Disembodied Voices and Narrating Bodies in The Great Gatsby

The act of reading is indispensable in fiction's process of creating meanings. The Great Gatsby elicits in the reader a condition like Gatsby's "state of enchantment" in relation to Daisy or Nick's in relation to Gatsby. Whatever else Nick may be, he is (like Fitzgerald) the writer of a book; but Nick's implicit stake in the act of narration is not confined to the art of telling or writing. In the course of the novel Nick repeatedly listens to stories told by Daisy, Gatsby, Jordan, and Myrtle. As writer and storyteller and also as a recipient of other people's stories, the figure of Nick illuminates numerous facets of narration: its motivation, impact, rewards, and dangers. Through metaphoric implication and analogy, the recurrent image of Nick as sometimes sceptical, but always intensely responsive, listener even provides a model for Fitzgerald's own wished-for, potential, ideal reader.