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Prospection and Retrospection
in “The Great Gatsby” by F. S. Fitzgerald
Prospekcija ir retrospekcija
F.S. Ficdþeraldo
,,Didþiajame Getsbyje”
Linas SELMISTRAITIS
Vilniaus pedagoginis universitetas
Studentø g. 39, LT-2004 Vilnius
Santrauka
Straipsnyje analizuojamos tokios maþai iðtirtos
teksto kategorijos kaip retrospekcija ir prospekcija.
Pasitelkiant apraðomàjá bei analitiná metodus, atskleidþiamos prospekcijos ir retrospekcijos kaip
anaforinio ir kataforinio teksto plëtojimo bûdø funkcijos, taip pat jø átakà pasakojimui bei siuþeto tëkmei laiko atþvilgiu. Nurodomos leksinës priemonës, padedanèios susieti tekstà á visumà tose vietose, kuriose retrospekciniai ir prospekciniai fragmentai ásiterpia á tekstà. F.S. Fitcdþeraldo romano, ku-
riame praeities ir dabarties ávykiai pateikiami ne
chronologine tvarka, fragmentø analizë leidþia teigti,
jog prospekcija ir retrospekcija struktûriðkai ir semantiðkai susieja teksto fragmentus, leidþia giliau
atskleisti pagrindiniø personaþø charakterius bei
naujoje ðviesoje iðvysti siuþeto ávykius.
Reikšminiai þodþiai: prospekcija, retrospekcija,
semantinis ir struktûrinis teksto riðlumas, leksinës
riðlumo priemonës, fragmentas, pasakojimas,
siuþetinë linija.
Until the middle of the XXth century problems
of text analysis were not given proper attention to in
the linguistic works. Text linguistics as a branch of
general linguistics evolved into an independent
branch as the consequence of deeper research into
language and speech organization in particular.
The main reason why units consisting of more
than one sentence were ignored was the conviction
that the largest unit of grammatical analysis had to
be the sentence. What was beyond the sentence
was no concern of linguistics proper. The sentence
was, and remains, the main object of traditional
linguistic research in syntax. Within the framework
of traditional linguistics, the analysis of sentence
structure and its semantics is incontrovertibly standard. All grammatical phenomena are analyzed in
reference to the sentence, which functions as a
maximal unit.
In the second half of the XXth century the peculiarities of functioning of the sentence in the text
were taken into consideration, i. e. linguists turned
to the functional aspects of the sentence, its com-
municative role. The impulse was the inability to
account for many linguistic phenomena without
reference to the text. To such linguistic phenomena
belong pronominal reference and word order. To
understand them, linguists were to leave the boundaries of one sentence and look beyond it – to the left
and to the right. Such analysis led to research into
the relations between text - sentences. The interest
in the pragmatics of the sentence led to the recognition of the text as a unit of communication. Acknowledging the text as a communicative unit
changes the direction of the research: from the text
to its constituents. In this case sentences function as
the largest text-building blocks. The other linguistic units (words, combinations of words, etc.) are
parts of the blocks. They take part in text organization as structural but not as communicative components. Treating the text as a product of speech and a
communicative unit enriches grammar: the field of
observation is enlarged, new features of other systemic units which where hidden within of the boundaries of one sentence are revealed, new linguistic
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1. Introduction
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Prospection and Retrospection
in “The Great Gatsby” by F. S. Fitzgerald
units appear and their functions become evident
(Sirtautas, 1998).
Text analysis in Europe started in the 60-70s. In
Western Europe the beginning is the year 1964
(Äåéê, 1989), when J. Grimes, R. Barthes, T. Todorov
published a book in French Communications. It
was designed for structural text analysis. Some papers on text linguistics, or text grammar, appeared,
too. First of all, it was the merit of the German
linguist P. Hartmann. The history of Russian text
linguistics is divided into 3 periods in terms of topics researched: 1) the theory of the whole syntactic
unit appears in the 4-5-th decade (N. Posepelov); 2)
the 6-th decade is marked by attention to
supraphrasal units, the analysis of the paragraph (L.
Loseva, I.Galperin); 3) in the 7-th decade attention
is shifted to the whole text (G. Zolotova and others). Lithuanian linguists have worked on problems
of text linguistics since the 7th decade of the XXth
century. As Lietuviø kalbos enciklopedija puts it,
“text linguistics is a new domain of linguistics which
is in the processes of development, studies the texture of language units larger than the sentence and
tries to discover the principles of their mutual connection” (LKE, 1999, 645; the author’s translation
– L.S.). In this connection, mention should be
made of works in text linguistics by Z. Alaunienë, J.
Buitkienë, V. Rasimavièius, V. Sirtautas, L. Valeika
and other Lithuanian linguists are carrying out researches in this field.
In text linguistics one of the main features of the
text as a system of the highest rank is coherence and
cohesion. The former is mostly maintained at a semantic level and the latter is at a structural level.
Cohesion “manifests itself on text surface and is
signaled by lexico-syntactic means” (Buitkiene,
2001, 9). Coherence, as V. Kucharenko puts it
(Êóõàðåíêî, 1988, 68), is maintained at the level of
content. Cohesion is formal, or explicit, and coherence is inner, integrative, it manifests itself at the
level of the content. Coherence can be of two types:
radial and linear. Radial coherence is characteristic of dictionaries, textbooks, when separate parts
of the whole are connected not to each other but
only to the topic of the whole text or to the communicative purpose. Linear coherence is a type of coherence when parts of the text are connected directly to each other, function interdependently and
influence each other. Illustrative material of our
research is a sample of the text of the linear type of
coherence.
The current paper presents one of the possible
views on text or discourse analysis. In the linguistic
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literature the terms text analysis and discourse analysis are widely used. The terms text and discourse
require some comments, since their usage is often
ambiguous and confusing. As they are used in scientific works, they often simply imply slight differences in emphasis. The term text generally refers to
the written text, discourse often implies interactive
discourse. To quote M. Stubbs, “whereas text implies non-interactive monologue, whether intended
to be spoken or written” (1995, 30). Some researchers have attempted to draw the distinction in a more
specified way. For example, H.G.Widdowson distinguishes textual cohesion, recognizable in surface
lexis, grammar and prepositional development from
discourse coherence which operates between underlying speech acts (Widdowson, 1992). Van Dijk
(1989) uses the term text to refer to an abstract theoretical construct which is realized in discourse.
The author of the present paper favours the term
“text analysis” over the other terms because, on the
one hand, it implies work which is done within European tradition, on the other hand, discourse analysis embraces, to some extent, analysis of extra linguistic factors. Thus, the term text analysis will be
used to refer to the study of language above the sentence, mainly analysis of mutual connection of sentences in the text.
The scope of the present study. The importance of
continuity in the general process of text construction on the one hand, and the lack of research on
prospection and retrospection categories in the text
as means maintaining to some extent coherence
and cohesion of the text on the other hand, suggested the choice of prospection and retrospection
as the main topic of the present paper.
The objectives of the present study. The main objective of the present paper is to study the function
of retrospection and prospection in the text from
the point of view their role as categories maintaining continuity, coherence and cohesion of the text
and as a special device of narration. Thus, the following aspects of the functioning of prospection and
retrospection in the text were chosen for investigation:
1) the role of prospection and retrospection in
narration;
2) time sequencing of the plot;
3) devices maintaining prospection and retrospection.
The researched was based on F.S. Fitzgerald’s “The
Great Gatsby”. On the one hand, “The Great
Gatsby” is text of high literary value. F.J.Hoffman
wrote that in 1925, when “The Great Gatsby” first
Linas SELMISTRAITIS
Prospekcija ir retrospekcija F.S. Ficdþeraldo
,,Didþiajame Getsbyje”
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appeared, “the majority of Fitzgerald’s readers and
critics were surprised by its excellence” (Hoffman,
1962, 1). 187 pages give enough space for drawing
scientific conclusions on the topic under discussion. On the other hand, the novel has the intricate
arrangement of the events, which are not presented
chronologically. J.E. Miller comments shrewdly on
time sequencing of events in the novel. He presents
a kind of chart. “Allowing X to stand for the straight
chronological account of the summer of 1922, and
A, B, C, D and E to represent the significant events
of Gatsby’s past, the nine chapters of “The Great
Gatsby” may be charted: X, X, X, XCX, X, XBXCX,
X, XCXDX, XEXAX” (Miller, 1957, 185-186).
The research method. The main methods of the
research are descriptive and analytic ones. The first
stage of the research consisted of an analysis of scientific literature dealing with the categories of
prospection and retrospection. The second stage
encompassed an analysis of the text of belles-lettres,
i.e. the whole novel “The Great Gatsby” by
F.S.Fitzgerald. The analysis of illustrative material
was followed by the description of the data.
The theoretical and practical value of the present
study:
1) it contributes, to some extent, to the study of
text coherence and cohesion in the general theory
of text linguistics;
2) it verifies the validity of prospection and retrospection as text categories.
The text is not a chaotic collection of units of
different language levels, but a hierarchic system
where parts and units are closely connected and subordinated. As has already been mentioned, one of
the main features of the text is its cohesion and coherence. However, that does not imply that the text
is an indivisible monolith. The systematical and
structural nature of the text allows us to divide it
from the formal (architectonical) and semantic
(compositional) point of view. Thus, two categories of the text – divisibility and cohesion/coherence – are the very nature of the text and functions
as symbiotic, mutually dependant phenomenon.
Divisibility and cohesion/coherence of the text
are directly connected to the effect of “the centrifugal and centripetal forces of the text”
(Êóõàðåíêî, 1988, 72). On the one hand, the text
implies different lines of the plot, intersection of
topics, changing of points of view. Devices of different styles and registers are introduced. In consequence, the text becomes fragmentary, with centrifugal forces dominating. On the other hand, everything is subordinated to one global, chief task.
Different segments scattered in the text are connected to one topic/theme or one character, to one
continuum of place and time. Thus, centripetal
forces are switched on.
The inseparable unity of centrifugal and centripetal forces of the text is also maintained also by such
text categories as categories of prospection and retrospection. These two categories develop the plot
in two different ways:
1) prospection develops the plot forward,
cataphorically;
2) retrospection develops the plot backward,
anaphorically.
As a rule, the world of art reflects forward development of the real world. Thus, in general we can
speak here about the dominance of the cataphorical
organization of the plot.
Prospection can be conceived as foreseeing future events. It states what “information and in what
sequence is to come in the course of narration on a
certain subject” (Ìåùåðÿêîâ, 1998, 175). A widely
used term is the flash-forward or anticipation of
events. Retrospection returns to the events which
happened in the past. It is denominated as a flashback.
Both devices violate and disturb place and time
continuum. They always interrupts the content connection of two utterances, standing in a position of a
close contact. However, thanks to the precise cohesion and coherence of the text a particular fragment
of the text fluently flows into a textual net and forms
a semantic bridge which connects the previous and
the following narration.
One of the signals of prospection is a change of
the grammatical tense indication. Lexical indicators are widely used as well.
Information, which appears to be prospective, is
presented in detail in the forthcoming text. It is common for prospective episodes to be not very extensive. Thus, prospective information is only mentioned and is revealed for the reader later. That is
why a return to the interrupted continuum causes
no difficulty to the reader. Sometimes prospection
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2. Theoretical Issues of Prospection and Retrospection
in Texts of Belles-Lettres
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Prospection and Retrospection
in “The Great Gatsby” by F. S. Fitzgerald
Prospekcija ir retrospekcija F.S. Ficdþeraldo
,,Didþiajame Getsbyje”
does not give any facts of the development of future
events. In this case prospection is a kind of intensifier of the reader’s attention. It directs and activates
the reader’s interest. Retrospection, unlike
prospection, usually leads the action from the current time of the plot to the past. Sometimes, the
current time of the plot serves only as the frame for
narration-recollection.
Although these two categories are of different
nature, they “help to create the manifoldness of such
text semantic concepts as Human Being, Time and
Space” (Êóõàðåíêî, 1988, 74).
In the following two sections we shift directly to
the categories of prospection and retrospection in
“The Great Gatsby” by F.S. Fitzgerald. Our interest lies in the sphere of narration in terms of
prospection and retrospection and their realization.
The aim of this chapter is to analyze fragments
of “The Great Gatsby” where the category of retrospection is functioning. We are concerned about
lexical devices taking part in retrospection, continuum of narration, peculiarities of interrupted
narration and the structuring of the plot.
Analysis will be applied text fragments where
the category of prospection was observed. Fragments here stand for deliberately chosen blocks of
the text which illustrates the categories under discussion.
“In my younger and more vulnerable years my
father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning
over in my mind ever since.” (p. 7).
This is the introductory paragraph of ‘The Great
Gatsby”. The narrator focuses the reader’s attention on the past events. The information about the
past is meant here to describe the narrator himself.
The comparative degree of adjectives my younger
and more vulnerable years helps to show that the
narrator refers to the years gone. The story begins
with a retrospective description. However, the first
paragraph does not contain the category of retrospection because the paragraph does not interrupt
the continuity of the text. At the very starting point
of the narration the categories of prospection or
retrospection do not function.
“He didn’t say any more, but we’ve always been
unusually communicative in areserved way, and I
understood that he meant a great deal more than
that. In consequence, I’m inclined to reserve all judgements, a habit that has opened up many curious
natures to me and also made me the victim of a few
veteran bores. <…>” (p. 7). The narration in the
Past Tense is interrupted. The Past Tense is switched
to the Present. The text cohesive device in consequence is a kind of bridge joining the past to the
present, introducing the consequences. The narra-
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tor depicts his father and then switches attention to
his own feelings about himself. In consequence
helps to jump from the past to the present.
“He had changed since his New Haven years.
Now he was a sturdy straw-haired man of thirty with
a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner .
<…>” (p. 13) The sentence presents a short flashback. However, this is only an indication that Gatsby
was different in New Haven. The narrator emphasizes the fact that Gatsby had changed since New
Haven’s times. It is important for the narrator. He
pays attention to it, inviting the reader to speculate
on this fact. The narration continues to use the tense
aspect of the preceding paragraph .
“I knew now why her face was familiar - its pleasing contemptuous expression had looked out at me
from many rotogravure pictures of the sporting life at
Asheville and Hot Springs and Palm Beach. I had
heard some story of her too, a critical, unpleasant
story, but what it was I had forgotten long ago.” (p.
25) Changing of the Past Tense to Past Perfect helps
to present some facts from the past of Jordan Baker.
The preceding narration is written in the Past Tense.
Returning to the events more distant than the ones
described at the moment, the narrator uses the Past
Perfect Tense. The flash-back is very short - some
story. The narrator tries to force the reader to keep
in his/her mind separate moments of information.
The story which was heard before is mentioned here
on purpose and has a negative connotation. In the
right-handed text an unpleasant story will be told.
Here unpleasant story connects the past, present and
even the future. On the one hand, it is a retrospective detail as far as the narrator recollects the story.
On the other hand, it serves as an introduction to a
story, which is not known to the reader.
“Myrtle pulled her chair close to mine, and suddenly her warm breath poured over me the story of
her first meeting with Tom.
“I was on the two little seats facing each other
that are always the last ones left on the train. I was
going up to New York to see my sister and spend the
night. <…>” (p. 42). The first paragraph of this
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3. The Category of Retrospection in
“The Great Gatsby” by F.S. Fitzgerald.
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fragment performs a dual function. On the one hand,
the sentence indicates that the plot will go back to
the events which had happened some time ago.
However, the tense-aspect does not change. The
narration continues in the Past Simple Tense - I
was on the two little seats. The first meeting signals
the narration which precedes the current events. The
following paragraph represents a narration about
the first meeting of Myrtle and Tom. On the other
hand “her warm breath poured over me the story”
implicitly plays a prospective role. The reader is
given a hint that in the right-handed text there will
be found this story. The first sentence gives information in a condensed way. The semantics of first
meeting is revealed later, in the following paragraphs.
“Reading over what I have written so far, I see I
have given the impression that the events of three
nights several weeks apart were all that absorbed
me. On the contrary, they were merely casual events
in a crowded summer, and, until much later, they
absorbed me infinitely less than my personal affairs.”
(p. 62). In this extract we can see the interlacing of
Present and Past Tenses. Time indications direct to
the present and the past. The narrator returns to the
past events and gives them a new light. They interrupt the content connection of the two utterances,
standing in a position of a close contact. However,
thanks to the precise cohesion and coherence of the
text, the fragment fluently flows into a textual net
and forms a semantic bridge which connects the
previous to the following narration. Events from
the past three nights several weeks apart are recalled
from the reader’s memory. They are activated and
get a new interpretation.
“ <…> Sitting down behind many layers of glass
in a sort of green leather conservatory, we started to
town.
I had talked with him perhaps half a dozen times
in the past month and found, to my disappointment,
that he had little to say. <…>” (p. 70) Changing
tenses – Past to Past Perfect (we started to town / I
had talked) – give space just for a short mentioning
of the conversations which took place between Nick
and Gatsby. The narrator mentions these conversations to make some conclusions about the main character – Gatsby, who cannot keep up the conversation. Retrospection in this fragment and the previous ones can be treated as a “paradigmatic process”
(Ãàëüïåðèí, 1981, 109). Juxtaposition of what was
said and what is being described at the moment creates connections of systemic nature rather than linear.
“I turned toward Mr.Gatsby, but he was no longer
there.
One October day in nineteen-seventeen – (said
Jordan Baker that afternoon, sitting up very straight
on a straight chair in the tea-garden at the Plaza
Hotel) – I was walking along from one place to another. <…>” (p. 80).
In chapter IV Jordan Baker retrospectively returns to the events that are preceding the year 1922
when the present action took place. Retrospection
is indicated by a concrete time modifier One October day in nineteen-seventeen. However, the grammatical tense does not change. The following paragraphs are the first narration about Gatsby’s past –
meeting Daisy, the important love affair between
Gatsby and Daisy which took place five years before the action in the book. It is presented from
J.Baker’s point of view. The narration continues for
13 paragraphs and finishes with the words When
Jordan Baker had finished telling all this we had left
the Plaza… The cataphorical pronouns all this semantically embrace everything what was narrated
and renews interrupted narration. All this is a kind
of text cohesive device.
“James Gatz - that was really, or at least legally,
his name. He had changed it at the age of seventeen
at specific moment… It was James Gatz who had
been loafing along the beach that afternoon in torn
green jersey <…>…” (p. 104) The restropective
narration in chapter VI is about Gatsby (James Gatz
is Gatsby’s real name) at the age of seventeen joining Dan Cody’s yacht in Minnesota. Time sequencing of the plot goes back to Gatz’s youth. The narrator uses the Past and the Past perfect Tense. This
retrospective narration continues for ten paragraphs.
The following paragraph returns to the present time
of the plot: “He told me all this very much later, but
I’ve put it down here with the idea of exploding those
first wild rumors about his antecedents, which weren’t
even faintly true…. So I take advantage of this short
halt, while Gatsby, so to speak, caught his breath, to
clear this set misconceptions away” (p. 108). The
narrator uses the words much later to indicate, that
these 10 paragraphs do not correspond to the linear
time sequencing of the plot and it was a kind of
forestalling. Then the narrator continues the interrupted narration “It was a halt, too, in my association with his affairs. For several weeks I didn’t see
him or hear his voice on the phone. <…>” (p. 108).
The narration is continued in the Past Tense.
Retrospection puts some new accents to the text.
Correlation between the two parts of the text which
are in juxtaposition gives new ideas, evokes some
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Prospection and Retrospection
in “The Great Gatsby” by F. S. Fitzgerald
parallels in terms of their semantic and estheticartistic value. The reader keeps in his memory some
facts, characteristics, time and place and he unconsciously works out his own attitude to what is described in the text. Thus, the narrator creates the
character of Gatsby presenting details from the past
of Gatsby step by step.
“And she doesn’t understand”, he said. “She used
to be able to understand. We’d sit for hours –”
He broke off and began to walk up and down a
desolate path of fruit rinds and discarded favors and
crushed flowers.” (p. 117) The two sentences, uttered by Gatsby, are retrospective and contain Past
Tense. However, the second sentence is interrupted
in the middle. The retrospection is cut short to emphasize the nervous state of the main character. The
narrator’s words follow Gatsby’s words and they
return interrupted narration to the current time.
“…One autumn night, five years before, they had
been walking down the street when the leaves were
falling, and they came to a place where there were no
trees and the sidewalk was white with moonlight.
<…>” (p. 117). The narrator starts a retropective
narration about Gatsby’s and Daisy’s second meeting in Europe. The tense does not change – it remains the Past Tense. The retrospection continues
for 2 paragraphs. Then it is fluently connected to
the following paragraph: “Through all he said, even
through his appalling sentimentality, I was reminded
of something – an elusive rhythm, a fragment of lost
words, that I had heard somewhere a long time ago.
<…>”. The retrospective narration is interrupted.
The words “through all he said” are semantic substitutes what was said in the two previous paragraphs.
It fluently joins retrospective narration to the present
time of the plot.
“It was this night that he told me the strange
story of his youth with Dan Cody …I think that he
would have acknowledged anything now, without
reserve, but he wanted to talk about Daisy.
She was the first “nice” girl he had ever known
<…>” (p. 154). Strange story is a retrospective narration about Gatsby’s and Daisy’s meeting. The epithet strange gives an evaluative tinge to what was
told by Gatsby. At the same time the connotative
meaning of the word strange is focused on the very
character of Gatsby, too.
The tense aspect does not change. The narration
is in the Past Tense as in the previous text. A change
of the time sequencing of the plot can be noticed
because of the words “now” , “I think”. The following paragraphs have no Present Tense indicators.
“He came back from France when Tom and Daisy
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were still on their wedding trip, and made a miserable but irresistible journey to Louisville on the last
of his army pay. He stayed there a week, walking the
streets where their footsteps had clicked together
through the November night and revisiting the outof-the-way places to which they had driven in her
white car. Just as Daisy’s house has always seemed
to him more mysterious and gay than other houses,
so his idea of the city itself, even though she was gone
from it, was pervaded with a melancholy beauty.” (p.
158) The account of Gatsby’s war experiences and
his trip, after discharge, back to Louisville to Daisy’s
home, is given in chapter VIII. Miserable and irresistible journey confirms that Gatsby was irresistible towards Daisy. Gatsby’s emotions concerning
Daisy’s house (mysterious and gay) once more proves
his special feelings for Daisy. The following sentences add more to the character of Gatsby. The
retrospective narration continues for several paragraphs.
“Now I want to go back a little and tell what
happened at the garage after we left there the night
before.” (p. 163). The narrator directly indicates
that he will retrospectively describe the scene at the
garage. “The night before” is a semantic indication
of the retrospective narration.
“My memory goes back to when first I met him”,
he said. “A young major just out of the army and
covered over with medals he got in the war. <…>”
(p. 177). Gatsby’s entry into his present mysterious
occupation through Wolfsheim is presented briefly.
The narrator uses for retrospective narration the
same lexical units as in the previous fragment: to go
back. The narrator uses the exact time indicator
when first I met him. The fragment pictures Gatsby
as a young major, which is important to the full
picture of the character described.
“Look here, this is a book he had when he was a
boy. It just shows you”.
“He opened it at the back of the cover and turned
it around for me to see. On the last fly-leaf was printed
the word SCHEDULE, and the date September 12,
1906. <…>” (p. 180). The reader finds the earliest
facts from Gatsby’s life - the only glimpse of Gatsby’s
boyhood. The facts from Gatsby’s boyhood are presented in a peculiar way: the schedule of a day routine and general aims. The schedule and resolves
are followed by the comments of Wolfsheim. These
are the final facts about Gatsby’s character. They
are presented almost at the end of the novel. In this
case retrospection presents the widest semantic gap
between the current plot floating and the present
narration.
Linas SELMISTRAITIS
Prospekcija ir retrospekcija F.S. Ficdþeraldo
,,Didþiajame Getsbyje”
þ m o g u s
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While reading, the reader accumulates facts, features of characters and works out consciously or
unconsciously his/her attitudes towards the text and
the characters. The perception of the character
changes according to the narrator’s intentions, which
is partially implemented through retrosprospective
fragments. Changing of the subjective-evaluative
phone is in the sphere of retrospection, too.
4. The Category of Prospection in
“The Great Gatsby” by F.S. Fitzgerald.
Prospection is a less frequently used category in
the text under analysis. We have found prospection
only in three fragments.
“<…> No – Gatsby turned out all right at the
end; it is what prayed on Gatsby what foul dust floated
in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed
out my interest in the abortive sorrows and shortwinded elations of men. ” (p. 8). At the end indicates
prospective changing of the narrator’s attitude towards the main character of the novel. The appreciation of Gatsby by the narrator changes only at
the end of the story - turned out all right at the end.
It gives the reader a chance to be more attentive and
implies that the narrator’s attitude must change.
When the reader knows what changes are coming,
he/she penetrates into the content information, i. e.
conceptual information. The very semantics of the
time modifier at the end, when used at the beginning of the novel, indicates some prospective
changes. Here the prospection does not give any
facts of the development of the future events. In this
case the prospection is a kind of intensifier of the
reader’s attention. It directs and activates the reader’s
interest. This kind of prospection could be called a
prospective detail.
“I’m going to make a big request of you to-day,”
he said, pocketing his souvenirs with satisfaction, ‘so
I thought you ought to know something about me. I
didn’t want you to think I was just some nobody. You
see, I usually find myself among strangers because I
drift here and there trying to forget the sad thing that
happened to me”. He hesitated. “You’ll hear about it
this afternoon” (p. 73). The Future Tense indicates
a flash-forwarding. The Future Tense indicates that
the reader is going to hear some new facts from
Gatsby’s life. There is a definite time indication –
“this afternoon”. So the reader can predict what
comes next because future events are foregrounded
here.
“It was seven o’clock when we got into the coupe
with him and started for Long Island. <…>
So we drove on toward death through the cooling
twilight” (p. 142). The sentence gives a prospective
hint about the forthcoming events. The word death
gives the idea that the future description will be
colored by someone’s death. It leads the reader to a
more clear and comprehensible connection of the
text fragments, events, episodes. The connotation
of the word death captures the reader’s attention,
he/she goes deeper into the text, because the prospective narration is enlightened by the anticipation of death. The current time of the plot is perceived in a slightly different way. It is something of
a mystery that needs to be defined and solved in the
action that follows. Here we deal again with prospective detail.
Having analyzed 3 cases of prospection and 16
cases of retrospection we can draw the following
conclusions.
In the text prospective fragments are not extensive: they consist of one to three sentences. Thus, a
returning to the interrupted continuum was not difficult. The information, which appeared to be prospective, was presented in detail in the succeeding
text. Some information was only mentioned (turned
out all right at the end, drove on toward death) and
revealed for the reader later. In this case prospection
was a kind of intensifier of the reader’s attention,
giving some hints about forthcoming events. This
kind of prospection could be called a prospective
detail.
The prospection in “The Great Gatsby” functioned as a text device which presented the perceiving of forthcoming events in a slightly different way.
It guaranteed the reader’s more distinct imagination about the connection and self-dependence of
the events.
The narrator used such lexical devices as time
modifiers for the prospective indicating of the
events. One of the signals of prospection in the text
was a change of a grammatical tense: Past or Present
Tense forms were changed to Future Tense form in
the second fragment.
A more important role in the text was played by
retrospection. The retrospection in ‘The Great
Gatsby” performed the following functions: it con-
ISNN 1392-8600
5. Conclusions
57
Prospection and Retrospection
in “The Great Gatsby” by F. S. Fitzgerald
Prospekcija ir retrospekcija F.S. Ficdþeraldo
,,Didþiajame Getsbyje”
nected the past events to the current time of the
plot, presented the information from the past for a
deeper and more complete understanding of the
events and characters, gave an opportunity to think
over the current events in a new light. Sometimes
retrospection helped to refresh the reader’s memory
of the facts, which were presented in the preceding
handed text. It gave new information about some
facts, too. Retrospection forced the reader to think
over the information, introduced earlier, in new circumstances, in a new context. In some cases retrospection concentrated the reader’s attention on separate parts of the text which were considered to be
important in disclosing the concept or the message
of the text.
The forms and length of restrospective fragments
varied, but the signals of the introduction and functions remained the same. A returning to the interrupted continuum was not difficult for the reader.
Precise cohesion and coherence of the text helped a
particular fragment of the text flow fluently into a
textual net and form a semantic bridge which connected the previous to the following narration. It
was achieved through the semantic structure of the
text, i. e. through coherence, the repetition of the
topics and main characters, semantically penetrating the plot of the novel, text cohesion maintained
by specific lexical devices such as time and tense
modifiers, repetition of pronouns, substitution, when
a long fragment was condensed into a few words.
In terms of semantics and time sequencing of the
plot, retrospection and prospection are of different
nature, their forms and length vary. However, they
have features relevant to both categories. Prospection
and retrospection were involved in partial semantic
repetitions. They always interrupted the content
connection of two utterances, standing in a position
of a close contact. First, information was presented
in a condensed way, later it was unfolded. Both categories interrupted the current time of narration,
simultaneously maintained the connection between
the past and the future.
The narrator used the exact time and place modifiers to indicate the exact time and place of the
events, presented through retrospective narration:
North Dakota, Minnesota, Louisville, Long Island;
September 12, 1906; one autumn night five years
before; at the age of seventeen; one October day in
nineteen-seventeen; since New Haven years; in my
younger and more vulnerable years. The narrator
maneuvred the present and the past in a succession
of scenic records: Louisville, Long island, Minnesota, Europe. Everything was seen either in memory
or in the impact of the present action. The narrator
worked “backwards and forwards” until the complete portraits of the characters finally emerged at
the end of the book.
The intricate way of arranging the events was seen
only by tracing the events through the book chronologically. The narrator Nick Carraway connected
all the events to float them in one continuum. This
interweaving of the present and the past was especially important in the light of Nick Carraway’s
role as the narrator. Series of scenes dramatizing
the major events of the story were connected by brief
passages of interpretation and a summary. The past
was constructed from several sources and presented
in fragments which were placed each time at the
proper moment of the current action for maximum
effectiveness.
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Linas SELMISTRAITIS
Literature