Crooked Carraway from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

In The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Nick’s unreliability as a narrator is blatantly evident, as his view of Gatsby’s actions seems to arbitrarily shift between disapproval and approval. Nick is an unreliable and hypocritical narrator who disputes his own background information and subjectively depicts Gatsby as a benevolent and charismatic host while ignoring his flaws and immorality from illegal activities. He refuses to seriously contemplate Gatsby’s negative attributes because of their strong mutual friendship and he is blinded by an unrealized faith in Gatsby. Furthermore, his multitude of discrepancies damage his ethos appeal and contribute to his lack of dependability.

     "Everyone suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known" (Fitzgerald Gatsby 64). So writes Nick Carraway in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, characterizing himself in opposition to the great masses of humanity as a perfectly honest man. The honesty that Nick attributes to himself must be a nearly perfect one, by dint of both its rarity and its "cardinal" nature; Nick asserts for himself that he is among the most honest people he has ever encountered. Events in the book, however, do not bear this self-characterization out; far from being among the most honest people in

Nick’s behavioural changes are one the most evident changes that the reader is able to notice after he is invited to Gatsby’s house. These changes could be regarded as either negative or positive depending on how the reader interprets them. “Everyone suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.”(pg. 59), this is one of Nick’s quote from the beginning of the story before he meets Gatsby, he states that he is very honest to himself and to others but the reader soon finds out that is not the case. Nick is not an honest individual because after Gatsby is accused for Myrtle Wilson’s murder he does not speak up and tell Tom Buchanan and George Wilson (Myrtle’s husband) as to whom committed the crime. This misunderstanding ultimately leads to the death of  Jay Gatsby as he shot my George at his Mansion. These series of events are important to Nick’s behavioural changes as the reader to notice how being in Gatsby’s mansion had affected his honesty. Another behavioural change the reader is able to notice is Nick’s drinking habit as he starts to drink more when he first enters one of Gatsby’s parties. Chapter two of “The Great Gatsby” is where the

“The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love,” once said Fyodor Dostoyevsky, a Russian novelist. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, narrator Nick Carraway spends a summer at Long Island where he befriends Jay Gatsby, a mysterious man of new money with an undying love for Daisy Buchanan, Nick’s cousin and the wife of Tom Buchanan. As Nick inadvertently becomes privy to the secrets of the corrupt world of the elite, he also becomes increasingly disillusioned with the moral decadence of high society. Through symbols such as Owl Eyes, Doctor

Besides ignorance to thought, Nick being a practical, peripheral narrator, provides little to no, personal opinion. Although it could be argued that this is a negative quality for a narrator, Fitzgerald made sure he gives nothing away, nor forces any opinions on the readers. He leaves all final opinions in the hands of readers, which makes the novel such an interesting topic because of the variety of interpretations available. Nick never judges any of the characters for their immoral actions and poses as an innocent, reserved bystander. This leaves final judgment open to opinion, which is why The Great Gatsby can appeal to so many different audiences. At the end of the novel, Fitzgerald includes the statement “one gentleman to whom I telephoned implied that he had got what he deserved” (169) in reference to Gatsby’s death, which leaves readers to choose a side, whether readers should pity Gatsby, or if one has the right to believe that his unlawfulness lead to his own demise.

Nick’s father gives him this advice “Whenever you feel like criticizing any one”(Fitzgerald 1) and to keep in mind “People in this world haven’t had the advantages you’ve had” (Fitzgerald 1). Nick then claims that he is “inclined to reserve all judgements” (Fitzgerald 1). Nick was able to stand up for Gatsby rather than just let Tom have a skewed view of Gatsby when he said that he was “Some big bootlegger”(Fitzgerald 107). Many other people believed Gatsby had some illegal, high paying job. Nobody knows Gatsby’s job, but Nick wanted to make sure that his reputation was not tainted before he met Tom. Nick defended Gatsby well staying reserved and without being rude to Tom. and on the surface it hardly did anything to gatsby’s reputation at all Daisy runs over Myrtle, Nick

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, an unfortunate and rather tragic love story is told. The narrator, Nick Carraway, plays quite a big role in the novel. He ends up knowing quite a bit of vital information about nearly every character in the book, and what he chose to do with that information greatly affected the tragic ending of this book. Throughout the novel, Nick is trusted with several secrets and choses to keep all of them to himself. He doesn’t once cross or wrong anyone. Although this is usually considered a good thing, if Nick decided to share this vital information, the tragedy at the end could have been avoided, or at the very least been less extreme.

From now we begin to wonder about how great Gatsby really is? On one hand he is “vile” because Carraway tell us he has “Unaffected scorn” for him while on the other hand he is “gorgeous”. We consider Nicks opinions to be very accurate as he is a fair and sensitive person who is also the

The real contradiction to Nick is The Great Gatsby himself, Jay. Jay and Nick share a similar small town upbringing but Jay was able to parle his stolen trades into the corrupted version of the American Dream. Most of what Nick knows about Jay is based on his reputation and it’s not until they actually meet and Nick sees the “quality of distortion” in Jay’s New York lifestyle that Nick sees for himself the illusion that Jay created. Nick is attracted to the high life that Gatsby has created in the valley of ashes. Who can blame him with all the lavish parties, cars, mansions, women and other temptations. It’s like Fitzgerald has placed Nick in the Garden of Eden and the two characters; Nick and Jay, represent the good

This shows how little Gatsby puts into his lies because he genuinely does not care. Even though he makes us Jay Gatsby, the novel says, “His parents were shiftless and unsuccessful farm people—his imagination had never really accepted them as his parents at all” and that is why he became Jay Gatsby. Since he actually believes in his heart he is Gatsby now, he really is not lying. When Tom discovers that Gatsby is a bootlegger Gatsby simply says, “What about it” (Fitzgerald 133) since he really does not care if his lies are believed. Nick basically just says, “I'm inclined to reserve all judgments” even though he seems to judge every character in the book (the book is one giant judgment), so he is a liar that cannot recognize his own lies- the worst kind (Fitzgerald 1). The rest of this society is terrible with their lies since they all are so good and ready to do it whenever. When Catherine says, “She’s a Catholic, and they don’t believe in divorce”, it is a total lie that symbolizes how the rest of this society lies about everything because they are so used to it (Fitzgerald 33). Women are not held to the same standard since “Dishonesty in a woman is a thing you never blame deeply” (Fitzgerald 58).

Nick Carraway describes himself in the first chapter as reserved in judgement and tolerant of other people, even when subjected to their unwanted and boring secret confessions. He is indeed more tolerant than most, and holds judgement even when faced with huge and unmistakable character flaws. For instance, he makes no solid judgement on Tom Buchanan when he sees him openly displaying his extramarital affair with Myrtle and holding no shame or guilt about cheating on Daisy. His unwillingness to criticize leads to his having double feelings about several characters, because he see their faults but wants to keep an open mind. He is especially reserved in holding judgement against Gatsby, which causes him to go so far as to create a sort of blind spot towards him. He criticizes Gatsby’s obsession with wealth and luxury, and is very aware of his criminal behavior, yet he sees more in Gatsby the man who would do anything for his love and worked towards his dreams all his life.

Imagine moving to New York in the spring of 1922. You have no money, and you live in a small cottage in West Egg, right in between the wealthy homes. Your dreams are big and simple: become rich and live well. Everything is great at first, until you meet your mysterious neighbor and nothing would ever be the same again. In The Great Gatsby, that is the life of the narrator, Nick Carraway. In the book he meets many characters, with their personality bursting at the seams. However, their personalities aren’t always the brightest as Nick discovers, and through their actions it becomes hard to tell whether they are morally good or morally evil. Nick himself is morally ambiguous, as is Daisy Buchanan and Jay Gatsby.

We know that Nick is an unreliable narrator from the very first page of the book. He begins by telling us that he is the most honest person he knows, and that he does not judge anyone for any reason. However, one paragraph later, he says “Gatsby who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn.”(1) He is saying that Gatsby is the epitome of

“Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had you’ve advantages you have””(5). The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, was written in a first narration. The narrator was given the name Nick Carraway. Nick grew up wealthy. He lived next to a gentleman named Jay Gatsby. Nick lives in West Egg. He was raised not to criticize anyone no matter what. Nick says he is “the only honest man he’s ever known”(//). But if he was so honest he would have confronted Tom about cheating on his cousin, Daisy, and he would not have allowed Daisy to retaliate.

Nick Carraway is the only character worth knowing in The Great Gatsby. He is living in East Egg with the rich and powerful people. He is on the guest lists to all of their parties and yet he is the person most worthy of attending such parties because he is well bread and his family is certainly not poor. “Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone, just remember that all people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.” (Ch1, P1). These words were taught to Nick by his father showing the qualities that a man with goals and values would have in a place where goals and values was no existent. His Judgmental eye for character and guts of using them when desired makes him more interesting. He has a greatest fear that he will be