“An Indefinite Procession of Shadows”: Fitzgerald on Film in The Great Gatsby

Abstract

This article examines F. Scott Fitzgerald’s representation of film in The Great Gatsby. Offering a close reading of Chapter VI of the novel, I seek to demonstrate that cinema functions in it as a means of metaphorically underscoring the illusory nature of Gatsby’s lifestyle and identity. Although critics have tended to focus on the crucial role film plays in Fitzgerald’s later fiction, I argue it is here, early in his career, that Fitzgerald begins to work out the themes that consume him in its final phase