Gatsby@100 Chapter 7 featuring Kim Stanley Robinson and Maxine Hong Kingston

Kim Stanley Robinson is, according to The New Yorker, “generally acknowledged as one of the greatest living science-fiction writers.” He is the author of more than twenty novels, including the Orange County Trilogy, the Mars Trilogy, and the Science in the Capital Series. His 2020 novel The Ministry for the Future won the Best Foreign Novel award at the 2024 Grand Prix L’Imaginaire, honoring the best fiction or science fiction book published in France in 2023. His most recent book is The High Sierra: A Love Story (2022).

Maxine Hong Kingston’s 1976 memoir The Woman Warrior won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award. Her 1980 non-fiction book China Men won the National Book Award; her 1989 novel Tripmaster Monkey won the PEN West Award; and her 2006 anthology Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace won the Northern California Book Award Special Award in Publishing. In 1997, she was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Bill Clinton, and in 2014 President Barack Obama awarded her the National Medal of Arts. 

Chapter 7 finds the rising drama of Jay Gatsby's quest to prove himself worthy of East Egg explode as the cuckolded Tom Buchanan outs our mysteriously ostentatious man of wealth as "Mr. Nobody from Nowhere." After a clash at the Plaza Hotel, Nick and company are complicit in the shocking demise of Myrtle Wilson, mowed down by a "death car" under the eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg. As Nick realizes, Gatsby faces a moment of doubt in his ability to realize the special destiny he believes he deserves.