Advanced English in The Great Gatsby

This essay discusses the novel Great Gatsby and the life lessons that can be learned from it. It emphasizes the importance of improving reading and writing skills for a successful transition to Senior English and for future academic and professional success.

Running head: ADVANCED ENGLISH IN THE GREAT GATSBY
Advanced English in The Great Gatsby
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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In the following essay, the central topic of discussion would be to highlight upon the
novel Great Gatsby and life lessons that could be learned from it. The reading of texts improve
the knowledge of students in a great manner, It has to be said that text books or novels always
deepens the knowledge gaining of human beings in a new level. The connection with texts is
indeed a very crucial for understanding and developing some soft skills within students. The
developments in reading and writing are also achieved among students if they read out texts. The
Great Gatsby is one of the best novels in the twentieth century and I have gained some
knowledge by reading these novels properly.
The Great Gatsby is a 1925 novel by the author F. Scott Fitzgerald which deals with a
group of characters living on the West Egg and East Egg on Long Island in the summer of 1925.
From reading the novel, I felt that for my transition to Senior English, certain skills are needed
that will not be helpful for the transition to Senior English but also will be helpful in work life
after school.
I feel that it is always important to be a very good reader and writer in order to make a
successful transition to Senior English. The more one can read a novel or books better, the better
one will have an understanding of the English language. This is not the only requirement
however for the successful transition into English. Other requirements for the transition includes
improving one’s reading and writing skills as having those skills itself will help a person a lot in
transitioning into Senior level English. As stated by Novita (2018), a good reading and writing
skills have several benefits. It will help the individual to be able to read novels that have more
complex meanings. The better an individual will be able to read and understand those meanings
by himself, the better he will be able to write complex English himself.

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Senior English will also be able to help me in my studies. This is because as I will go on
to higher levels, the studies will be difficult and they would involve more complex readings and
writings. Since the studies will be getting more difficult, having a good knowledge of English
will be helpful as it will help in understanding the matter that the topic is trying to convey to the
readers. As stated by Jancucowicz (2018), another important benefit of better reading and writing
skills is it will help the students to get a good hold of the topic that he/she is studying in general.
Similarly, The Boat and other Short Stories is a collection of stories by the author that a deal
with the theme of war and death in the country. The book offers a new perspective of the
aftermath of the Vietnam War in the country. The novel presents a combination of countries
from Iran to South China Sea but the theme of Vietnam War plays an important role in two
stories of the book. This war is linked to the author’s political and personal history.
Senior English will also help me in my life after school because when I will join college,
I will be able to understand the subject matter that they present in the class if I decide to choose
English as my subject. This will also help me to not only write during my examinations but also
writing resumes for jobs after my college life is over. Senior English indeed has its benefits as
learning such English would not only help a student to pass his/her higher examinations easily
but also ensure that he/she can be successful in both college life and job life as well.
Reading and writing are two very crucial things that are needed to be cared for when I
have to approach higher classes in my English. Spelling and grammar are very significant in
order to gain a proper knowledge. The issues of reading and writing are very much suited to
children of school (Langan 2013). However, these things are the foundations for becoming a
good reader and writer. When I read the Great Gatsby, I understood that use of language and
rhetorical perceptions are very much there within the texts. This is why it has been a very

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influential book for me. When I have taken the assistance of machines like desktops and laptops,
it has become much easier for me by the use of grammar and spell checks. Therefore, it has been
a great helping hand for me. On the contrary, it is very much essential to keep a note of
development of spelling skills (Langan 2013).
Therefore, Great Gatsby has provided me with that opportunity since its elaborative
theme of reflecting on jazz age of United States. I have been benefitted by the use of many
critical words in texts and the way they have been used to intensify the scenario of that novel. I
have learnt from my junior school lessons that proper grammar is only about putting proper
words and sentences at the correct place to make a sentence more meaningful and attractive.
The collection of stories named Boat Nam Le has been chosen as the central theme for
this book. The main theme of this book is regarding death and war. I have gone through the
stories as they are concerned with Vietnamese refugees. I have felt for the miseries of those
refuges where 200 people had been fitted in a boat where it could only accommodate 15 to 20
people. Those people were in deep misery as they were ill, hungry and thirsty at the same time.
This is why their fight was to get their lives saved. The condition was so much dreadful that
there was very little water and no medicine for those people. Many people were dead and some
of them were nothing more than a skin and bone. All these people had been thrown into the
waters. The main protagonist of this story was Mai who was a teenager. I felt she gave a huge
fight in order to save her life and the lives of others. After she fought so hard to stay alive, she
understood the real reason as to why her father wanted to stay on land after fighting with
communists for five years and two more years spending in the re-education camp.
I have come to realize that this happens in the lives of many other people since they have
been confronted with death so closely. They have seen death from a very close position and this

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happens to be their motivation in life to fight more. The opening story of this collection concerns
with the two people who have born in Vietnam and they have grown up in Australia. Likewise,
other stories in this collection also concerns with circumnavigation all around the world. The
miserable life of people can be found if someone falls down in the sea and loses his life, get shot
by terrorists or lose all members of their family in the wars. Some people will not face this
situation in a brave manner and some will confront these situations with utmost valor. I have also
realized that the author has been able to give a proper description of the overcoming all the
hurdles in their lives. Thus it will be very much effective for them to understand how they can
cope up with all difficult and extreme situations in their lives. The most brilliant story in this
collection is ‘Love and Honor’. This has been a heart rending story of a young author who had
been writing from a writer’s block. The strict lifestyle thrown upon him by his father has been
one of the most miserable things that had ever happened to him. Thus I find that Nam Le has
inspired me to think about many themes and brought it under central theme- suffering of
common people in their lives.
Thus, I can conclude the essay by saying the reading and writing skills have been
a given me a sea of potentials. I would be able to understand proper use of grammar, punctuation
and spelling so I could grow as a reader and writer when I go to college in later years.

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Reference List
Buell, L., 2014. The dream of the great american novel. Harvard University Press.
Chen, C.M., Wang, J.Y. and Chen, Y.C., 2014. Facilitating English-language reading
performance by a digital reading annotation system with self-regulated learning mechanisms.
Journal of Educational Technology & Society, 17(1), pp.102-114.
Graham, S., MacArthur, C.A. and Fitzgerald, J. eds., 2013. Best practices in writing instruction.
Guilford Press.
Irambona, A. and Kumaidi, K., 2015. The effectiveness of English teaching program in senior
high school: A case study. REiD (Research and Evaluation in Education), 1(2), pp.114-128.
Janczukowicz, K., 2014. Teaching English pronunciation at the secondary school level (No. 1).
Peter Lang Edition.
Langan, J., 2013. College writing skills with readings. Tata McGraw-Hill Education.
Novita, T., 2018. STUDENTS’ENGLISH SPEAKING SKILL AND ACTIVATION METHOD:
THE CASE OF ONE SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL. Edukasi: JurnalPendidikan Dan Pengajaran,
4(2), pp.10-17.
Perin, D., 2013. Literacy skills among academically underprepared students. Community College
Review, 41(2), pp.118-136.
Petraglia, J. ed., 2013. Reconceiving writing, rethinking writing instruction. Routledge.
Temperley, H. and Bigsby, C., 2014. A new introduction to American studies. Routledge.

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References and Bibliography
Buell, L., 2014. The dream of the great american novel. Harvard University Press.
Graham, S., MacArthur, C.A. and Fitzgerald, J. eds., 2013. Best practices in writing instruction.
Guilford Press.

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Langan, J., 2013. College writing skills with readings. Tata McGraw-Hill Education.
Perin, D., 2013. Literacy skills among academically underprepared students. Community College
Review, 41(2), pp.118-136.
Petraglia, J. ed., 2013. Reconceiving writing, rethinking writing instruction. Routledge.
Temperley, H. and Bigsby, C., 2014. A new introduction to American studies. Routledge.