Full Answer
What does levity mean in The Great Gatsby?
Lightness of manner or speech1. Levity. noun Lightness of manner or speech, especially when inappropriate; frivolity. “frequently I have feigned sleep, preoccupation, or a hostile levity when I realized by some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon…”
What does intimate revelation mean?
'Intimate revelations' means that the other young men were telling him private or even secret things about themselves. Nowadays, this phrase usually has a sexual significance: however, in the past it meant simply private matters and I should not think that Fitzgerald intended anything more than that.
What does it mean to feigned sleep?
Feign comes from the Latin fingere "to devise, fabricate." The word fiction comes from the same source, so if you feign something such as sleep, you give off the fiction that you are sleeping.
What does quivering on the horizon mean?
An object on the horizon will quiver because of the way that hot air rising will distort an image.
Have feigned sleep preoccupation or a hostile levity when I realized?
I was privy to the secret griefs of wild, unknown men. Most of the confidences were unsought—frequently I have feigned sleep, preoccupation, or a hostile levity when I realized by some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon.
What is a unwieldy?
Definition of unwieldy : not easily managed, handled, or used (as because of bulk, weight, complexity, or awkwardness) : cumbersome.
What does feign ignorance mean?
Description. If the other person wants to talk about something and you do not, then you can sometimes shorten the conversation (or even kill it stone dead) by pretending that you know little or nothing about the subject.
Does Fein mean fake?
Feign is all about faking it, but that hasn't always been so. An early meaning of the word is "to fashion, form, or shape." That meaning comes from its Latin source: the verb fingere. In time, people began fashioning feign to suggest the act of forming, or giving shape to, false appearances.