Vandamm Studio, 1926, via New York Public Library (public domain)
Free English reading, level B2
Read The Great Gatsby in Fitzgerald's original English
The Great American Novel opens on a single, quietly loaded sentence. Read it exactly as Fitzgerald wrote it, not flattened by translation.
Learn English with this book for freeThe Great Gatsby is famous for prose so precise that a single misread word can throw off the whole sentence, and Fitzgerald never simplifies for the reader. Lira keeps the text exactly as Fitzgerald wrote it, but every unfamiliar word is one tap away from a translation, and every word you look up gets scheduled for review so the vocabulary actually sticks, not just the plot.
Key vocabulary from The Great Gatsby
A preview of the words you'll run into early on, with pronunciation. Every one of them, and every other word you tap while reading, gets saved to your review deck automatically.
vulnerable
easily hurt, exposed
advice
advice
communicative
open, willing to share
judgement
judgment
reckless
careless, heedless of danger
wistful
longingly sad
What actually happens while you read
One tap to translate
Click any unfamiliar word for its contextual translation, right inside the page. No dictionary tab, no losing your place in the story.
Every word saved with its sentence
The word you looked up keeps the exact sentence you found it in, not an isolated flashcard, so the meaning stays anchored to real context.
FSRS brings it back before you forget
Spaced repetition schedules each word's next review right before you'd naturally lose it, so vocabulary from this book actually stays with you.
In my younger and more years my father gave me some that I've been turning over in my mind ever since.
TRANSLATION
easily hurt, exposed
CONTEXT
In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since.
Start reading free →The science
Recognizing a word isn't the same as remembering it
According to Stephen Krashen's comprehensible input hypothesis, a language is acquired durably through exposure to content you mostly already understand, not through isolated word lists. Reading a real book supplies exactly that kind of exposure. Spaced repetition on top of it is what turns a word you translated once into one you actually remember weeks later.
Learning approach
Retention with Lira
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