glamorous and corrupt. The fact that he leaves everything behind. The
burden of European history, the values… New self-contaminated by crime.

Material success you sell up your ideals.

The great Gatsby shows that in 20thC American Romanticism cannot be separated from
materialism and capitalism.

Passage in the novel, Gatsby of Daysi, “her voice is full of money”, he cannot hear the
actual Daisy but the Daisy from the past. Ideal girl, born in a very rich family.

FTIZGERALD was into the beauty of failure Nick “Transitory enchanted moon”.

The thing with the American dream, the American dream did not exist when the novel was
published and came to live during the depression in the 1930’s by a historian who wanted to
name his book “The American dream”, they did not allowed him but the terms was used
numerous times in the book.

CHAPTER 6
HE doesn’t care about the legality; he doesn’t care about the reality.

He invented himself.
 The Great Gatsby TEXT 2:
Essence of Gatsby, his contradictions

Daisy has gone to his party, went into his room. Gatsby then show her his amazing shirts. She
starts to cry when she sees then. The party ends in failure-

Why does she cry? Because her perception is not limited? Because she is unable to respond to
the vitality that Gatsby is trying to express? What is the essence of the passage?

With Daisy you can’t repeat the past, the past that happened 5 years ago. To live in the
present, looking for the future.

Pure Romanticism Wants to recreate what happened 5 years ago, their first kiss

Gatsby wants Daisy to tell her husband she doesn’t love him he wants her to go back to
past and repeat it. “She used to be able to understand” = BEAUTY, expressiveness of a
party that was a failure.

Fitzgerald likes to write about the magnificent failures.

Gatsby insists on asking Daisy the impossible. He is obsessed with repeating the past that it’s
already done makes him unable to live in the present.

Critics Gatsby image, mythology, form of America, starting new from scratch…
Forget about the passage of time….

It’s all about himself, of recreating himself through Daisy. Daisy is made into an object rather
than a subject. Object of a romantic contraption. An Object to make himself recover, to make
him complete, whole…

This the night when the autumn begins is one of the changes of the year. Gatsby denies
seeing these changes.

The ladder romantic aspirations, to get the romantic dream. Some readers see it as a
fairytale. Like a fairy of Peter Pan. Daisy Fay. Fay fairy in the Anglo-Saxon ascendancy

The Pup what babies eat. A way of saying Gatsby is terrible immature in his perceptions,
in his aspirations. Are his dreams childish? Is not just about the food. Also the female Breasts,
the nipples… “Incompressive milk of wander” Is the images that defines Gatsby, that
anticipates the famous image of Myrtle at the end of the book.

Possession if the love object the ends, if you make the dream real, the dream vanished.
To posses the object of desire, he must start a relationship with Daisy, stop listening to the
tuning…
Then the inevitable happens, he kisses her, blossom her like a flower she is named after a
flower. She is perishable, she is a perishable flower… “Blossoming for him” the same with
all the men, take all they want from her. They are like bees with honey, they take what they
need and the they disappear… This is the moment that traps Gatsby (kiss) and he remains
obsess with reliving the moment.

Gatsby is a baby, is like a baby and at the same time, in the book he is the representation
of America creating gold, of the American Believes…

THE CARS idea of the perfect car and the perfect girl
1920’s was a very characteristic image of the American life wealth, the cars give
new freedom to the life of the individual. The Cars as powerful dreadful element of
distraction. As a reality and as a symbol.

Description of Gatsby’s car in Chapter 4… When Nick and Gatsby are coming from
Manhattan through the bridge.

The Cars related to power, to death… The car I materialistic society your
state in society, economic, how far you are in the road to success.

Jordan Baker: She is a modern girl but at the same time she retains all the privileges of
the traditional lady… Chapter 3 Nick and Jordan together in the car

- Baker: conservative, electric car

- Jordan: sports car…

In the last chapter, a CAR KILLS A PERSON.

Cars and bad driver irresponsible people Daisy runs over Myrtle while driving
Gatsby’s car, while Gatsby is in the passenger seat She does not accept the
consequences and they lie and tell Gatsby was the one driving. The car here is like
a death machine, it is described as the death car

The Image of the breast hanging loose from the body like a flan.

Myrtle Wilson and John Wilson are in the novel to make a difference with more rich people
like Gatsby. His business is wreck cars, their live is repeatedly connected to the wasteland
where this car wreck is located.

Doesn’t seem to have much ambition opposite to Gatsby really, nothing of his ideas are
in George. The novel show that people like Tom and Gatsby are responsible of the poverty of
people like the Wilsons. The Wilsons are literally destroyed by the irresponsibility of these rich
people.

The novel associate’s cars to the wasteland, they kill not only the people but the land itself.
That’s why Wilson’s garage is in the valley of ashes.
In a novel like the Great Gatsby where gender roles are so important, the car is related to
women. The car logically is these women freedom to move around, and the death of the
tem like myrtle Wilson, who is punished for trying to break her social class. This is a novel
where Jordan Baker has a car and Daisy is driving a car whose irresponsibility leads to
death, “I was the one driving the car”.

Deeply related to the Wilsons is the valley of Ashes. The Great Gatsby is a fictional version
of T.S.Elliot, the wasteland. Fitzgerald new the work by heart and he even sent Elliot a copy of
the great Gatsby “The first advance in American fiction since henry James”.

Why does it take place in 1922: the really important year of modernism This year in
the publication of Joseph’s Ulises and Elliot’s The Wasteland? Describes at the opening of
Chapter 2: describes as a big place where to pile garbage.

This is the thing the Great Gatsby is about the American Dream but in Chapter 2 we see
the Valley of Ashes in which the dream has turned. That is something of which Gatsby’s
represent. It has been made into a Wasteland.

“Among ash cubes and millionaires” (?)

Gatsby represent some alternative hope, some possibility of redemption, of liberation of the
wasteland, of the Ash. Fitzgerald was attracted to the bright lights in the big city near the
Wasteland, where all the Garbage of New York goes.

This is where the Wilsons live on the edge of this dumping ground. Where near the end,
Myrtle is Killed? All these references to Ash and Dust are connected to the modern industrial
society. The idea to defect the death of all these dreams.

George Wilson is a failure, looks more like a ghost than to a human being, one of the
walking deaths in The Wasteland.

We find the eyes of the Doctor of PJ, that are looking down into this Ash. Symbolic description
The eyes as a symbol for the eyes of god, a god that went blind. This oculist has
disappeared. Many see here a god who has hidden himself, who has died, that never looked
again to the human being living in this wasteland. After Myrtle dies, George loses the control
completely, he looks at the eyes, and starts to talk to god “God sees everything”. The other
guy” Stop talking to God, it is not god it is an advertisement”. A land dominated by these
commercials.

Gatsby is like and advertisement, fancy house, fancy car, fancy shirts… The eyes
th
connects the commercialize world of the 20 century with the world of traditional faith,
believe, where they had faith in God.

God has disappeared, this is the time of lost, loss of faith, the lost generation, disillusion…
God is death, God is no more that and abandon advertisement. When George Wilson
sees it the eyes god makes the reader wonder if there is indeed a God that doesn’t care but
that it is looking down on us.
Daisy Fay- became Daisy Buchanan: fay= fairy, what she is in Gatsby’s point of view,

World of mass production, mass consumption, she is totally removed from the natural
world. The main thing with her she is this idealizes woman that becomes the object of a
romantic obsession to take her into his life again, and what keeps him alive. He is hoping
to retain his self-old sense.

Fitzgerald had a lot of personal experiences about social inadequacy, what brought Daisy
and Gatsby apart. He understands what moves Gatsby’s. To what girls aspire and he is not able
to do this because the lack of money. The relationship ended because Fitzgerald came
from a lower side of society. The social and the money.

Preoccupation that Gatsby has too. Fitzgerald about Gatsby unfairness of a poor young
man not getting the girls because of not having money.

Daisy is presented as a character through the eyes of other characters. Described through
Nick. He pays attention to her voice,

The description emphasizes her romantic attractiveness. Doesn’t matter what she says but
the musicality of her voice.

This initial description of daisy acknowledging her voice her position in Gatsby’s dreams
makes her a prisoner, the object of male desire. Different from Gatsby admires Gatsby’s
romanticism. There are some things about Gatsby that he detests, but after says it’s not him
whom he hates, but the people around him.

Daisy as a woman who doesn’t have power in this society, only with the powers of her
husband. Bus she is aware of the role of charm, of a charming seductive woman
Conversation with nick when she knew she was having a girl. “I hope she is a girl, so she
can be stupid and pretty”

According to Fitzgerald are the same words her wife said when their daughter Scottie was
born. They (women) must be delicate, like flowers that blossom.

That’s the way she is presented she only exists in the images the men have of her. She is
not happy in the traditional roles of wife and mother but she has no alternative to this world.

There are more passages of Daisy’s voice.

The Daisy that Gatsby loves it is not the reality creation of his imagination. Not a real
entity. By concentrating in her voice he can ignore the real Daisy. dream figure who
remains perfect all the time.

Frivolity and shallowness of these people cry because of how beautiful some shirts are.

Gatsby tells Nick his intentions make everything the way it was before.
It is Gatsby that creates Daisy, construct the Daisy of his dreams. She is in the middle of the
dream and ambition of Gatsby’s perception of her husband What he wants of her is
symbolize by the wedding present he gives her, a stream of pearls 300.000 dollars.

Daisy could not wait for Gatsby’s romanticism. Gatsby could not wait for him to become
rich and successful. So, she married Tom with his power, and male sexuality, the patriarchy…

Tom is not a very happy man; his dream was to become a football player at university, and he
is now very disenchanted. He is afraid of social change, he is a nowadays what we call a white
supremacists, racist.

We have Daisy materialistic vision of tom and the Romantic Vision of Daisy of Gatsby. She
is always made into a blank page that the men cover. When Gatsby forces a ----- in front
of Tom. He wants her to deny in front of Tom. She realizes that in those years she could have
had a sentimental life of her own, Gatsby is so focus in his dreams that doesn’t pays
attention to what Daisy wants.

This failure makes him unable to accept change in Daisy and in people in general. The Daisy of
the present is not the same person of five years ago when daisy was young. He is unable
to hear her adult voice.

Chapter 7. She never loved Tom, just his power, money, social status. Is in this
chapter where Tom shows where Gatsby’s money is coming from (illegal) after this he allows
Daisy to go back in the car with Gatsby

Is this the death of Gatsby the result of this conspiracy?

At the end Daisy goes back to Toms materialism instead of Gatsby romanticism.

Daisy is a charming woman from the upper class. And the society has no other role to women.

About her voice Gatsby “Her voice is full of money jajaja”. He is not aware of what
he is actually saying; at least not totally, her lover for her is inseparable of her money. She
is charming, attractive, but her charm and her beauty are inseparable of the fact that she was
brought up in this environment of great wealth.

Daisy is proud about the hot struggles of the poor.

This is the novel where the romantic is inseparable of the money. This suggests that maybe
what happens is that money is what dreams are made of.
 F. Scott Fitzgerald

Babylon Revisited
Is this a story with a strong moral content?

The story was written in 1931 when the action also takes place

Early 30’s during the depression

Story protagonist is paying the deeds of his pass actions, in the 1920’s, before the
market crashed that year….

Babylon New Testament connected to moral degeneration of the men

kind, before time of Abraham. Not only moral degeneration but of exile The
Hebrews were exiled in Babylon Someone wondering in search of
permanent/real home.

He is from America but lives in Prague.

THE STORY IN GENERAL AND THE WAY IT WAS CONSTRUCTED/STRUCTURED?

CHARLIE VS CHARLES?

There are two stages in the life of this man, told in the 3rd person, limited, restricted,
the narrator it’s not OMNIPOTENT.

Conflict in the present day of the protagonist living in Prague Charles in

contrast with the Charlie of the past

They are trying to make him (Charles) go back to the past (Charlie)

The story says too much in just a few pages

IS THE PAST CRUCIALLY CENTRAL IN THE STORY? IS IST ABOUT THE PAST OR ABOUT
THE PRESENT? It’s about how the past conditions the present Story about
the tragic consequences of the roaring 20’s

Physical and moral dissipation.

When Lincoln marries “The big party is over now” in Gatsby “The party is Over” by
Nick.

Page 452 in the past It was not real but now realise that is through (1929)
and now has lost his live, his money, his life…

These present of the issue of the past the most powerful force, about the
inescapable, of scaping the past…
We are conditioned by the past, there is not way to avoid, to cape the consequences
from the past fatalistic conception of the human being. There are a lot of
monetary references that are also view as an analogy for moral issues. DEEDS
moral deeds he has to pay for the sins of the past.

Representative of the past Lorraine

The death conditions the present condition of Charles, his daughter and his sister
in law (the jealously she feels of Charles)

The Issue The importance of home, money… He has no real family life

WHAT ABOUT THE IN-LAWS? Do they have a home? What type? Is it Ideal?
There are several references to their home warm and comfortable American “It
was warm in there, it was a home, people together by the fire…” The chimney felt
important.

Moving sin 442 at the end of chapter 2 very revealing about Charles
situation. His daughter is inside, all warm and he is in the dark, outside, waiting, in
the cold… The story is significally located during autumn The winter is coming and
he has to wait at least another 6 months to stablish a home with her. His daughter is 9
and he is 35.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE RIZT BAR crucially important, he is such a fool

he is going to the Ritz to ask about former acquaintances = raise problem.

Is there a hidden part in the present Charles that miss the past? Is he not totally
recovered or over the past? Someone who is trying to stop drinking visits a bar.

RITZ most representative place of the recent past and the present
represents the 20s and the devastation in the depression of the 30’s, not American to
spend dollars, empty

The story stars and ends in a bar Circular structure = he has not achieved his
purpose; he has not recovered his daughter.

Are we entitled to suppose that he keeps coming to the bar because there is an
insincerity in him? Does he miss that past? Does he want to return to that past? Is it
the past a pass home he is trying to recover?

Is the money important in the novel? There are allusions to money, physical, real
money, to financial transactions Analogy for moral issues moral collapse of
Charlie in the recent past the collapse of Wall Street. Economic bankrupt = moral
bankrupt, it’s both realistic and symbolic.

Confessions between Charles and the bartender

the issue of money related the issue of home

the story doesn't prove this but raised the question is a real home is impossible with
money.

People with home like the Peters are not rich they are poor in comparison with
Charles, they are warm, and they have children, Charles doesn’t see it that way. We
see him trying to buy expensive things for his daughter and his in love.

452 It is not important much money that is incompatible with having a home will
not help him recover.

in the 1920s during the boom Charlie had money home he was not conscious of the
value of their home. he games conscious after him stay home because of his
irresponsibility’s. his wife gets sick and dies consequently.

Raise a question about the protagonist who is he? he's the respectable Charles, honest
businessman that aspire to have a home or is he the old Charlie? is he the reform
Charles Wales of Prague.

if its domestic situation of Lincoln and Marion ideal or boring? is it excessively

conservative with no real enjoyment?

the bus was full of more reception time of wonder activity and transformation there
were distracted but also positive things.

Dissipation, the 1920’s were the year of the boom, of the infantilised Charlie.