The theme of carelessness in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

He viciously breaks his mistress’s nose after she annoys him by repeating his wife’s name. “Making a short, deft movement, Tom Buchanan broke her nose with his open hand.” (37) The use of simple, sharp words like “short”, “deft”,“broke”,“nose” and “hand” convey seem almost barbaric. The words contrast with the wealthy and civilized sounding name “Buchanan”. In contrast, When Daisy, Tom’s wife, calls him “a brute of a man,” (12) and describes him as “hulking” (12), Tom restrains himself from violence. He seems to take the beleaguerment almost affectionately, as if he considers it a civilized consequence of marriage. The juxtaposition between the two incidents suggests that Tom has much less control over himself when he is drunk. After over-imbibing, his true character rears its ugly head: he becomes irrationally aggressive and abusive at the slightest

The Great Gatsby had many situations where people weren’t happy with their current life, though no one did anything about it. A few of those situations dealt with Tom, Myrtle, and Daisy, and their love triangle. Tom, being the abusive one in both relationships, was the one making them unhappy. Making it to where neither Daisy nor Myrtle loved Tom because he is treating them horribly, but they stay with him for his money demonstrating the greediness of human nature.

Daisy's father wanted her to marry somebody who wasn't going off to war. He wouldn't let Gatsby even propose because of this. Daisy eventually married Tom, who wasn't shipped off to war, because he came from old money. He is imperious and commanding and knows what he wants: Daisy. Even Gatsby, the man that Daisy first fell for and still loves, tries to control her by telling Tom that she never loved him, and then tries to make her say it herself. But it is too much for Daisy. Even though she loves Gatsby, she feels she cannot honestly say she has never loved Tom at

Daisy is miserable in her marriage with Tom, saying, “Well, I’ve had a very bad time, Nick, and I’m pretty cynical about everything.” (Fitzgerald 16) Daisy’s cynicism mainly stems from Tom’s abuse and infidelity. Jordan Baker points out Tom’s infidelity when the phone rings, saying, “She might have the decency to not telephone him at dinner time.” (Fitzgerald 15) At the end of the novel, Daisy’s opinion of Tom is made clear when she tells him, “You’re revolting” (Fitzgerald 131) Had Daisy married Gatsby instead, she would have both wealth, and love, leading to a happy life. Daisy clearly misses Gatsby and regrets marrying Tom, as seen when she sees Gatsby’s shirts "They're such beautiful shirts," she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds. "It makes me sad because I've never seen such—such beautiful shirts before.” (Fitzgerald 92) This breakdown is not actually the result of the shirts, but possibly of her realization of how she should have married Gatsby instead of Tom Buchanan. Her tears may also be indicative of her guilt, for what she has put Gatsby through for years; it is not clear to the reader. However, in the end, Daisy is unable to reconcile her wrong decisions, as in the end, she was never able to life up to Gatsby’s expectations, crushing both her dreams of happiness, and Gatsby’s of love. This is not only depressing for Daisy, but Gatsby as well, crushing his dream; “In the end, Gatsby becomes Daisy’s victim of the elusive American Dream.”

Like Gatsby he is a confident, possessive, and wealthy man- but the similarities end there. He replaced Gatsby’s glamour and optimism with arrogance, ignorance, and violence. Tom makes his elitist opinions of women, minorities and the poor crystal clear. The constant breach of Daisy and Tom’s marriage demonstrates his deceitful nature and enlightens the reader of his hypocrisy towards Daisy and Gatsby’s affair. His predisposition towards cruelty was unmasked when he used brute force on his mistress Myrtle who he supposedly “loves”. Tom’s misogynistic/racist/elitist attitude, and his violent nature gave the readers the ideal ignominious character. There could be a dispute over whether Daisy is in fact the most despicable character of this novel. It’s true that she is despised by many readers and for good reason, but- the people Daisy hurt with her actions were due to weakness. The people Tom Buchanan hurt was due to malicious

It is revealed that Daisy truly had affection for Tom when she says, “Even alone I can’t say I never loved Tom, it wouldn’t be true” (Fitzgerald 133). Although she had loved tom in the past, the same can’t be said in the present. Many examples are present throughout the book that show Daisy having lost her affection towards Tom. The first introduction of both Tom and Daisy in the book shows her cynical behavior towards Tom when he says, “I hate that word hulking,” to which Daisy replies to, “hulking” (Fitzgerald 12). Daisy enjoys teasing Tom and seeing his reaction.

Fitzgerald exposes the corruption within society through Daisy when she tells Tom “go ahead… and if you want to take down any addresses here’s my little gold pencil”(Fitzgerald 105). Daisy knows that Tom is having an affair, but she does not really care because she now has Gatsby. This is very ironic because most married couples would not encourage their spouse to have an affair. Even though Gatsby knows Daisy is married, he still pursues her because “[his] desire for Daisy is enhanced by the fact that she is the object of the desires of so many other men”(Bloom 104). Gatsby wants Daisy because of her money and because other men want her. He views Daisy as a competition and is in love with her for the wrong reasons. Daisy’s relationship with Gatsby proves that money contributes to infidelity and the decline of morals.

Fitzgerald utilized many facets of the novel to show the pitfalls of this practice, most dramatically by killing off Gatsby, a representative of the American dream. Tom is a character that is fully entrenched in such an ideology, leading him to devalue the relationship with his wife in favor of more thoughtless misbehavior. The desire that Tom holds for possessions and status, ambiguous inanimate concepts, was translated by Fitzgerald onto his personal relationship with his wife and with his mistress. Daisy is viewed as a non-autonomous possession, rather than a person with motivations and emotions. It is impossible for a healthy relationship to exist between people when there is an inherent power imbalance between, exacerbated by the dehumanization of one by the other. Because Tom doesn’t respect Daisy’s personhood, it is impossible for them to form a symbiotic rapport, and that disrespect stems from the banausic and secular

Daisy has the opportunity to go with Gatsby only to leave Tom. Daisy complicates matters further when she says, “I did love him once- but I loved you too.” (Fitzgerald, 140). In making this comment, Daisy, regardless of having the power to leave Tom, feared to make a decision in which she could lose her comfortable life.

Gatsby’s impractical view of life is so great that he tells Daisy to break up with Tom. He undertakes that his dream will be complete if she says she never loved Tom. To Gatsby, Daisy is an object of the past. His obsession with her does not allow him to distinguish between times. Gatsby perceives Daisy being the same women he met long ago. Gatsby’s failures stems from the gap in his judgment that Daisy only represents beauty and love. Although she seems to be light and full of kindness, she is actually selfish and greedy. She is irresponsible and inconsiderate with others; she lets Myrtle’s death become Gatsby responsibility, and she shows no concern when her action leads to Gatsby’s death. In fact, Daisy’s character is immediately revealed early in the novel when she hopes her daughter will “…be a fool…a beautiful little fool.” (20) After Daisy learns about Gatsby’s illicit activities, she almost immediately sides with her equally-alike husband.

Throughout the American History, there has been impacting literature that has brought a motion to Americans. Some of the best literatures were written during the Modernist movement. One of those great writings includes “The Great Gatsby”, a story written by Francis Scott Fitzgerald. In this fictional story, Jay Gatsby who is one of the main characters, proves to have great characteristics. These characteristics are also portrayed in another story that was written in the same time by William Faulkner.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel belongs to those that are particularly important for the American society as it reveals all the depraved sides of it. When the idea of the book came to him, Fitzgerald wanted to create something simple but at the same time deep and commonly important. And he succeeded with his goal. He created a masterpiece that is easy to read and perceive and that has already been filmed for four times and would probably be attractive as a field for creativity for future generations, as well. As for me, I preferred the novel more because there have been some differences in the film which does not disclose heroes as they were represented by Fitzgerald. Moreover, a couple of scenes were strongly exaggerated by the director what created a different atmosphere from that described by Fitzgerald. I am going to review these differences below.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby is largely narrated by Nick Carraway and the events surrounding his life, however many other characters are also exposed and developed through Nick’s narrations. Tom Buchanan is one such character; the husband of Nick’s second cousin once removed, Daisy, many of the events Nick partakes in also concern Tom to some extent. Tom is involved in a number of dynamic relationships, influenced largely by the secrets he keeps for and from the members of those relationships. Nick often portrays Tom’s view of Gatsby as very negative, and Tom’s reaction to Gatsby’s death is not surprising given his perspective on Gatsby. Tom also best represents the thematic idea of ignorance as it is developed in The Great Gatsby.

Daisy Buchanan manages to corrupt her American Dream by sacrificing people she loves for materialist desires. She sacrificed her happiness and the love for the man she supposedly adored, Gatsby, for someone with more wealth, Tom. Daisy’s true self and greedy intentions are shown at the beginning of the novel when she describes to Nick and Jordan what she hopes for her infant daughter; “I hope she’ll be a fool—that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” (Fitzgerald

Daisy, who kills someone in Gatsby's car, simply allows Gatsby to take the fall for her, and never sees him again, even avoiding his funeral. After the entire ordeal of her affair with Gatsby, claiming that she loved him so much, she intends to let him suffer the consequences of her mistake. Tom ends up making choices that are even more despicable and disgusting than Daisy. Tom defends his actions to the very end, honestly not aware of his wrongdoings, as if he were innocent. When Nick confronts Tom about Wilson killing Gatsby all Tom has to say is, "What if I did tell him? That fellow had it coming to him." (Fitzgerald 178). He feels absolutely no remorse about having a man killed, just blatantly and indirectly takes a life, and as if to add to his count of sins, he has affairs but refuses to let his wife go, not out of love, but out of a possessive competitiveness. Tom does not love Daisy, he sees her as a possession no one else can have. Despite his physique and tough talk, Tom is nothing but a dishonest coward, who goes through life with no heed to anything he destroys, because in his world everything is replaceable, even people. "They were careless people, Tom and Daisy -they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made..." (Fitzgerald 179). Still another eyesore on