The Great Gatsby Vocabulary List #5
Using context clues, write what you think the word means; using a dictionary, or a reference source, write the actual definition of the
term and the meaning of the stem(s). The stems are identified for you; they are underlined or italicized.
Target Goals: I can determine and clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases using context.
I can verify the meaning of a word using a dictionary.
Common Core State Standards: L. 10. 4a and L.10.4d
1.
“Now he was a sturdy straw-haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner.”
(Ch. 1) cili – cilium
2. His speaking voice, a gruff husky tenor, added to the impression of fractiousness he conveyed. There
was a touch of paternal contempt in it, even toward people he liked — and there were men at New
Haven who had hated his guts.
3. “Her host looked at her incredulously” (Ch. 1)
4.
“A momentary hush; the orchestra leader varies his rhythm obligingly for her and there is a burst of
chatter as the erroneous news goes around that she is Gilda Gray’s understudy from the “Follies.” The
party has begun.” (Ch. 3)
5.
“A celebrated tenor had sung in Italian and a notorious contralto had sung in jazz and between the
numbers people were doing “stunts” all over the garden while happy vacuous bursts of laughter rose
toward the summer sky.” (Ch.3)
6.
“I had expected that Mr. Gatsby would be a florid and corpulent person in his middle years.” (Ch. 3)
7.
“Da Fontano the promoter came there, and Ed Legros and James B. (“Rot-gut”) Ferret and the de Jongs
and Ernest Lilly – they came to gamble and when Ferret wandered into the garden it meant he was
cleaned out and Associated Traction would have to fluctuate profitably next day.” (Ch. 4)
8.
“Gatsby took an arm of each of us and moved forward into the restaurant, whereupon Mr. Wolfsheim
swallowed a new sentence he was starting and lapsed into a somnambulatory abstraction.” (Ch.4)
9. “He raised his hand to stop my words, looked at me with unforgettable reproach and opening the door
cautiously went back into the other room.” (Ch. 5)
10. “Americans, while occasionally willing to be serfs, have always been obstinate about being peasantry.”
(Ch. 5)
11. “He was now decently clothed in a “sport-shirt” open at the neck, sneakers and duck trousers of a
nebulous hue.” (Ch. 5)
12. “This was his day off and with laudable initiative he had hurried out ‘to see.’” (Ch. 6)
13. “James Gatz – that was really, or at least legally, his name. He had changed it at the age of seventeen
and at the specific moment that witnessed the beginning of his career – when he saw Dan Cody’s yacht
drop anchor over the most insidious flat on Lake Superior.” (Ch. 6)
14. “He was employed in a vague personal capacity – while he remained with Cody he was in turn steward,
mate, skipper, secretary, and even jailor, for Dan Cody sober knew what lavish doings Dan Cody drunk
might soon be about, and he provided for such contingencies by reposing more and more trust in
Gatsby.” (Ch.6)
15. “For several weeks I didn’t see him or hear his voice on the phone – mostly I was in New York, trotting
around with Jordan and trying to ingratiate myself with her senile aunt – but finally I went over to his
house one Sunday afternoon.” (Ch. 6)
16. “At this point Jordan and I tried to go but Tom and Gatsby insisted with competitive firmness that we
remain – as though neither of them had anything to conceal and it would be a privilege to partake
vicariously of their emotions.” (Ch. 7) vic=vice
17. “I was thirty. Before me stretched the portentous, menacing road of a new decade.” (Ch. 7)
18. “She was the first “nice” girl he had ever known. In various unrevealed capacities he had come in
contact with such people but always with indiscernible barbed wire between.” (Ch. 8)
19. “I suppose there’d be a curious crowd around there all day with little boys searching for dark spots in
the dust, and some garrulous man telling over and over what had happened, until it became less and less
real even to him and he could tell it no longer, and Myrtle Wilson’s tragic achievement was forgotten.”
(Ch. 8)
20. Elocution (Ch. 9)
a. “On the last fly-leaf was printed the word SCHEDULE, and the date September 12th, 1906. And
underneath:
Rise from bed…………………………….
6.00
A.M.
Dumbbell exercise and wall scaling……..
6.15-6.30
“
Study electricity, etc……………………..
7.15-8.15
“
Work……………………………………..
8.30-4.30
P.M.
Baseball and sports………………………
4.30-5.00
“
Practice elocution, poise and how to attain it 5.00-6.00
“
Study needed inventions…………………
“
7.00-9.00
pg. 181