Claudine Caluza

Mrs. Storer
English 3/ Block 5
February 20, 2020
Socratic Circle Reflection on The Great Gatsby
The book we discussed was the Great Gatsby Our circle was assigned questions 1-5 on
the packet, and throughout the seminar we focused on questions two and three, which were “Did
Gatsby truly love Daisy” and “How are money and social status related but not the same”. Our
facilitator was Mary Chiappe. After she asked the first question, Priscilla started it off by
introducing the idea that Gatsby was not in love with Daisy, but he was in love with her because
of her status and that Gatsby was obsessed with the idea of money. Our group mainly added on
and agreed with this idea. The only person that tried to disagree with the group was Nellie, when
she said that Gatsby is in love with her because Daisy reminded him of something before the
war, and that he would do anything for her. Despite her evidence, our group quickly countered
her saying that his time in war was a thing of the past, and specifically Marissa stated that Gatsby
was in love with Daisy solely because she reminded him of the past and what she used to be. I
agreed, since there was 5 years of time spent apart, and the only thing Gatsby could really do was
add onto the illusion of Daisy rather than accept the changes she undergoes. In our second
conversation, our group debated whether Gatsby was considered of high social status. Priscilla
again starts off saying that even though Gatsby was rich and well known, the old rich, such as
Tom still had suspicions and always tried to shoot Gatsby down by accusing him of being a
bootlegger. On the other hand, Andres says that even though only few attended Gatsby’s funeral,
this does not determine social class because Tom was not present at his own daughter’s birth.
Many groupmates, such as Sophia, established that life and death were different. Personally, I
agree with Sophia, because Gatsby had many people attend his parties, big people such as
celebrities, yet they did not attend his funeral.
I believe that the two most original arguments were when Sophia mentions how Gatsby
was obsessive than in love. This was insightful because there really is a thin line between being
obsessed and in love, and she was able to support this difference with quotes saying how
Gatsby’s mind was so preoccupied with impressing Daisy. For example, Gatsby assigns different
values on his possessions depending on how Daisy reacted to the, or the glimmer in her eye. If he
was not obsessed with her, his possessions should not really matter, but he wanted to impress her
that much. Another idea that I believed was insightful was when Jennah mentioned how Daisy
was part of Gatsby’s American Dream, and rather than being in love with specifically her, he
was in love with the idea of loving her, and uses mainly actions to show this love to her. It was
unique how she connected loving Daisy to the American Dream because the main ideas that was
usually presented in connection to the American Dream was that he was in pursuit of money and
not being a failure, but when Jennah factored in winning the Golden Girl, Daisy, it really
deepened the idea of his American Dream because why pursue all thing when there is nobody to
share it with. The most original piece of evidence from the book was when Andres mentioned
Tom not attending his daughters’ own birth and compares it to how people did not attend
Gatsby’s funeral, and saying how it was not different. I think that this was original because other
people used quotes that directly said what they wanted, but this quote was a comparison of life
and death.
For my imaginary essay, my thesis statement would be, “Gatsby’s love for Daisy
ultimately turned into an obsession with her, because he only saw her as a trophy, he had a false
idea of her, and he only wanted to satisfy her”.
My general points in that essay would be from the scene where Gatsby invites Nick and
Daisy over to his mansion, and all Gatsby does is trying to impress her, the scene where Nick tell
s the audience that Gatsby could only build upon an illusion of Daisy after she left, and how
Gatsby wanted to be with Daisy in his mansion.
The connection between real life and how Gatsby is obsessed with Daisy is the lengths
one will go to impress the one they love. For example, people who stalk celebrities. I remember
on Tumblr that a fan hacked into an airplane security camera so that they could watch a One
Direction celebrity. I do not think that people know the difference between a love for something
and an obsession, like Gatsby.