Narrators Ancient and Modern: Petronius’ Satyrica and Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby

James L. W. West, III (Pennsylvania State University)

Though F. Scott Fitzgerald’s penultimate version of his novel was entitled Trimalchio, a gesture toward the freed slave in the Satyrica who, like Jay Gatsby, gives loud, ostentatious parties, this paper argues that the closest parallel between the two texts is their mode of narration, and details how, despite some differences, Encolpius is in many ways the direct ancestor of Nick Carraway. Fitzgerald eventually settled on The Great Gatsby as his title, but the text of the book still contains allusions to Petronius, and Fitzgerald wants us to know that he is drawing parallels between the Rome of Nero's era and the gaudy American 1920s. Nick Carraway is not the hapless, beleaguered ne’er-do-well on the model of Encolpius, and he is far more thoughtful and reflective than the anti-hero of the Satyrica. But, like Encolpius in many parts of the Satyrica, Nick Carraway is a liminal character in the story, standing both outside the main action of the story but also drawn into the story by his own connections to the characters. An acute observer of people and surroundings like Encopius, he can both describe dispassionately but also reflect sympathetically. Both narrators shape the story considerably and, by controlling the information the reader receives, also profoundly affect the reader’s response to the characters and their lives.