answer:
let’s look at the literal meaning of the sentence and then see if we can extract a theme from it. to “beat” is to attempt to make linear progress, against the prevailing wind, in a sail-powered craft. this cannot be done by heading directly in the direction from which the wind is coming. it must be done by tacking back and forth in a zigzag pattern; it is time consuming, labor intensive, and unsure.
fitzgerald compounds the implicit challenge by putting an opposing current under the boat to go with the presumed headwind. finally, it seems that this vessel cannot progress against the cumulative force of the wind and current and is, in fact, going backwards or opposite of the direction intended. this seems to me to be the literal meaning of this sentence.
because fitzgerald ends a very emotional narrative with this sentence, one feels that it is more than a report of the unfortunate navigational results of an afternoon’s outing on the bay. jay gatsby put a lot of time, blood, sweat, and tears into recreating himself as something higher or more advanced than he once was. he did this because he believed that he could go back and “rewrite” the love story between him and daisy; this time “correcting” the problem that took the previous narrative in an unsatisfactory direction.
the problem, as gatsby saw it (and daisy also), was that he did not have enough money or prospects to put him on a footing to woo or marry an upper-class girl such as daisy. consequently, daisy married tom (an upper-class boy), and jay (“jimmy” at that time) went off to war.
when, after the war, jimmy gatz, through hard work, luck, and some seemingly nefarious means, gains extreme wealth, he recreates himself as jay gatsby and goes about the project of redoing the love story with daisy. he believes that now that he has remedied the previous lack of funds that he believes drove the story awry the first time, he can pick up the love story with daisy right where he left it when he went to the war.
because daisy is unhappy in her marriage with the rich but despicable tom, she at first seems amenable to gatsby’s plan. however, daisy’s responsibility for a car accident, resulting in the death of a working-class woman, puts her in serious jeopardy, causing her to choose the security of money and class over the love that gatsby has offered her. further confusion, and bad luck, result in gatsby’s death at the hands of the dead woman’s husband.
when the only people at gatsby’s funeral are his father, the narrator, and a few paid staff, it becomes clear that he never really entered the upper class. he is, was, and always would be jimmy gatz, the son of a north dakota farmer.
so, it seems that fitzgerald is telling us that the characteristically american belief that anyone can be anything he or she wishes, providing he or she has charisma and ambition, is false. we cannot change the circumstances of our birth or upbringing, and these are the true controlling factors in our lives.
