The Great Gatsby Character Analysis

Gatsby exemplifies an individual who can not always get what he or she yearns for. He possesses more than millions of people have combined, yet is still not satisfied. There is only one thing that Gatsby is destined to have, and that is Daisy Buchanan’s unconditional love. Hence by the name, she is married to another man: Tom Buchanan. The madness begins before Daisy gets married when she shares a kiss of a lifetime with James Gatz. Gatsby allows himself to fall in love with her, and from that moment on, all of his life decisions and daily problems are stimulated by Daisy, and framed around her life. Some may consider Gatsby to be an extreme stalker or nutcase, but in reality Gatsby simply has faith in

“The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald is a story filled with lust, bloodshed, and greed. In the story many charters act immoral and greedy. The reason for this is because they have been corrupted by money and power. A prime example of this corruption is Tom Buchanan. In the story “The Great Gatsby” it is evident that Tom Buchanan was corrupted by both money and power when he only cared about other people’s stature, demonstrated that he was very ignorant, and lacked any type of moral values.

“‘I think he [Gatsby] half expected her [Daisy] to wander into one of his parties, some night,…” (Chapter 4). Yet, no matter what Gatsby does, his American Dream is unattainable, because Daisy chooses her husband, Tom Buchanan, over Gatsby. “Her [Daisy] frightened eyes told that whatever intentions, whatever courage, she had had, were definitely gone” (Chapter 7). The protagonist from The Great Gatsby desires something he cannot obtain, similar to the protagonist from The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield.

According to Nick, Tom Buchanan is a “sturdy, straw-haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner” (13). Tom shows careless and arrogance multiple times

In many instances, Gatsby showed signs of selflessness. But, if the reader were to dig deeper into the roots of the story, they will be able to see that under the kind acts and good deeds, Gatsby’s intentions were always selfish. After the car scene, Tom, Jordan, Daisy and Nick returned to Daisy and Tom’s house. As Gatsby waits outside of the home, Nick, unknowingly, asks Gatsby whether or not Daisy was driving. Gatsby replies saying, “Yes, but of course I’ll say I was” (Fitzgerald 143). When Gatsby took Daisy’s place in the murder of Myrtle, although seeming kind-hearted, his only reason for this was to earn Daisy’s love and to impress her. Gatsby has somewhat put up an image of himself to be the pure and almighty man that deserves Daisy more. Meyer Wolfshiem, Gatsby’s business partner, mentions to Nick of Gatsby’s chivalrous actions towards women saying, “Yeah, Gatsby’s very careful about women. He would never so much look at a friend’s wife” (Fitzgerald 72). Although Meyer Wolfshiem’s comment on Gatsby about him being a gentleman, and how he would never look at another man’s wife, Gatsby proceeds to exceed all expectations and have an affair with Tom’s wife, Daisy Buchanan. Yes, some might say his only reason for doing so was out of true love and destiny but, in either case, it was morally wrong. In every action that Gatsby commits for Daisy, his selfishness secretly hides beneath it, shading itself from light so no one will approach the real man that lurks behind the curtains of self pride.

Tom Buchanan is one of the many colourful, intriguing and enigmatic characters of the masterpiece “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald. He is the antagonist of the novel and rightly so. He is racist, a hypocrite, an immoral cheater, a short-tempered brute and misogynistic. Tom is also part of an old and out dated sort of world that is being swamped all-round the edges by a new and better society. That is the reason why he is acting so tough and also why he hates Jay Gatsby so much, it is because he is afraid, afraid that the world that he knows and all the old-fashioned values of love, wealth and masculinity will come crashing down on him. He dislikes Gatsby because he is part of the new generation and he got rich by a different way

Tom Buchanan, a crucial character to the events of The Great Gatsby, is how Fitzgerald presents a symbol of greed and immoral acts to the reader, a character whom is corrupted by sin and iniquity. Fitzgerald uses Tom Buchanan, a disloyal and proud character, in order to suggest some of the traits that may cause one to lose their sense of morality.

“The only people you have to look out for in life are the people that don’t care about anything or anyone” (Alde). In The Great Gatsby by, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tom and Daisy are just those people that are not to be trusted. They have no regard for other’s feelings and live life without facing the consequences. Tom and Daisy show that they are careless people through their insensitive, thoughtless and selfish acts.

Through the means of characterization, Fitzgerald expresses Tom Buchanan as another immoral character. Tom is portrayed as an egotistical, hypocrite who advocates white supremacy. His hypocrisy is shown when he speaks to Gatsby, he conduct himself as a “high” class citizen but dwells as a “low” class citizen. “I picked him for a bootlegger the first time I saw him, and I wasn’t far wrong.” “What about it?” said Gatsby politely. “I guess your friend Walter Chase

Gatsby realizes that life of the high-class demands wealth to become priority; wealth becomes his superficial goal overshadowing his quest for love. He establishes his necessity to acquire wealth, which allows him to be with Daisy. The social elite of Gatsby?s time sacrifice morality in order to attain wealth. Tom Buchanan, a man from an enormously wealthy family, ?seems to Nick to have lost all sense of being kind.?(Lehan, pg.60) Nick describes Tom?s physical attributes as a metaphor for his true character when remarking that Tom had a ?hard mouth and a supercilious manner?arrogant eyes has established dominance over his face?always leaning aggressively forward?a cruel body?his speaking voice?added to the impression of fractiousness he conveyed? (Lehan, p.61)

The Great Gatsby is a novel that was published in 1922 by F. Scott Fitzgerald, in this novel he writes about the Jazz Age in language that marvelously evokes music. The Great Gatsby is a romantic and cynical novel about wealth and he portraits characters in the novel who maneuver themselves in complex or difficult situations. The character Tom Buchanan, is Daisy Buchanan’s husband, which Daisy is cheating on him later with Gatsby whom I’ll explain who he is in a bit, and also Daisy is the main character’s cousin. The main character is a man named Nick Carraway which in the novel he is telling the story in a second person point of view of Gatsby, who is a fabulously wealthy young man living in a mansion in West Egg. He is famous for the big parties he throws every Saturday night, but no one knows what he does, what made his fortune, or where he comes from. In the novel Tom Buchanan is cheating on his wife Daisy for a woman named Myrtle Wilson who is married to a man named George Wilson, a lifeless man owning a run down garage in the Valley of Ashes. Tom Buchanan and George Wilson are more similar than different because they both got cheated on. They will be compared and contrasted on their attitudes towards women, their ways of showing violence, and their reactions of being cheated on.

Gatsby does well in the war and he then tries to go back to Daisy but is unable to and is sent to Oxford instead. When he comes back, he is absolutely broke and then he tries to find a job. He shows his selfishness again when he tries to get money. Gatsby meets Meyer Wolfshiem while searching for a job. He ends up getting involved in some shady, illegal business and becomes a bootlegger. Gatsby was so adamant in getting money and rising up in society that he was willing to do whatever it took to get money. His greed and selfishness led him to do illegal things that he shouldn’t have been doing. Gatsby ends up buying a house across from Daisy where he was hoping to reconnect with her again. He again shows his selfishness by wanting to reconnect and rekindle his love with her even though she is already married to Tom Buchanan. Daisy is clearly taken and Gatsby wants her to leave Tom and go away with him since now Gatsby isn’t poor and can provide for her. Even now, he still selfishly hides the truth by lying about his education and not telling the truth about the source of his wealth. He even confronts Tom about his love for her saying “she never loved you. She loves me.” (Fitzgerald 137) Gatsby’s selfishness ends up costing him his life at the very end. He does end up showing some selflessness by taking the blame for the accident even though Daisy was the one driving.

The purpose of this chapter is to show what Tom Buchanan is like, and how he acts towards other people and his money. Also, the reader is prepared to meet Gatsby as the party scene continues to build an aura of mystery and excitement around Gatsby, who has yet to make a full appearance in the novel. Here, Gatsby emerges as a mysterious subject of gossip. He is extremely well known, but no one seems to have any

In continuation, another theme within F. Scott Fitzgerald’s wonderful book is betrayal. One of the main acts of betrayal in the book is Tom Buchanan’s betrayal of Daisy. He does this by having an affair with George Wilson's wife, Myrtle. This act then destroys everything that Daisy and himself had built together. Tom’s disloyal and deceit filled ways had caused him to believe that he was doing no wrong. He even states “I love Daisy too. Once in awhile I go off on a spree and make a fool of myself, but I always come back, and in my heart I love her all the time"(Fitzgerald 131). This was not a one time thing, he had done this horrible act multiple times and just expected that since he loved Daisy that he would always be welcomed by her. Another significant betrayal in the novel is Gatsby’s betrayal to himself. Gatsby had always tried to become a better man when he was growing up, and he had many hopes and dreams that would help in in achieving this goal. His father even states “[Gatsby's] got something about improving his mind. He was always great for that”(Fitzgerald 173). Gatsby was capable of great things, but he wasted his time chasing after the girl he loved the most. Every decision he made involved Daisy is some way. He had became a bootlegger for her, and in the end lost his life because of her. Gatsby had cheated and betrayed himself all for this girl's affection. He never became the

Tom Buchanan is a strong, powerful, and forceful picture of a man who cares only about himself. He first meets Gatsby in the second half of the book because Gatsby is trying to steal daisy from him. Although Tom is a powerful rich man he is also a coward. He told George “The yellow car that I was driving this afternoon wasn't mine”(Fitzgerald, 140). There were many more ways for tom to give out the information, from turning it to the police or for waiting for george to ask him. Even though Tom offers George false information, eventually leading him to Gatsby's home, he is still less culpable than others. Tom's actions were unwarranted and could have been avoided. This is because his wife was the person who tempted Gatsby first.