The Great Gatsby is the most misunderstood novel (2021)

Post by SirSavary » Sun, Jan 04, 2026, 3:26 AM UTC

kazinator wrote: post #3

> The thought crossed my mind that it would be really interesting if someone were to write Nick's story," he says. In 2014, by then a published author in his 40s, he sat down to do just that, telling neither his agent nor his editor. It was only when he delivered the manuscript 10 months later that he learned copyright law meant he'd have to wait until 2021 to publish it. WTf? Can't write an original spin off on some…

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jan 04, 2026, 3:46 AM UTC

thundergolfer wrote: post #10

hutao wrote: post #6

Today, we tend to see The Great Gatsby as a work of historical literature, as it gives a window into the Roaring Twenties. However, F. Scott Fitzgerald did not set out to depict the past; he was depicting his own present. Similarly, Proust's literature is seen as a window into the French high-society of the Belle Epoque, a society in which Proust lived. Which works today do you think future generations will see as th…

Unironically dril's tweets[1]. Part of the problem of our time is that shared culture has significantly receded. There's little capacity to maintain "classics" as we understand them today. Take any massive artistic output (film, book, TV show) and it's nowadays either not seen/read/heard by more than 20% of the population or it's a flash in the pan hit which will be forgotten in another year or so (e.g. Barbenheimer)…

Post by duskwuff » Sun, Jan 04, 2026, 3:51 AM UTC

SirSavary wrote: post #11

kazinator wrote: post #3

> The thought crossed my mind that it would be really interesting if someone were to write Nick's story," he says. In 2014, by then a published author in his 40s, he sat down to do just that, telling neither his agent nor his editor. It was only when he delivered the manuscript 10 months later that he learned copyright law meant he'd have to wait until 2021 to publish it. WTf? Can't write an original spin off on some…

Crazy huh? If an author wrote something as a child and lived over a hundred, you could hit even two hundred :) F. Scott Fitzgerald, the author, died in December 1940. Given the rules around copyright I would have expected things to expire in 2010 (death of author, roll to next calendar year, +70 years) so I'm unsure what happened here.

Post by tbrownaw » Sun, Jan 04, 2026, 3:55 AM UTC

hutao wrote: post #6

Today, we tend to see The Great Gatsby as a work of historical literature, as it gives a window into the Roaring Twenties. However, F. Scott Fitzgerald did not set out to depict the past; he was depicting his own present. Similarly, Proust's literature is seen as a window into the French high-society of the Belle Epoque, a society in which Proust lived. Which works today do you think future generations will see as th…

Post by Analemma_ » Sun, Jan 04, 2026, 3:59 AM UTC

hutao wrote: post #6

Today, we tend to see The Great Gatsby as a work of historical literature, as it gives a window into the Roaring Twenties. However, F. Scott Fitzgerald did not set out to depict the past; he was depicting his own present. Similarly, Proust's literature is seen as a window into the French high-society of the Belle Epoque, a society in which Proust lived. Which works today do you think future generations will see as th…