Great Gatsby Reflection

Gatsby has not only perfected Daisy’s image, but he is also stuck in the past. As previously mentioned, he idolized all of his good memories from the past because they gave him happiness. He had a girlfriend whom he loved and all of the other soldiers wanted. The fact that many of the other soldiers liked Daisy made her like a trophy to him. This, like the perfected image of Daisy, is viewing her as an object that he must obtain. After Gatsby becomes wealthy, he buys the house across from Daisy’s to show off his wealth and draw her in. He sought out Daisy as his final valuable possession or trophy. Gatsby states that, "After [Daisy] was free, [Gatsby and Daisy] were to go back to Louisville and be married from her house--just as if it were five years ago" (Fitzgerald 109). This quotation thoroughly displays Gatsby’s infatuation with the past because he furthers the conversation by assuring the

Another section of this dream was to recover his lost love. His love for a certain young woman never changed throughout the years-- a woman by the name Daisy Buchanan. Daisy and Gatsby had met half a decade prior while he was an Army general. Though she married and had a preschool daughter, Gatsby fervently believed she loved him. At night, he went out on his boardwalk. Nick comments that Gatsby “stretched out his arm toward the dark water in a curious way...I distinguished nothing except a single green light” (p 26). Later we discover that every evening when the mist would shroud the green Sound, Daisy’s illuminated house would emit the eerie green

Jay Gatsby said “Can’t repeat the past?…Why of course you can!” This simple quote, stated while speaking of his relationship with daisy encompasses his endless efforts in re kindling his past love. He is so invested in fighting for Daisy because he truly believes that the past can be brought back. As if there is no Tom, no child and no responsibilities. The past willingly leads us into the trap of ignorance, that we may return from journeys long and messy to find

Gatsby continues to hold out hope for Daisy to return to him. He implanted himself across the water from her to be in close proximity, trying to get the closest he can get. He stares out at “[the] green light that burns all night at the end of [Daisy’s] dock” (92). The color green negatively means the need to be materialistic, being possessive, and envious. By Gatsby examining Daisy’s life from afar, he notices the green light which signifies the hope that Daisy and him can have the life they were destined for. The color green also means ‘love to observe’, Gatsby stands out on the end of his dock to gaze out to Daisy’s life. He stares and “On [a] green Sound, stagnant in the heat...Gatsby’s eyes followed it momentarily; he raised his hand and pointed across the bay” (118). While Gatsby speaks and is around Daisy, he feels happy of his ability to hold hope and that Daisy still loves him. The green light is what allows Gatsby to continue to have hope for his own version of the American Dream. Looking at the Buchanans’ elegant house across the water shows how Gatsby subconsciously feels inferior to Tom who was born into Gatsby’s dream life. Because of his obvious differences in social order and graces, Gatsby cannot let go of the past and develops a false sense of

Jay saw her as an object that he needed to obtain, as evident by the fact that, “It excited him, too, that many men had already loved Daisy, it increased her value in his eyes“ (82). Rather than settling down and truly loving a woman, Gatsby needed a wife that dozens of other men desired. He doesn’t care about how she is as a person, simply her value to others. He thinks he is capable of anything because of his extravagant wealth, as evident by his conversation with Nick Carraway when he explained, “Can't repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!" He looked around him wildly, as if the past were lurking here in the shadow of his house, just out of reach of his hand. "I'm going to fix everything just the way it was before," (59). Gatsby is completely incapable of settling for anything, so he feels he is able to recreate his and other people’s lives, simply to please himself. Jay Gatsby is unable to have a real relationship with Daisy Buchanan because he can’t compromise and empathise with others, instead, everything has to be perfect in his own

Often in fictional literature, characters are faced with decisions that challenge them to either reconcile or avoid past conflicts that would impact present situations. As evident in the statement by an unknown author, “The past cannot be changed, forgotten, edited, or erased; it can only be accepted.” The Great Gatsby, a novel of triumph and tragedy written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, involves the same types of characters who ultimately strive to form their own picture of tranquil living despite previous hardships. Decisions to reflect or forget earlier experiences leads to catastrophe and throughout the work, proves that the past continues to trouble each character on a personal and emotional level. Perceiving the past as a time of bliss that could be relived clouded the characters’ good judgement and encouraged careless actions without considering future consequences. The main figures in the novel who equally exhibit unhealthy ambition and reluctance toward their past, Daisy, Gatsby, and Nick directly influence the lives of those around them as well as the outcome of their own fate in the novel.

From the start of Gatsby’s years he has always been a hardworking man. When he was younger things for him did not always go his way, but as his life went on it got better. He was very mysterious in the way that he would come and go, as well as people thinking that he may or may not be alive. Gatsby tends to not make a lot of appearances and when he does no one actually knows it’s him. “Nick Carraway’s pronouncement, near the start of the novel, that “Gatsby turned out all right at the end” (Fitzgerald 1999, 6). Jay Gatsby, a figure marked by failure and shadowed by death throughout most of the novel, nevertheless achieves a form of “greatness” in the final paragraphs of his story” (Will). Even though Gatsby struggled in the beginning of his life he was able to pick himself up and achieve “greatness” by the end. He was not always as wealthy as he is now though, and if he was back then, then things with daisy would be different. Gatsby’s obsession with Daisy is indescribable. He would do anything to get her into his

After Gatsby had returned from the war he made an extreme effort to become a respectable man for Daisy to marry. Once he had accumulated his wealth, Jay built his mansion across the bay from the Buchanan’s house and he waited for Daisy to show up at one of his parties. She eventually came into Gatsby’s house with Nick and Jay where Nick narrated, “He hadn’t once ceased looking at Daisy and he revalued everything in his house according to the measure of response it drew from her well-loved eyes” (Fitzgerald 96-97). Gatsby had done everything for Daisy; even after she had been married to another man he still waited for her. Once he had finally brought Daisy to his house, he would change anything to make it perfect for her.

“Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future… I thought of Gatsby’s wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. He had come a long way to this blue dawn, his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that is was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city” (Fitzgerald

“Can’t repeat the past?... Why of course you can!” Jay Gatsby, a man of wealth, charm, grace, and mystery stated this in The Great Gatsby. All things considered, it seems like Gatsby had it all but like most people, Jay was a dreamer. Jay Gatsby was in search of love until he met Daisy, but Daisy didn’t want to marry Jay because at the time he was very poor, so Gatsby made it his mission to become rich to be accepted by the woman of his dreams.

Throughout the novel, the protagonist of the story, Jay Gatsby, is essentially an innocent victim (romantic idealist) who is destroyed by his inability to accept reality. All throughout the story it is clearly shown to us how much Jay Gatsby is in love with a girl he once knew, Daisy Buchanan. He is constantly doing everything he can to try to win her back. He is always trying to relive this past relationship with her no matter what it takes. When Gatsby is talking to the narrator, Nick Carraway, Nick tells him he can’t revolve his life around what happened in the past.

Gatsby has many setbacks in his quest for his American dream but he never gives up hope. This is illustrated by the time when Nick sees Gatsby looking out at the green light.”I decided to call to him, Miss Baker had mentioned him at dinner, and that would do for an introduction.But I didn’t call to him, for he gave a sudden intimation that he was content to be alone-He stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling.Involuntarily I glanced seaward-and distinguished nothing except a single green light , minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock”(Fitzgerald 24,25). That light is his symbol of hope because he knows however far away from Daisy he feels he can always look to that green light and see that she is not that far away after all. That green light represents his American dream so close but in the end too far away to grasp if only he could

“Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us.” (Fitzgerald 189). Gatsby spent so many years just watching the green light, hoping Daisy would appear at one of his parties. He didn’t know that every day he watched the green light, his chance of a future with Daisy diminished. Despite this, Gatsby continues his ritual, with the hope that one day, he will get to show Daisy his abundant love.

Fitzgerald’s description of Gatsby and Daisy as they revel in each other’s presences utilizes vivid imagery and metaphors to illustrate the all-consuming love and faith that Gatsby has in his dream. Gatsby himself is overcome with emotion, when Daisy says something to him he turns “toward her with a rush of emotion,” captivated by her very presence. The two are so very enamored by each other that they forget the others in their vicinity, though Daisy holds her hand out to her cousin, Gatsby “[doesn’t] know [Nick] now at all.” They are two people “possesed by intense life”, so caught up in the moment and in each other that the rest of the world disappears during the brief moments that they are together. The trance that they are in is comparable

Jay wants every single bit and piece of Daisy, that including her uncontrollable past. Gatsby is so caught up in all of his memories that he forgets to add reality into his planned future. “Unfortunately, the dream is based on hollow underpinnings, on the vacuous Daisy and the misguided concept that large amounts of money can be made and used without responsibility”