WINDSOR, England (Reuters) – Jay Gatsby, the tragic hero of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s most famous work, made an appearance at the wedding of Queen Elizabeth’s granddaughter Princess Eugenie on Friday.
Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank during their wedding ceremony at St George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle, Windsor, Britain, October 12, 2018. Danny Lawson/Pool via REUTERS
After Eugenie and wine merchant Jack Brooksbank were wed at Windsor Castle, her sister read a passage from the novel about the characteristic smile of Gatsby, a rich man famed for throwing lavish parties for the 1920s New York glitterati.
“It (Gatsby’s smile) understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey,” Eugenie’s sister, Beatrice of York, read.
“Precisely at that point it vanished – and I was looking at an elegant young rough-neck, a year or two over 30, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd.”
According to the Dean of Windsor, David Conner, who officiated at the wedding, Eugenie had read “The Great Gatsby” shortly after meeting Brooksbank and the passage reminded her of her future husband’s own smile.
“As we heard from the reading: ‘It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it’,” Conner said.
Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Robin Pomeroy