Imagery In The Great Gatsby

“Creating visual imagery is a state of mind. It involves the reproduction of what we see. But much more than that, it becomes an outlet to express feeling about what we experience.” (Tracy Sabin). In literature, imagery is what gives books the attention it needs, but what is it about imagery that draws readers so much to books? In The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, and The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway, the two authors bring readers deeper into the reading with their use of sensory oriented imagery. Without the use of this imagery, it could be a possibility that these books may have not been as successful as they truly are. While the plots of the book typically get more recognition, the imagery is what gives books most of …show more content…
At sea, Santiago goes through some rough times trying to catch the marlin. While in his boat, he cuts his hands on the fishing wire. “He woke with the jerk of his right fist coming up against his face and the line burning out through his right hand. He had no feeling of his left hand but he braked all he could with his right and the line rushed out. Finally his left hand found the line and he leaned back against the line and now it burned his back and his left hand, and his left hand was taking all the strain and cutting badly. He looked back at the coils of line and they were feeding smoothly. Just then the fish jumped making a great bursting of the ocean and then a heavy fall. Then he jumped again and again and the boat was going fast although line was still racing out and the old man was raising the strain to breaking point and raising it to breaking point again and again. He had been pulled down tight onto the bow and his face was in the cut slice of dolphin and he could not move.” (Hemingway, d2). His quest was just only starting and was already off to a rough start. Back on land, he passes out and is laid out with his arms spread and palms up, but when the boy sees him, he is very sad at what he sees in front of him. “He was asleep when the boy looked in the door in the morning. It was blowing so hard that the drifting-boats would not be going out and the boy had slept late and then come to the old man’s shack as he had come each morning. The boy saw that the old man was breathing and then he saw the old man’s hands and he started to cry. He went out very quietly to go to bring some coffee and all the way down the road he was crying.” (Hemingway, d5). Here we are given the sense that this was truly one of the hardest things he's gone through and we were able to “live” through it with

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