My Favorite Criticism

After finally reading up on all of the criticisms of Gatsby I feel the one that resides in me and my own writing style the most is reader response. I love how Tyson went through each character in the novel and explained how they project themselves onto Gatsby. Whether it be the party guests who simply love to gossip, all the way to Nick who looks up to Gatsby as a hope that the American Dream still does exist, Tyson was able to accurately back up her criticism. I also loved how she went through and picked out certain scenes from the novel which negatively and positively affected Nick's view of Gatsby. The Great Gatsby is a novel, that without the reader bringing fourth some of their own opinions and understandings of how the world works, could leave the reader confused because of all the ambiguous imagery and unanswered questions. I am a firm believer that an author simply starts a book, but it is the reader who finishes it. Everyone has their own beliefs about what a novel can produce and as an aspiring writer/critic I want to be able to talk about not only what is in the text but how it effected me as a reader. This writing The Great Gatsby has helped me narrow down my subject for the final paper which I am happily writing as a reader-response critic! -Kayleigh