What if Fitzgerald is/was in fact a racists? As beautifully described by Lois Tyson, the man does a quality job describing the time period the way it was. All the while leaving out the fact that black people exist, or had any effect in his days. Not even the slightest notation of black culture in the novel truly does allow us to judge Mr. Fitzgerald. I agree with Lois in her remarks of Fitzgerald’s ability to weave the happenings of the day into his text in clever and discrete ways. For example on pg. 397 of CTT in the 3rd paragraph on the page, Tyson brings up the part in The Great Gatsby, when Tom brings “the bottle of whisky ’wrapped… in a towel (127; ch. 7)’” and tells how the line regards prohibition. This is the perfect example of Fitzgerald’s genius ability to throw in hints of major time changing events into his story. It would be far to easy for him to comment on black society if not hint at it in the slightest way. It’s not looking good for our acclaimed author. Tyson gets him again by blaming him for insinuating that white people created jazz as seen on pg. 405 of CTT "the novel gives the credit for jazz symbolically to whites." Since Lois Tyson says is true, and there is no way Fitzgerald did not know jazz was created through black culture, why would he insinuate it was created by white people? We have come to conclusion. One of the most famous writers of all time is clearly Racist.
I just realized I didn't actually answer any of the questions assigned... except do i agree. I just like to add that it dose not change my reading of Gatsby because we shouldn't judge Fitzgerald just because hes racists. He was probably an awesome guy other then that small part of him that hated black people. This might even be a quick generalization because he dose not shove racist remarks down our throat, so why should we think of his work any less if it dosen't offend us, or anyone else? Do you think hes racists? Do you think its wrong if we interpret his work differently just because he is racist? Is this post and the entire reading just ensuring us that Critical theorists are just really good at making big deals out of nothing?
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