Russ: The Gatsbian Rise

We landed in Beijing after an uneventful flight, my favorite kind. After shuffling through customs, we met up with our student hosts. Leo, Nancy, and Joan are college students who volunteered to chaperone our group around Beijing for the week.

Nancy told me she is a sophomore at the Beijing Science and Technology University and majoring in English. When I talk to other English majors the conversation inevitably turns to The Great Gatsby.

“It’s about the American dream?” she asked.

“Sort of,” I said.  “There’s a lot going on in those pages.”

On the bus ride to the hotel, I asked Nancy if there was something comparable to Gatsby in Chinese literature.

“Modern China,” she said as we drove past skyscrapers draped in the afternoon haze.