Brynn Gorney

Mrs. Storer
English 3H, block 4
February 20, 2020

Socratic Circle Reflection on The Great Gatsby

On Tuesday, February 18th, we had a Socratic Circle on the text The Great Gatsby. The
three groups and questions for each group were predetermined, which set up a pretty cookie-
cutter discussion. My inner circle spent a lot of time on the debatable power of each character
and the possibility of Gatsby being a Christ-figure. The majority of the group seemed to agree
that Daisy and Gatsby are simultaneously powerful and weak as characters in the text. Daisy is
powerful because men fight over her, but she is weak when it comes to expressing her opinion to
these men. Gatsby is powerful in his wealth, but weak in his relationships, especially that with
Daisy. As one member pointed out, Gatsby acts childish and needs to be led on by someone else
during his earlier interactions with Daisy. During the discussion about Gatsby being a Christ
figure, the few juniors who spoke agreed that he was too materialistic and selfish to be like Jesus.
Mrs. Storer disagreed, saying that Gatsby did what he did for Daisy alone and chose to sacrifice
his life and money for her. There was some heavy debate over how true that might be, but a
conclusion was not reached before time ran out.
Something that stood out to me, coming from the group that followed ours, was one
member’s analysis of the shirt scene in Gatsby’s mansion. No one else had really taken time to
look at the scene since we read it, so it was an original evidential piece right off the bat. They
looked at the individual color of each shirt and inferred how the seemingly randomly assigned
colors had meaning; they painted a picture of Gatsby’s sadness (blue) and fake lifestyle (gold?),
both of which were masked from public awareness by his wealth (silver). I hadn’t thought to
look deeper into the color of the shirts, so the impact of the truth in the group member’s analysis
was very powerful and different from other contributions to me. I also enjoyed a very original
outlook by another member of the same group about the significance of the green light. While
most people tied it back to daisy, the group member associated the light with Gatsby’s fading
dream to have the life he had envisioned for himself (with Daisy in it). I thought that this was a
very different and truthful view on the heavily discussed object, so I appreciated this
contribution.
If I were to write an essay, a thesis statement I might include would be: “Despite the
justifications that Gatsby used to put himself in the right when he would act a certain way, there
was nothing Christ-like about the man and the things he did, especially when it came to Daisy.”
In the essay, my main points would focus on Jordan’s explanation of why Gatsby is so obsessed
with Daisy, Nick’s narrations of Gatsby’s view of Daisy, and Gatsby taking the blame for
Daisy’s automobile accident. Through Jordan’s account of the past, I could prove that Gatsby
was caught up in a past romance and the lifestyle that came with it instead of focusing on the
changed person that was in front of him. I could show that his affection weighs more on the side
of obsession than real love. Through Nick’s narrations of what Gatsby said about Daisy and is
love for her, I could prove how she is an object to be obtained and fought over in his eyes,
instead of a human person with rights and feelings. Finally, with the scene of Gatsby telling Nick
he wants to be responsible for Daisy’s automobile accident, I can show that he was not expecting
to die “for Daisy”, he was expecting some sort of consequence whenever he got caught and
eventually, the life he dreamed about with Daisy. This shows he was not “ready to die for her”,
to our knowledge, just ready to take a punch for her. Who knows how he would have reacted if
he knew his life was on the line?
In my personal experience, it’s easy to make mistakes and to be focused on what you
want (for some time). However, I would hope that I would never allow myself to deprive a
human of their due respect because I wanted to be with them forever. I would hope that, like
Gatsby did, I would be willing to help someone out, and like Christ would, lay down my life for
someone when it matters.

Checklist
Before turning in a reflection, use the following checklist to ensure you have included all the
necessary requirements to receive full credit:

One-to-two pages, single-spaced, 12-point font, typed

MLA Header: Your name, the teacher’s name, the course title and block, and the due date
of this reflection
Centered Title: Socratic Circle Reflection on [the subject of this particular Socratic circle]
One paragraph reflection on the performance of your group
_____ One paragraph reflecting on your individual performance (Does it still exist?)
A thesis statement for an “imaginary” essay on this text
One paragraph explaining the main points of that “imaginary” essay
One paragraph explaining the connections you made between the text and your own life