Something I haven’t thought of till today because I took a day trip to a state park and was thinking about how The Great Gatsby has little to no parts of the book with anything natural. The book takes place in East/West egg, New York, the valley of ashes. All of these places are in some way shape or form unnatural, especially the valley of ashes which has no life other than people. Coming to this conclusion I wonder if Fitzgerald did this consciously or unconsciously. The only part of the story with any green plants in it is Nick’s small groundskeeper house. I wonder if this is another way that Fitzgerald used to play into the fact that Nick is the most respectable character. The fact that green is such an important part of the story yet the oldest metaphor for life being green plants is almost never in the story. I wonder if this subversion of this common metaphor I think works for this story as nobody in this story has a life.
