Can't Repeat the Past? A Gatsby Boat Tour Can.
The morning rain clouds had parted and blue sky peeked through as some 75 members of the F. Scott Fitzgerald Society waited on a Long Island pier. They had gathered on a recent Sunday for The Great Gatsby Boat Tour, a 90-minute cruise around Manhasset Bay to explore East Egg and West Egg, the fictional peninsulas where Fitzgerald set his 1925 novel, 'The Great Gatsby.'
While the captain worked to replace a dead battery on the boat, the group of Fitzgerald scholars and fans munched on deli sandwiches and mingled.
Kirk Curnutt, a professor of English at Troy University in Alabama, explained that the cruise was the kickoff event for the society's annual conference, which, befitting the centennial of the publication of 'Gatsby,' was being held this year in New York.
Attendees had come from around the country and world. Mr. Curnutt pointed to a tall blond woman who was a professor of American literature at the University of London and the author of several works on Fitzgerald, including a recent article for The Financial Times about how 'Gatsby' predicted Trumpism.
'That's Sarah Churchwell,' he said. 'She's one of the stars.'
Mr. Curnett, 60, teaches 'Gatsby' to education students who will go on to teach the novel in high schools. 'We teach them how to teach,' he said. 'Like avoiding the phrase 'American dream.' It's such a shopworn cliché.'
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