Significance of"The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God-a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that-and he must be about His Father's business, the service of a vast, vulgar and meretricious beauty."

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Ortiz

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11 October, 10:02

Significance of"The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God-a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that-and he must be about His Father's business, the service of a vast, vulgar and meretricious beauty."

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Andrew Cobb · Answer 1

Here we see a parallel between Gatsby and Jesus, as Gatsby transforms himself into the ideal that he envisioned for himself (a "Platonic conception of himself") as a youngster and remains committed to that ideal, despite the obstacles that society presents to the fulfillment of his dream.

Explanation:

This is an excerpt from F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. Some scholars think that Fitzgerald was probably influenced in drawing this parallel by a nineteenth-century book by Ernest Renan entitled The Life of Jesus. In this book Jesus is presented as a figure who essentially decided to make himself the son of God, then brought himself to ruin by refusing to recognize the reality that denied his self-conception.