“Can’t repeat the past? Why, of course you can!” Jay Gatsby, the protagonist of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby
The Great Gatsby is a 1925 novel written by American author F. Scott Fitzgerald that follows a cast of characters living in the fictional towns of West Egg and East Egg on prosperous Long Island in the summer of 1922. The story primarily concerns the young and mysterious millionaire J…
Nick Carraway is a fictional character and narrator in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.
Full Answer
In response to Nick Gatsby say's "can't repeat the past? Why of course you can!" This truly highlights his inability to accept the truth, being that Daisy has moved on and is married with a child. It is not only foolish, it is delusional to think that you can turn back time.
' he cried incredulously. 'Why of course you can! ' He looked around him wildly, as if the past were lurking here in the shadow of his house, just out of reach of his hand.
Following Nick Carraway's claim, “You can't repeat the past,” Gatsby responds, “Can't repeat the past?… Why of course you can!… I'm going to fix everything just the way it was before… She'll see” (110).
To Nick's statement that "you can't repeat the past" Gatsby replies incredulously, "Can't repeat the past? Why of course you can!" Gatsby is confident that he will be able to repeat the past of when he and Daisy first met now that he has the money to attract her attention. His view is very simplistic and naive.
"Can't repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!" He looked around him wildly, as if the past were lurking here in the shadow of his house, just out of reach of his hand. This quote says that what has happened in the past can happen again.
Daisy! Daisy!... I'll say it whenever I want to!” (p. 41) Tom actually gets so angry that he strikes her and breaks her nose.
Nick know that you can't and shouldn't repeat the past, but Gatsby thinks he can just erase the last five years and start over again. His opinion is unrealistic because it's been five years and both of them have changed.
The Great Gatsby Time Analysis After Nick telling him that the past belongs there, Gatsby replies with this “ Can't repeat the past?” he cried incredulously. “Why of course you can!” (110) Gatsby has no real connection with the true difference between the past and present, they are the same to him.
The green light Nick first sees Gatsby stretching his arms towards a green light at the end of Daisy's dock. Here, the green light is a symbol of hope.
Nick tells him that she did causing him to say " you can't repeat the past" Gatsby wants to go back to the way it was before and have Daisy tell Tom she never loved him. You just studied 8 terms!
Memory and the Past: Is “the past” a boundary we cannot overcome (as Nick rationally argues, “you can't repeat the past”) or is the future a boundary we cannot overcome (as Nick notes, we are “ceaselessly born back into the past” as the “future recedes before us”)?