Gatsby Chapter 8 Notes And Thoughts

• Nick suggests that Gatsby forget about Daisy and leave Long Island, but Gatsby refuses to consider leaving Daisy behind
•  He says that he loved her for her youth and vitality, and idolized her social position, wealth, and popularity
• He adds that she was the first girl to whom he ever felt close and that he lied about his background to make her believe that he was worthy of her
• Eventually, he continues, he and Daisy made love, and he felt as though he had married her
• Gatsby’s gardener interrupts the story to tell Gatsby that he plans to drain the pool
• Gatsby tells the gardener to wait a day; he has never used the pool, he says, and wants to go for a swim
• Nick has stayed so long talking to Gatsby that he is very late for work. He finally says goodbye to Gatsby
• As he walks away, he turns back and shouts that Gatsby is worth more than the Buchanans and all of their friends.
• George Wilson stays up all night talking to Michaelis about Myrtle 
• He tells him that before Myrtle died, he confronted her about her lover and told her that she could not hide her sin from the eyes of God
• The morning after the accident, the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg, illuminated by the dawn, overwhelm Wilson
• He believes they are the eyes of God and leaps to the conclusion that whoever was driving the car that killed Myrtle must have been her lover
• He decides that God demands revenge and leaves to track down the owner of the car
• He looks for Tom, because he knows that Tom is familiar with the car’s owner—he saw Tom driving the car earlier that day but knows Tom could not have been the driver since Tom arrived after the accident in a different car with Nick and Jordan
• Wilson eventually goes to Gatsby’s house, where he finds Gatsby lying on an air mattress in the pool, floating in the water and looking up at the sky
• Wilson shoots Gatsby, killing him instantly, then shoots himself
• Nick finds Gatsby floating dead in his pool
• Nick imagines Gatsby’s final thoughts, and pictures him disillusioned by the meaninglessness and emptiness of life without Daisy, without his dream

In this way, Gatsby continues to function as a symbol of America in the 1920s, which, as Fitzgerald implies throughout the novel’s exploration of wealth, has become vulgar and empty as a result of subjecting its sprawling vitality to the greedy pursuit of money. Just as the American dream—the pursuit of happiness—has degenerated into a quest for mere wealth, Gatsby’s powerful dream of happiness with Daisy has become the motivation for lavish excesses and criminal activities.

1. What does Gatsby tell Nick about his night when Nick shows up early in the morning?  What does Gatsby say about what happened between Tom and Daisy?
2. What does Nick suggest that Gatsby do?  Why does Gatsby reject Nick's suggestion?
3. What does Gatsby say about the way he and Daisy left each other the first time, when he went to war?
4. The gardener interrupts to tell Gatsby he wants to drain the pool.  Why, in the middle of all of this drama, do you think the author interrupts the tense relationship dialogue with a secondary character and mention of the pool?  Why do you think it's important that Gatsby wants to swim at least once in his own pool?
5. Nick gets to work-- and the entire narrative shifts.  Now we're getting to the climax of the plot, and Fitzgerald goes nearly Shakespeare.  Describe the action and what it represents.