Characters:
- Jay Gatsby
- Tom Buchanan
- Daisy Buchanan
- Nick Carraway
- Myrtle Wilson
- George Wilson
Summary:
- Narrator is Nick Carraway, who is also Daisy's cousin. He moves into the small bungalow next to a mansion owned by Gatsby.
- Daisy is married to Tom Buchanan, who has a mistress, Myrtle, who is the wife of a gas station owner.
- Nick becomes friends with Gatsby who is in love with Daisy.
- Daisy accidentally runs over Myrtle while driving back from the city. Tom unintentionally misleads the heartbroken husband George into believing that the accident was Gatsby's fault, and Gatsby is consequently shot by George, who commits suicide afterward.
- Only Nick attends Gatsby's funeral, where he meets Gatsby's father, a poor farmer.
Famous closing lines:
"He believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter - tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms further...And one fine morning - So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."
This Side of Paradise
Characters:
- Amory Blaine
Summary:
- wealthy and attractive Princeton student who dabbles in literature and has a series of romances
"Amory Blaine inherited from his mother every trait, except the stray inexpressible few, that made him worth while. His father, an ineffectual, inarticulate man with a taste for Byron and a habit of drowsing over the Encyclopedia Britannica, grew wealthy at thirty through the death of two elder brothers, successful Chicago brokers, and in the first flush of feeling that the world was his, went to Bar Harbor and met Beatrice O'Hara. In consequence, Stephen Blaine handed down to posterity his height of just under six feet and his tendency to waver at crucial moments, these two abstractions appearing in his son Amory. For many years he hovered in the background of his family's life, an unassertive figure with a face half-obliterated by lifeless, silky hair, continually occupied in "taking care" of his wife, continually harassed by the idea that he didn't and couldn't understand her."
Tender is the Night
Characters:
- Dick Driver
- Nicole Driver
- Rosemary Hoyt
- Abe North
- Jules Peterson
- Tommy Barban
Summary:
- Dick and Nicole Diver are a glamorous couple who take a villa in the South of France.
- Also staying at the resort is Rosemary Hoyt, a young actress who falls in love with Dick.
- However, Rosemary senses something is wrong with the couple.
- Jules Peterson, a black man, is murdered and ends up in Rosemary's bed. Dick moves the blood soaked body to cover up any implied relationship between Rosemary and Peterson as this could potentially ruin her career.
- The history of the Divers emerge. Dick Diver was a doctor and psychoanalyst whose patient was Nicole. Nicole had a complicated, incestuous relationship with her father. Dick is almost driven to marry Nicole as part of her cure, but strong objects are raised as Nicole is an heiress and her sister thinks Dick is marrying her for her money.
- Nicole and Dick eventually do marry and Nicole's money pays for Dick's partnership in a Swiss clinic and their extravagant lifestyle.
- However, Dick gradually develops a drinking problem and gets into trouble with the police various times.
- Eventually Nicole has an affair with Tommy Barban and divorces Dick to marry him.
"Babylon Revisited"
Characters:
- Charlie Wales
- Honoria Wales
- Marion and Lincoln Peters
Summary:
- Charlie Wales has come back to Paris to regain custody of his daughter, Honoria, from his sister-in-law, after enduring the death of his wife and his battle with alcoholism.
- However, Marion, his sister-in-law, his cold and angry towards Charlie, and her dislike for him is evident.
- The next day, Charlie takes Honoria to lunch and they run into Lorraine, an old "fling" of Charlie's, and her partner Duncan. They try to make plans but Charlie brushes them off and takes Honoria to a vaudeville show instead.
- Charlie confesses to Marion that he wants to regain custody of Honoria but she blames him for his wife's death. However, she finally relents.
- Nonetheless, Lorraine and Duncan show up at the door of the Peters' apartment when Charlie is there and their drunken debauchery horrifies Marion. Charlie now knows he will not be able to take Honoria.
- Charlie sits at the Ritz bar where he hopes to find Lorraine and Duncan. He calls the Peters' apartment and speaks to Marion's husband, who informs him that she is ill and will not be able to discuss Honoria's guardianship for at least another six months. Charlie refuses another drink and plans for the future when he will be able to get his daughter back.
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