One kind of allusion prevalent in The Great
Gatsby is the allusion to people, places, or events of that era, or
immediately preceding that era. These allusions give a richness to the novel's setting,
The Roaring Twenties, a decade-long celebration of the end of World War I and also an
era in which organized crime began its stranglehold on
America.
Here are some
examples:
Tom makes reference to a book called
The Rise of the Coloured Nations (17), which is a thinly disguised
allusion to a real book of the era, The Rising Tide of Color
(Stoddard).
There is a reference to Gilda Gray, the star of
the Ziegfield Follies (45), which was a series of Broadway productions of the
era.
Wolfsheim, who is a "friend" and business associate of
Gatsby's (73-75), alludes to his presence the night Herman Rosenthal, a notorious owner
of gambling joints, was gunned down in a gangland
killing.
These sorts of allusions run throughout the entire
book, firmly planting the story in a particular era, but not seeming to limit the
timelessness of its idea.
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