“Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.”-William Shakespeare This does not appear to be the case with the character Gatsby in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Although he did achieve a lot in the life he was given this does not give him the right to be called great. One cannot simply be called great for the things they achieve but how they achieve them and the way Gatsby raised to the top is anything but great. All Gatsby turns out to be in the end is fallacious. He lied; he manipulated people and was naive. This is not the kind of person you would want to refer to as ‘great’. Gatsby was never one for honesty. His whole identity of ‘Jay Gatsby’ is a lie itself as Nick tells us the story …show more content…
It is common knowledge that Gatsby’s greatest desire is Daisy and throughout the book we watch as Gatsby stops at nothing to achieve this goal, as it is the sole purpose he is even there. The first example of this is with Jordan Baker. Shortly after Jordan meets Gatsby with Nick he calls upon her as his butler approaches them and tells Jordan that “Mr. Gatsby would like to speak with [her] alone.” (Fitzgerald.51) This was the first part of Gatsby’s plan. After Gatsby finishes talking with Jordan she asks Nick to come see her where she reviles the next part of his plan. Gatsby used Jordan to ask Nick if he would invite Daisy over to his house as she is closer to Nick and is afraid that if he asks himself he “might be offended.” (Fitzgerald.77) When asked why he did not just ask her she states, “he wants her to see his house…and your house is right next door” (Fitzgerald.77). Gatsby is able to successfully manipulate Nick, simply using him as a bridge to bring Daisy unknowingly to him. Although Gatsby has already gotten what he had longed for all those years he is still not satisfied, this is when he begins to manipulate Daisy. As Nick says himself "he wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: ‘I never loved you’.” (Fitzgerald.105) After the heated argument
For a person to be “great” they would have to be honorable, truthful and caring all year round. A great person would be brave and loyal to the end: their trust never wavering. Many traits of a person could be described as “great”, and in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby is known to the world as a great person: in reality he is nothing close. Although his hospitality is seemly boundless, Gatsby’s naive nature and his striving for perfection prohibit him from deserving the title “Great.”
Gatsby’s love for Daisy could even be described as his love for the idea of having Daisy, saving his love from Tom who doesn’t fit in his plan of being with Daisy. This is still not to discredit his hope as he “believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year” (Fitzgerald 138) as he grasps toward this enchanted light which represents hope. The hope of reaching is dreams and was at the end of Daisy’s dock. Tragically Gatsby died as someone who was not liked and maybe even despised by others and disregarded despite his
Instead Gatsby works with gangsters and crooks in his bond ploy and role as a bootlegger. If Jay were truly great, he would be able to make a living off legal practices. Rumors of Gatsby’s illegal practices have spread, and these words have significantly damaged Jay’s reputation as his party guest discuss what they have heard: “’I'm scared of him. I'd hate to have him get anything on me’" (Fitzgerald __).
Even when Daisy got married to Tom, Gatsby would not stop trying to be with her. Nick says, “ (Gatsby) He hadn’t once ceased looking at Daisy, and i think he revalued everything in his house according to the measure of response it drew from her well-loved eyes” (91). Even after Gatsby knew that Daisy has a husband of her own, he still has very strong feelings for her and is still trying to impress her with his possessions. He will never stop trying to get with
Don’t Buy The Lie Gatsby has told most all of his closest buddies who he has made himself up to be and deleted his past throughout the novel of the American Dream, The Great Gatsby. The theme shown throughout the novel is lies and deceit proven by the characters Nick Carraway, Tom Buchanan, and Jordan Baker. Nick Carraway says “I’m one of the most honest people I know. ”(59)
A lot of people today get caught up in the past. They allow the memories to consume their minds, preventing them from moving on, living their lives. In the book The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby, and others, are stuck in their pasts - and it is preventing them from making real friends, second chances at love, and living their lives to the fullest - happy, and with purpose. Nick, along with others, had a hard time believing Gatsby about anything concerning his past.
In a sense, the word “great” can be attributed to large and grand things such as Gatsby’s, house, his lavish parties, his wealth, and even his personality. All of these can be viewed as trophies of success or in a particular person’s eyes, greatness. Throughout the novel Nick is enamored by Gatsby's outstanding personality and ability to hold onto hope. He describes Gatsby as having, “..an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again. ”(2).
In “The Great Gatsby there are many opinions on “great” and the way they think of Gatsby. There are people who don’t like him, people that do, and people who only like him for his fortune. Hey may have set out and made a good fortune out of his life but he did it in all the wrong ways. But Gatsby was also driven by noble emotion and love.
Everything he does is to win Daisy back which is clearly outlined in a conversation that takes place between Jordan and Nick, “’It was a strange coincidence,’ I said. ‘But it wasn’t a coincidence at all.’ ‘Why not?’ ‘Gatsby bought that house so that Daisy would be just across the bay.’” (Fitzgerald 78).
In the book, Gatsby is very foolish, his actions are unreasonable and unrealistic. “He wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: "I never loved you."” (125) Gatsby had expected Daisy to be the same girl she was five years ago, but the truth is that she isn't. Many things had happened to the both of them and he had set up a foolish expectation that Daisy was willing to leave Tom for him. Gatsby’s foolishness originated with Daisy.
The Great Gatsby is an American novel written by Scott Fitzgerald. On the surface, the book revolves around the concept of romance, the love between two individuals. However, the novel incorporates less of a romantic scope and rather focuses on the theme of the American Dream in the 1920s. Fitzgerald depicts the 1920’s as an era of decline in moral values. The strong desire for luxurious pleasure and money ultimately corrupts the American dream which was originally about individualism.
When Gatsby first moved in over at the east egg he started having wild parties in hopes of Daisy wondering into one of them. He also started trying to see her more after her and Tom came to one of the parties. When Daisy finally came to one of the parties she realized that she had married the wrong guy. “As I went over to say good-bye I saw that the expression of bewilderment had come back into Gatsby's face, as though a faint doubt had occurred to him as to the quality of his present happiness. Almost five years(Fitzgerald pg.)!”
In the story "The Great Gatsby" Nick has a favorable opinion of Jay Gatsby. In the first chapter of the book Nick states "When I came back from the East last autumn I felt that I wanted the world to be in uniform and at a sort of moral attention forever; I wanted no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human heart. Only Gatsby, the man who gives his name to this book, was exempt from my reaction- Gatsby, who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn. " The book gives many examples of Nick thinking of Gatsby as the "Great" such as Gatsby 's smile, what Gatsby was willing to do for Daisy, and what Gatsby did for himself.
Once Daisy begins to see Gatsby on a regular basis, Gatsby begins to encourage Daisy to leave Tom and create a life with him. In the novel, Nick observes, “He wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: "I never loved you." After she had obliterated four years with that sentence they could decide upon the more practical measures to be taken. One of them was that, after she was free, they were to go back to Louisville and be married from her house—just as if it were five years ago.” Gatsby believes he can provide Daisy with a lavish and happy life that her unfaithful husband could never give
“There was music from my neighbor’s house through the summer nights. In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars.” (Fitzgerald 39) In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, all is well in the setting of 1920s Long Island.