“The Colossal Vitality Of His Illusion”: Some Thoughts on Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby

July 10, 2013July 11, 2013 ~ nicolespokane ~ Leave a comment

by Erika Koss During a 2003 interview, Baz Luhrmann’s motives were questioned for bringing Puccini’s celebrated opera La Boheme to Broadway. The director answered straightforwardly: “My motive is, I think, that there are extraordinary works, and someone did it for me when I was a child – someone pulled the curtain back and revealed the … Continue reading “The Colossal Vitality Of His Illusion”: Some Thoughts on Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby

“Fire or Freshness”: Some Thoughts On The Great Gatsby (Part Two)

June 13, 2013 ~ nicolespokane ~ Leave a comment

by Erika Koss “I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.” American fiction is rife with characters who feel “within and without”—from My Antonia’s Jim Burden to The Grapes of Wrath’s Tom Joad; from The Age of Innocence’s Newland Archer to A Farewell to Arms’s Lt. Henry. This … Continue reading “Fire or Freshness”: Some Thoughts On The Great Gatsby (Part Two)

What’s So Great About The Great Gatsby?

May 30, 2013May 30, 2013 ~ nicolespokane ~ 14 Comments

by Erika Koss This was the question my friends and I asked, repeatedly, back in 1990, when we were required to read The Great Gatsby in our 9th grade English class. I was 14 years old. And how often does this question continue to be asked, by teenagers who continue to be informed that this … Continue reading What’s So Great About The Great Gatsby?