So how can one justify teaching a novel written in the '20s about the '20s? How can it be made relevant to a bunch of teenagers who feel that unless it is contemporary, why read it? The answer can be found by looking at how the 1920s were so pivotal in how we define ourselves today. It is by showing that the illusion of possessions, both inanimate and human, is still often the basis of how we measure success. It is through the advertising of today that young people are able to see what Fitzgerald saw with such clarity. That a life measured by notches on the belt of possessions and not character is a shallow life to say the least.

Before I ask my students to read The Great Gatsby, I ask them to consider the values of American society. In the past few years, English teachers have begun to see how important it is for students to be media literate. Whole classes have been devoted to the concept that students must be able to see what an impact the media plays in American society.

Fitzgerald, being the visionary that he was, saw this almost 100 years ago. By reading The Great Gatsby and analyzing magazine advertisements and television commercials, students see that American society has been shaped by these concepts for decades.

When Gatsby begins throwing his shirts into the air for Daisy to marvel at, we see ourselves blindly using our possessions to define ourselves, Yes, they are beautiful. Yes, they can bring tears to one's eyes to see such blind devotion to another. But is the pursuit worthy? Do we have to define ourselves by what we own and not by who we are? These are the questions that students begin to see as relevant today as they were in the '20s.

In addition to media manipulation, celebrity is another concept that students can explore in The Great Gatsby. Celebrity--how long has the concept been around? At what point in our history did we see others as "special"? How is celebrity quantified? How little does it take to be considered a celebrity? How does our concept of celebrity define us as a society? The actress and the director in The Great Gatsby are there to show a new attraction that is beginning to take hold of America in the 1920s, the idea that celebrity is based on exposure and not character. The embryo of celebrity began in the 1920s and has now become the behemoth it is today. The idea that a life on screen has to be so much more valuable than a life that is not begins to take hold in the '20s. Students begin to explore the shallowness of celebrity based on the popularity of people who are on a television show for only a few hours, or for that matter, those who are actually considered "legitimate" celebrities based on their longevity. Students begin to realize that the concept of celebrity needs to be explored rather than accepted as a given.

In addition, the concept of time is one that students can explore during the reading of The Great Gatsby. Just as Gatsby has a distorted view of time, modern American society has accepted the idea that Gatsby espoused: time can be manipulated. In today's society, installment credit, another concept that was basically birthed in the 1920s, can be explored while reading the novel. Own today, but pay later--the illusion is being sold that time can be manipulated so that the feeling can be had today without the inevitable pain of tomorrow's reality. This discussion alone can be one of the most beneficial ever when these students are inundated with credit card offers when they arrive on a college campus.

Dreams were no doubt being sold before the 1920s, but it was the publishing of The Great Gatsby that personified the pursuit of a dream based on the fickleness and shallowness of a society that make students want to examine the beliefs that were explored by Fitzgerald in the '20s and are being espoused to this day.

So is The Great Gatsby worth teaching today? The answer is in every ad we see in a magazine, every spot we hear on radio, and every commercial we see on television.

Born in Missouri, but growing up in Los Angeles, Rance King now lives in Arkansas and teaches AP English and journalism at Harrison High School. He graduated from the University of Arkansas and is currently doing graduate work in counseling. Teaching, writing, reading, and traveling are his passions.
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