Adventures in Classic Readings Sponsored by the FOL's Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Fund

This reading group, facilitated by Dr. Laury Magnus, Professor of English, will feature great classic works — ancient to contemporary — as well as participatory reading out loud of selected passages.

Our next selection will be The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Scott Fitzgerald's classic American novel of the Roaring Twenties is beloved by generations of readers and stands as his crowning work. Nick Carraway, a Midwesterner-turned-New-York-bond salesman rents a small house next door to the mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby. There, he has a firsthand view of Gatsby's lavish West Egg parties' and of his undying love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan. After meeting and losing Daisy during the war, Gatsby has made himself fabulously wealthy. Now, he believes that his only way to true happiness is to find his way back into Daisy's life, and he uses Nick to try to reach her. What happens when the characters' fantasies are confronted with reality makes for a startling conclusion to this iconic masterpiece.

This deceptively simple work, Fitzgerald's best known, was hailed by critics as capturing the spirit of the generation. In Jay Gatsby, Fitzgerald embodies some of America's strongest obsessions: wealth, power, greed, and the promise of new beginnings.

Copies of the book will be available at the Information Desk. All participants will receive a complimentary copy of the book provided by the Friends of the Library’s Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Fund (while supplies last).