《了不起的蓋茨比》以20世紀20年代生活在紐約市及長島的中上層社會為背景，以窮小子尼克的視角出發，講述了蓋茨比歷盡艱辛不擇手段地攫取財富，最終從一個窮光蛋變成“了不起”的富豪，以及他與初戀時因貧窮而失去的情人黛西之間的情感糾葛。蓋茨比對名車豪宅、奢靡派對充滿了狂熱的喜愛，他瘋狂的享樂主義和對財富不擇手段的追逐，折射了當時社會普通的的躁動情緒和道德倒退。而黛西對他情感的態度同時也揭露了當時殘酷的社會現實，揭示了“美國夢”的破滅。
　　本書一經出版便獲得高度評價，村上春樹、海明威、和艾略特等著名作家都給予了該書極高的評價。

★美國文學史上的經典之作
★唱響了“爵士時代”的哀哀挽歌

Chapter 1
IN MY YOUNGERand more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turningover in my mind ever since.
‘Wheneveryou feel like criticising anyone,’ he told me, ‘just remember that all thepeople in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.’
Hedidn’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. Inconsequence, I’m inclined to reserve all judgements, a habit that has opened upmany curious natures to me and also made me the victim of not a few veteranbores. The abnormal mind is quick to detect and attach itself to this qualitywhen it appears in a normal person, and so it came about that in college I wasunjustly accused of being a politician, because I was privy to the secret griefof wild, unknown men. Most of the confidences were unsought — frequently I havefeigned sleep, preoccupation or a hostile levity when I realized by someunmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon; forthe intimate revelations of young men, or at least the terms in which theyexpress them, are usually plagiaristic and marred by obvious suppressions.Reserving judgments is a matter of infinite hope. I am still a little afraid ofmissing something if I forget that, as my father snobbishly suggested, and Isnobbishly repeat, a sense of the fundamental decencies is parcelled outunequally at birth.