If there is one American novel that is well-known to teachers and students alike, it’s F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic, The Great Gatsby, which captures the clash of traditional and modern values in 1920’s America. It’s probably featured on more high school reading lists than any other book I can name.At heart, it’s an exceedingly simple story. A slow-motion tragedy involving a very rich man, Jay Gatsby, in love with a beautiful young woman, Daisy Buchanan, who is married to the well-bred – but somewhat boring and ill-mannered – Tom Buchanan. The story is told through the eyes of Nick Carraway, a likable fellow from the midwest with whom most readers can identify. The background is haunted the mysterious Meyer Wolfsheim, and further decorated by Nick’s girlfriend the golfer Jordan Baker and attended by George and Myrtle Wilson. And that is the cast of characters, or so it seems.