“Vande Mataram!”
Throughout the swarming buzz of sound, the patriotic cry is the only one which resounds clearly–it pierces the pounding of the rain and reverberates in the humid air, into the coat of wet grime which makes the streets slippery and brown.
“Vande Mataram!” They wail, they scream, they hold each other and post the tricolored flags on their doorsteps, on their rooftops, on their cars, on their shirts and hats. They don orange saris and pray in gratitude for their freedom. They pour into the streets they were not allowed access to–they sing in loud, clear voices. Victory, at last.
For a moment, rolling thunder masks the anthems of their tribulation and freedom. The sky suddenly convulses and procures a corrugated sliver of blinding light, rendering the firmament a ghastly shade of white and green. It casts an eerie glimmer upon an empty alley, flashing to reveal a petite silhouette.
Torn paper, broken bottles, rotten carcasses of once-cooked chicken, and wet excrement litter the narrow alleyway–the catcher of all trash haphazardly thrown out of the apartment windows, leaking out of torn, unattended garbage bags. Beneath the thunder and the overwhelming enthusiasm from the streets, the quick, sharp pitter-patter of rodent feet is barely audible as they scamper beneath the litter, causing the pieces of scrap metal to clink together.
Beneath even the noise of the rats, a highly trained ear would be able to make out an incongruous sound–the rapid intake and release of shallow, halting, quick and unsteady breaths. The slim shoulders of the silhouette double over onto knelt, bent legs, which press against shattered glass and leak a thin stream of crimson. The shoulders heave, the demure figure shakes violently. Her slim arms tremble beneath the gossamer fabric of her white salwar kamiz, torn and wrinkled. She holds her quavering hands beneath her bent torso–one clutches her stomach, one presses against the torn fabric which was not enough to guard her inner thigh.
Caught against the handle of a garbage can adjacent to her, a soaking, mint colored scarf flaps helplessly against the wind and the rain.
All at once, the thunder ceases–the downpour halts, like the tap of a shower-head is slammed closed.
“Hindustan, Hindustan!” The cries from the streets persist with an unparalleled fervor. “Vande Mataram!”
Slowly, her battered silhouette straightens. Lifting one vertebrae at a time, she rolls into a seated position, her thick black eyebrows furrowed, her delicate hooked nose crinkled as she presses her closed fists into the ground and stretches out her legs. She winces as she places her bare foot flat upon the filthy ground, as it crunches into labyrinth of feces and sharp debris. Her brown eyes glinting with bitter fury and pain, she snatches the drenched scarf from where it is snagged onto the garbage can. With deliberation, she wraps it’s tattered folds around her head, the tip of her long black braid peeking through the end of it.
Finally, she manages to rise to her feet. She tips her head towards the sky, her face reflecting the obscure medley of the colors it emanates. Her lips part–they move as she whispers silently. Her chant grows louder and louder as she places one foot ahead of the other–walking hesitantly down the alleyway, into the teeming streets.
“Allahu Akbar,” she repeats, with greater and greater resolve, “God is great, God is great.”
Her homeland had deserted her, it had reached into her mind and stripped the flag which rested there of orange. Ruefully, she made her way to the crowd. But hers is not triumph–her battle is upstream.
“Allahu Akbar,” she chants, and quietly she declares, “Long live Pakistan.”
She sits peacefully in a navy blue wheelchair,
Legs splayed, feet resting on plastic blue squares.
From her patchy head trickles a thin braid of grey hair
Every wrinkle, every sag, displays a life, unfair.
She strides with confidence in a rippling navy skirt,
The silky fabric billowing with a grace far from inert,
She flicks her thick, black locks with a smiling flirt,
Shining molten chocolate eyes, incessantly alert.
In her folded, leathery hands, she holds a paper slip
It’s crinkled like her fingers where she presses it to her hip
Slowly, her clenched fist relaxes its trembling grip
And it flutters to the tile floor beneath her IV drip. more…
You are only fifteen, but your baby sister Jennie is in the next room hiccupping quiet tears to herself. It’ll take a while for you to become sufficiently instigated, given that your hands are shaking violently where you’ve stuffed them under your armpits, and your eyes are squeezed shut so tightly you’re beginning to see purple dots. Go ahead and keep them closed—you won’t need them for a little while. Keep your ears open, though, and listen closely to the ruckus unfolding in your kitchen. Listen to the heavy clunking of your drunken stepfather’s walk, his slurred words and his sleazy chuckle. That alone is enough to send a jolt of fear through your slender arms and quicken your already agitated heartbeat. But fear won’t be enough—tune in to your mother, as her nervous sweet-talk gradually inclines in pitch—as her words transform from shaky to incomprehensible. You hear a soft thud and then a shriek—now her voice is broken, shrill, and plaintive. She is begging. Let your tremulous fingers grow stiff and allow them to curl into the sweaty flesh of your palm, clench your teeth and hold your breath. The anger courses through your blood and makes you breathe faster—you’re incensed. You’re mother has been black and blue since she married that son-of-a-bitch and you won’t stand for it anymore.
But you’re still locked to the little alcove you’ve created in the center of your bed, you’re still too frightened to move—and you’re eyes are still closed. Don’t worry, only a little longer now. Listen to the sound of your sister’s sobs become a little bit louder—you’re stepfather’s laugh grow more and more malicious—and your mother’s hopeless screams—allow all the sounds to mix together and become your own, custom-made monster. But suddenly, you hear a sickening crack. One third of the noise comes to a jolting stop. Your heart skips a good five beats, you’re eyes pop open, and all the breath escapes your lungs. A wheezy string of swears from your detestable stepfather confirms that the worst has happened.
You jump to your feet—there’s a pocket knife in your drawer. Take it out—flip open the tiny silver blade. Don’t pretend like you haven’t been deliberating this for the past four and a half months. Take a moment for the anger to reach its peak, and for the fear to subside. It’s all quiet in the kitchen for a few moments, but you freeze when you hear the unsteady clunk of his boots swaggering towards your room.
“Kay-teeee,” you hear his drunken drawl, “come’ere sweetie, clean up this mess your goddam momma made.”
And that’s enough to make you so weak that your knees buckle and you fall to the ground, pocket knife this close to scraping your tender, bruised flesh. You hear his footsteps growing louder, he’s coming closer to your room. You know there’s no escaping.
But he stops a little short of your room. You hear your sister’s sobs come to a halt.
“Hey, there, Jennie, why were you crying?”
And now you’ve had it—hop to your feet, pocket knife closed tightly in your fist. Walk fast—there’s no turning back. It’s not so hard when you see his long, disgusting fingers scraping your baby sister’s tear-crusted cheek. Your knife finds a soft home in your stepfather’s back. Leave it there, watch for a moment as your stepfather falls to the ground with shock in his hazy eyes and the beginnings of a stream of blood form around him. Take your sister in your arms and get the hell out. No regrets—just resolve.
On a nebulous evening at the corner of town
The vacated carnival begins to close down
And as the jaded workers wander out wearing frowns
The top of the Ferris wheel reveals a clown.
He teeters on the seat with sleazy eyes
Flashing a red smirk as he turns his head to the sky
Twists his caricatured face as he murmurs “goodbye,
Fair-you-well, cruel world, tonight I shall die.”
In his colorful suit and huge mottled shoes
He throws his bulky legs over the edge, into the view
They dangle haphazardly over the carnival blue
The icy laughter replaying in his mind like a queue.
He looks down at the world which bore him such dread
A state of angst past any tears he could shed
Off the seat he slipped, and into his death
They’d find him the next day, in a pool of red.
What makes gossip so absolutely riveting—what makes tale-telling and backbiting all the more mischievously pleasing? The magic of the rumor comes from the perspective of the outsider—the onlooker, the narrator. Even the most clichéd and anticlimactic tale can be treated with zest and laced with enticing mystery when related by the crafty words of another. In the case of The Great Gatsby, widely considered one of the greatest novels ever crafted, we are faced with a relatively common—but nonetheless entertaining—storyline; of unquenched desire, greed, and romance. So then, what is it that makes this novel so wonderful? F. Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece The Great Gatsby is illuminated—its beauty at the same time mystified and magnified—by the narration of a bystander, an observer. The unique, uncharacteristically objective, and reverent perspective of our narrator Nick Carraway adds a tantalizing aroma of mystery and tension to the novel—it provides the je-ne-sais-quois that makes Gatsby’s protagonist so memorable and endearing.
The magnificent persona of Fitzgerald’s protagonist, Jay Gatsby, is insinuated to from the very title of the novel, which rounds out his character in the simple yet effective acclamation “great”. However, the audience is not personally introduced to him until several chapters into the book. Instead, Fitzgerald puts the job of aggrandizing Gatsby’s personality into the hands of the narrator of the novel, Nick Carraway. In the first chapter, Carraway looks back on his short, lackadaisical stay in an affluent establishment of New York—the short period in which Gatsby made an impression which lasted forever.
When I came back from the East last autumn…I wanted no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human heart. Only Gatsby, the man who gives his name to this book, was exempt from my reaction—Gatsby, who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn for…there was something gorgeous about him…as if he were related to one of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away. (Fitzgerald, 2)
Here, Nick Carraway expresses his negative attitude towards his previous home—his intolerance for any more “riotous excursions” and scorn towards “privileged glimpses” into the ugly truth of human nature. However, while he conveys his sense of exasperation with the people and the experiences that he faced in this affluent neighborhood, he introduces the exception—the only one who was “exempt from my reaction”, the very Gatsby to whom the novel is named for. Carraway provides an enigmatic first glance at the protagonist; one just revealing enough to instill interest, but vague enough to raise probing inquiries. What is it about this Gatsby that makes him “gorgeous”? What characteristics about him make him reputable and memorable—“exempt” from Carraway’s general disapproval, even while representing “everything for which I have an unaffected scorn for”? Perhaps there is something about Gatsby, something original and endearing, which outshines and even beautifies his flaws. Perhaps Gatsby is one of those melancholy and romantic persons, maybe socially awkward and unintentionally insulting, but essentially innocuous. Our skilled storyteller even goes to make an extremely unique simile, comparing the protagonist to “one of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away”—in effect, relating Gatsby to a seismometer. What exactly does this mean—is Gatsby skilled at detecting drama or trauma before it begins? Or is there something deeper to the comparison, something only to be deciphered after getting to know him better? Carraway’s baffling yet alluring initial introduction of the audience to Gatsby is ingenious; it makes the readers begin to bounce in their seats and exchange curious glances, makes them turn their ears intently towards the storyteller and begin a fluttering of speculated rumors.
While Carraway’s narration in the very first pages of Gatsby serves to stir up everything from far-fetched to constrained speculations, our raconteur begins to satisfy some of the violent curiosity in later chapters, when describing the sort of affluent and hedonistic lifestyle Gatsby appears to promote. Nick Carraway describes Gatsby’s weekend extravaganzas from the point of view of an amazed neighbor:
There was music from my neighbor’s [Gatsby’s] house through the summer nights. In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars. At high tide in the afternoon I watched his guests diving from the tower of his raft, or taking the sun on the hot sand of his beach while his two motor-boats slit the waters of the Sound…And on Mondays eight servants…toiled all day with mops and scrubbing-brushes and hammers and garden-shears, repairing the ravages of the night before. (Fitzgerald, 39)
In this passage, Carraway gives the audience a glimpse at Gatsby’s unfathomable wealth, the sheer aesthetic beauty of his household, and identifies the reason behind his general popularity. Everything about these gatherings seems grand, pleasurable, and expensive. The elegant “music” which Carraway hears throughout charming “summer nights”; the enticing and enchanting “blue gardens” which attract young men and women like “moths” to lamps—these characteristics bring about a sense of occult splendor. Carraway describes the exhilarating fun to these parties as he watches these excited people “taking in the sun on the hot sand of his beach” and enjoying themselves inside speedy “motor-boats”—everything, of course, bought and paid for by our own Mr. Gatsby. Carraway continues to describe with awe how Gatsby takes care of the physical repercussions of these parties—by handing the seemingly insurmountable task off to a team of eight servants who “toil all day” with every sort of gardening and cleaning tool to restore the household to the resplendence of the night before. What an impressive and prosperous man Gatsby displays himself to be—to both narrator, and transitively to the reader. Is Gatsby really as overindulgent and riotous as his parties make him seem to be? Now, the audience is about bursting with awe and overwhelming interest; Fitzgerald reluctantly decides to truncate his sadistic fun in building the anticipation and the mystery—it is time for Nick Carraway, time for the audience, to meet Gatsby. And it better be worth it.
Fitzgerald introduces Nick Carraway to Gatsby in a way that fulfills all expectations—surprising, satisfying, and not disappointing. They become acquainted at one of Gatsby’s opulent summer bashes, in which Nick enjoys himself alongside the company of his attractive lady-friend, Jordan Baker.
We were sitting at a table with a man of about my age and a rowdy little girl, who gave way upon the slightest provocation to uncontrollable laughter…At a lull in the entertainment the man looked at me and smiled…We talked for a moment about some wet, gray little villages in France. Evidently he lived in this vicinity, for he told me that he had just bought a hydroplane, and was going to try it out in the morning. (Fitzgerald, 47)
At this point, the audience understands that Nick is beginning to feel acclimated to the party environment—he is even making his first friends in the neighborhood. Wealthy friends, at that— especially this man who happens to accompany Nick and Jordan at their table, who has enough money to indulge in entertainments like “hydroplanes”, and vacation in “wet, gray little” French villages. An impressive acquaintance, but what significance does he play to this story? Carraway continues his riveting narration, inquiring on the elusiveness of the host, Gatsby, and is dumbfounded by the response he receives:
“This is an unusual party for me. I haven’t even seen the host…and this man Gatsby sent over his chauffeur with an invitation.”
For a moment he looked at me as if he failed to understand.
“I’m Gatsby,” he said suddenly.
“What!” I exclaimed. “Oh, I beg your pardon.”
He smiled understandingly…It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced — or seemed to face — the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. (Fitzgerald, 48)
Here, the reader gives a small yelp of surprise along with Carraway—what an excellent way to break the suspense and finally allow a physical first glance at the character so enhanced in the primary chapters of the book. The audience can feel the potential awkward tension after Gatsby “suddenly” announces who he is, and then allows itself to digest the situation forgivingly when Gatsby “smiled understandingly”. This dazzling, considerate turn of the mouth, strangely seems to represent everything Gatsby is portrayed as—someone who “you may come across four or five times in life”—someone inimitable and invaluable. This impression could not have been achieved had the point of view of the acquaintance been different—this creative form of storytelling is the key to the effectiveness in the building up and finally revealing Gatsby’s character.
