immoderate
Although "immoderately" is used here to describe how Catherine laughed in response to Nick's question of whether she lived in the apartment with her sister Myrtle, it can describe how all the guests conducted themselves at this party. Even the discreet Nick got drunk for the second time in his life and somehow ended up standing beside the bed of Mr. McKee, who was clad only in his underwear.
But when I asked her she laughed immoderately, repeated my question aloud and told me she lived with a girl friend at a hotel.
languid
His wife was shrill, languid, handsome and horrible.
hauteur
The intense vitality that had been so remarkable in the garage was converted into impressive hauteur.
assertion
Her laughter, her gestures, her assertions became more violently affected moment by moment and as she expanded the room grew smaller around her until she seemed to be revolving on a noisy, creaking pivot through the smoky air.
mincing
"My dear," she told her sister in a high mincing shout, "most of these fellas will cheat you every time.
strident
I wanted to get out and walk eastward toward the park through the soft twilight but each time I tried to go I became entangled in some wild strident argument which pulled me back, as if with ropes, into my chair.
impassioned
Some time toward midnight Tom Buchanan and Mrs. Wilson stood face to face discussing in impassioned voices whether Mrs. Wilson had any right to mention Daisy's name.
deft
Making a short deft movement Tom Buchanan broke her nose with his open hand.
ravage
And on Mondays eight servants including an extra gardener toiled all day with mops and scrubbing-brushes and hammers and garden-shears, repairing the ravages of the night before.
garnish
On buffet tables, garnished with glistening hors-d'oeuvre, spiced baked hams crowded against salads of harlequin designs and pastry pigs and turkeys bewitched to a dark gold.
gaudy
The last swimmers have come in from the beach now and are dressing upstairs; the cars from New York are parked five deep in the drive, and already the halls and salons and verandas are gaudy with primary colors and hair shorn in strange new ways and shawls beyond the dreams of Castile.
permeate
The bar is in full swing and floating rounds of cocktails permeate the garden outside until the air is alive with chatter and laughter and casual innuendo and introductions forgotten on the spot and enthusiastic meetings between women who never knew each other's names.
prodigality
Although "prodigality" is used here to describe how the guests are spilling out their laughter with each drink they pour down their throats, the guests did not actually spend any money at the party. Gatsby is using their prodigal natures (that come from being born into money) and his current ability to be prodigal in order to get closer to Daisy. Unlike his guests, he is not enjoying himself at his own expense.
Laughter is easier, minute by minute, spilled with prodigality, tipped out at a cheerful word.
eddy
Dressed up in white flannels I went over to his lawn a little after seven and wandered around rather ill-at-ease among swirls and eddies of people I didn't know--though here and there was a face I had noticed on the commuting train.
vehement
As soon as I arrived I made an attempt to find my host but the two or three people of whom I asked his whereabouts stared at me in such an amazed way and denied so vehemently any knowledge of his movements that I slunk off in the direction of the cocktail table--the only place in the garden where a single man could linger without looking purposeless and alone.
cordial
Another meaning of "cordial" can be seen in the same chapter in this description: "a bar with a real brass rail was set up, and stocked with gins and liquors and with cordials so long forgotten that most of his female guests were too young to know one from another." This would be why Nick's remarks, cordial as they might be, but influenced by cordials, might not be so welcomed by him or others.
Welcome or not, I found it necessary to attach myself to someone before I should begin to address cordial remarks to the passers-by.
homogeneity
Instead of rambling this party had preserved a dignified homogeneity, and assumed to itself the function of representing the staid nobility of the countryside--East Egg condescending to West Egg, and carefully on guard against its spectroscopic gayety.
tortuous
There was dancing now on the canvas in the garden, old men pushing young girls backward in eternal graceless circles, superior couples holding each other tortuously, fashionably and keeping in the corners--and a great number of single girls dancing individualistically or relieving the orchestra for a moment of the burden of the banjo or the traps.
vacuous
A celebrated tenor had sung in Italian and a notorious contralto had sung in jazz and between the numbers people were doing "stunts" all over the garden, while happy vacuous bursts of laughter rose toward the summer sky.
jovial
He smiled with jovial condescension and added "Some sensation!" whereupon everybody laughed.
convivial
When the "Jazz History of the World" was over girls were putting their heads on men's shoulders in a puppyish, convivial way, girls were swooning backward playfully into men's arms, even into groups knowing that some one would arrest their falls--but no one swooned backward on Gatsby and no French bob touched Gatsby's shoulder and no singing quartets were formed with Gatsby's head for one link.
dissension
Even Jordan's party, the quartet from East Egg, were rent asunder by dissension.
deplorable
The hall was at present occupied by two deplorably sober men and their highly indignant wives.
tumultuous
Fifty feet from the door a dozen headlights illuminated a bizarre and tumultuous scene.
discordant
Compare the discordant din and violent confusion at the end of this party to 1) the earlier orchestral music and hilarity; 2) the violence of Tom and wailing of Myrtle in the much smaller and unplanned party.
However, as they had left their cars blocking the road a harsh discordant din from those in the rear had been audible for some time and added to the already violent confusion of the scene.
