Worked example — How The Great Gatsby is classified
A worked example of the classification standard applied to one book. Every value below comes from a cited public source.
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (Scribner, 1925) is the most-assigned 11th-grade novel in the US AP English Literature curriculum and the canonical short-novel for late-high-school close reading. It works well as a worked example because its data shape is meaningfully different from To Kill a Mockingbird — higher Lexile, narrower grade band, AP-required (not optional), zero banning records — so the methodology demonstrates differently across the same six dimensions.
The book’s machine-readable record is at /api/book/the-great-gatsby; the human-readable page with full assignment list is at /book/the-great-gatsby.
1. Lexile measure
Value: 1070L.Sourced from MetaMetrics’ Lexile Hub. 1070L is at the upper edge of grade 9-10 (≈900-1200L) and squarely within grade 11-CCR (≈1100-1400L) — consistent with the book’s most common assignment context (grade 11). Notably 200L higher than To Kill a Mockingbird’s 870L despite being a shorter book, reflecting denser sentence structure and more idiomatic Jazz-Age vocabulary.
2. Grade band
Value: grades 10-12. A narrower band than TKAM (which spans 7-10). Reflects that Gatsby is rarely assigned in middle school — the prose density and themes (infidelity, materialism, vehicular death) are high-school-only territory. Common Core ELA Appendix B cites it specifically as a grade 11-CCR exemplar.
Source: CCSS ELA Appendix B (Text Exemplars, grades 11-CCR).
3. Curriculum alignment
The book is cited in two named pedagogical frameworks tracked on this site:
- Common Core State Standards (ELA), grade 11. Listed in CCSS ELA Appendix B as a grade 11-CCR text exemplar.
- AP English Literature and Composition, grade 11. Cited in the College Board’s AP English Literature course framework as a requiredreading — a stronger designation than TKAM’s “recommended” status. The AP exam regularly references Gatsby in free-response prompts.
Sources: CCSS ELA Appendix B · AP English Literature course framework (College Board).
4. State-level evidence
The book appears on two state ELA frameworks tracked by this site as of publication: New York and Massachusetts — both citing it at grade 11. Notably appears on the New York City Department of Education district reading list, providing an additional district-level citation beyond the state-level evidence.
Sources: New York State Education Department · Massachusetts Department of Elementary & Secondary Education · NYC Department of Education (district page).
5. Removal / banning records
Zero documented removals or formal challenges. Gatsby does not appear in PEN America’s Index of School Book Bans. This contrasts with TKAM’s four-state record and is consistent with the book’s long-standing status in the AP curriculum: required, broadly accepted, rarely contested at the K-12 level despite its themes of wealth, infidelity, and disillusionment.
Source verified empty: PEN America — Index of School Book Bans (2022-2024) (no entries for The Great Gatsby).
6. Seasonal & contextual tags
One AP Literature grade 11 assignment carries a summer context tag — Gatsby is a frequent summer-reading recommendation for incoming AP English Literature students because of its short length (180 pages) and dense prose, making it a useful pre-course warm-up.
Source: AP English Literature course framework — summer reading guidance.
Bonus dimension — public domain status
Gatsby entered the US public domain on January 1, 2021 (95-year copyright term from 1925 publication). This affects the book in ways the classification standard’s six core dimensions don’t cover: free reprints can be produced by any publisher, and classroom adaptations and derivative works no longer require permissions. The book’s detail page links the canonical paperback edition on Amazon. This is a worked-example bonus, not a core methodology dimension — the standard’s six dimensions don’t depend on copyright status.
How this rolls up
When you view /grade/11, The Great Gatsby appears because its grade band (10-12) overlaps grade 11. When you view /state/new-york/grade/11, it appears because the New York State ELA framework cites it at grade 11 AND the Common Core / AP Literature national curricula apply across all states. When you query /api/v1/recommend?grade=11&curriculum=ap-literature, Gatsby is one of the higher-Lexile entries (1070L). When you query with exclude_banned=true, Gatsby still appears (zero banning records).
The takeaway from comparing this example with TKAM’s walkthrough: the same six dimensions produce very different classification outcomes for different books. That’s the methodology working — the framework is consistent, the data drives the result.
Want a different example?
Worked examples are added on request. If you’re a researcher or developer building on this dataset and need the methodology walked through for a specific book, contact us via the contact page.