F. Scott Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1896, and he graduated from Princeton University. In college he used to write musicals and because of his devotion to writing, he left and joined the army in 1917 and was dismissed in 1919. In 1920, He published his first novel "This Side of Paradise". The novel was very successful, and Fitzgerald entered the world of fame; as the book sold over 50 thousand copies in the first edition.
Nick however, is unlike the other residents in West Egg. He went to yale, and has social connections with the East Egg, a fashionable area of long island and home to the established upper class. One evening, Nick decides to drive out to the East Egg and have dinner with his beautiful cousin Daisy Buchanan and her husband Tom who was a classmate of Nick’s at Yale. Daisy and Tom introduce Nick to Jordan Baker, a beautiful young women in which Nick starts a romantic relationship with. Nick also learns some about Daisy and Tom’s marriage. Jordan tells him Tom has a lover named myrtle who lives in the valley of ashes, a dumping ground between West Egg and New York City. Soon after, Nick travels to New York City with Tom and Myrtle.In a party in the apartment Tom keeps his affair, Myrtle begins to taunt Tom and Daisy, and Tom ends up breaking her nose.
Nick presents himself in way that can persuade the readers that he is an honest, true individual in the beginning. He demonstrates that he is the innocent bystander who is simply just observing everyone around him, and describes himself as “one of the few most honest people that I have ever known” (Fitzgerald 59). He is immensely charismatic and can make friends with almost everyone, therefore his narration can be described as unbiased and he seems to be merely telling the story as it is. He begins the novel as stating that “In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I 've been turning over in my mind ever since. "Whenever you feel like criticizing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people
The major differences between East Egg and West Egg is that West Egg is home to the new rich (having made their fortunes recently), while East Egg is home to people who have inherited their money from ancestors.
Due to Nick being the narrator, we see the whole story in his eyes. This makes it more difficult to truly observe him as a character due to him not being the protagonist in the novel. Therefore, Nick’s character development is shown through his interactions and observations of the other characters. At the beginning of the novel, Nick exists on the outside of the wealth consuming lifestyle. This allows Nick to observe the lives of his peers without feeling much emotion towards it.
The movie begins with Nick Carraway in a psychiatric hospital receiving treatment for alcoholism, insomnia, anxiety, and fits of anger. He talks to his doctor about Jay Gatsby the most hopeful man he had ever met. His doctor suggests that he writes all he has to say down to make discussing it easier.
Nick Carraway is the most reliable character for the choice of narrator. At the beginning of the book Nick’s father
Daisy throughout the novel was part of a failing marriage, specifically her husband affair with Myrtle. In the beginning of the novel, Daisy did not know she had an option to get out of her marriage, and could live a happier life with Gatsby. When Daisy first learned of Tom’s affair, she seemed embarrassed not for him but herself, considering this was not the first time Tom has had an affair and
“In his blue gardens men and women came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars” (Fitzgerald 39). In his character, his relationships, and his gatherings, Jay Gatsby epitomized the illusion of a perfect romance. When Gatsby and Daisy met in 1917, he was searching for money, but ended up profoundly falling in love with her. “[H]e set out for gold and stumbled upon a dream” (Ornstein 37). Only a few weeks after meeting one another, Gatsby had to leave for war, which led to a separation between the two for nearly five years. As “war-torn lovers” Gatsby and Daisy reach the quintessential ideal of archetypical romance. When Gatsby returned from the war, his goal was to rekindle the relationship he once had with Daisy. In order to do this, he believed he would have to work hard to gain new wealth and a new persona. “Jay Gatsby loses his life even though he makes his millions because they are not the kind of safe, respectable money that echoes in Daisy’s lovely voice” (Ornstein 36). Gatsby then meets Daisy’s cousin, Nick Carraway, who helps to reunite the pair. Finally being brought together after years of separation, Gatsby stops throwing the extravagant parties at his home, and “to preserve [Daisy’s] reputation, [he] empties his mansion of lights and servants” (Ornstein 37). Subsequent to their reconciliation, Tom Buchanan, Daisy’s husband, begins to reveal sordid information about Gatsby’s career which causes Daisy to
To begin with, because Nick is merely another character in the unfolding tragedy readers can never see into
However, the eggs are dissimilar in “every way except shape and size.” On West Egg, “the less fashionable of the two,” the houses are built with no regard to codes or restrictions, as Nick's house is a bungalow sandwiched between two mansions. By contrast, the houses on fashionable East Egg “glittered” with “white palaces.” We see the difference between new money, with the possible implication of lack of refinement or class (West Egg), and old money, with well-groomed houses and lawns accompanying well-groomed residents, well-mannered who, on the surface, are characterized by gentility (East Egg). The West Egg residents symbolize pioneers, in its diverse melting pot neighborhood, taking on the persona of the old west, a land founded for the solo reason for the fulfillment of dreams. On the other hand, in East Egg, the inhabitants take the pleasure of not working, where making the most money without any effort is their aspiration. The theme of wealth flourishes throughout both areas, although different in various ways, with this wealth, each character has their own motivations such as Gatsby
Once Nick Carraway, the narrator, moves into a small home in West Egg, he soon comprehends that East Egg and West Egg are completely different. Carraway realizes the East Egg is where the upscale residents live and West Egg is more economically disadvantaged as he explains, “I lived at West Egg, the--well, the less fashionable of the two, though this is a most superficial tag to express the bizarre and not a little sinister contrast between them” (Fitzgerald 5). East Egg residences extremely wealthy people whose wealth has been passed down the line for years, while West Egg houses the hard-working people who build up their wealth. Furthermore, Thomas C. Fowler defines that living in a wealthy, luxurious geographical environment can reconstruct a character into a conceited personality explaining, “Literary geography is typically about humans inhabiting spaces, and at the same time the spaces inhabiting humans” (174). This theory is correct because the residences’ in East Egg are spoiled, selfish people finding themselves in a wealthy and treasured lifestyle.
during his time in New York. The two main characters of the story are Nick
Beginning to end, Jay Gatsby portrays himself as a man of passion to his new neighbor and the narrator of the novel, Nick Carraway. Gatbsy unexpectedly takes an interest in Nick because of his relation to Daisy and invites him to one of his opulent parties. James later finds Nick to be terribly good company and decides to keep him close. He shows Nick that there