Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter - to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther ... And one fine morning ---

One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.

I had a strong sudden instinct that I must be alone. I didn’t want to see any people at all. I had seen so many people all my life -- I was an average mixer, but more than average in a tendency to identify myself, my ideas, my destiny, with those of all classes that came in contact with. I was always saving or being saved -- in a single morning I would go through the emotions ascribable to Wellington at Waterloo. I lived in a world of inscrutable hostiles and inalienable friends and supporters.

That familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.

God knows what you've been doing, everything you've been doing. You may fool me, but you can't fool God!

but there was an immediately perceptible vitality about her as if the nerves of her body were continually smouldering.

The two basic stories of all times are Cinderella and Jack the Giant Killer-the charm of women and the courage of men.