What Do They Want? - Critical Essay of The Great Gatsby
- Yuying
- May 4
- 7 min read
Abstract
The Roaring 20s, or the 1920s, were an important era primarily situated in America and England, representing the peak of economic prosperity and culture. The Great Gatsby, a 1925 tragic novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, reveals the importance of social class and its great influence on romantic relationships within the community. The society within this novel is undeniably corrupted and controlled through social class and fortune. The impact of wealth influences most people, and they only see money as the key factor in their lives. People like Daisy Buchanan are so corrupted by her desire for wealth and secure income that she gives up the love of her life to marry a richer man. This example is common in the real world and highlights the unstable state of 'true love'. In the novel, love is also depicted as a means for power and control. In many relationships throughout the novel, the male party often holds more power than the female party. This essay will focus on analyzing the influence of social class on love lives, the instability of true love, and the usage of love as a means of control.
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The Great Gatsby, a novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, introduces Nick Carraway, a Yale graduate who moved to New York after fighting in WW1. He describes his neighborhood, the West Egg, to be full of the 'new rich'. When he goes to the East Egg, the neighborhood full of the 'old rich' to have dinner with his cousin Daisy Buchanan, he meets Tom Buchanan, Daisy's husband, and Jordan Baker. Soon, Nick discovers Tom's secret affair with Myrtle Wilson, who had a husband, George Wilson. After attending one of his neighbor, Jay Gatsby's, extravagant Saturday parties, Nick meets him in person and learns about his past relationship with Daisy, including his wish to get back with her again. After Nick arranges a meeting with the two, they rekindle with one another, to Tom's fury. One evening, Daisy, driving Gatsby's car, hit and killed Myrtle Wilson on her way to run away from her husband. Gatsby, blinded by his love for Daisy, doesn't tell anyone other than Nick that she is driving the car. George Wilson, convinced that the person who ran over Myrtle was her secret lover, shot Gatsby and killed himself shortly after in his pool. Nick sets up a funeral for Gatsby, only for he, Gatsby's father, and a drunk man from one of Gatsby's parties to show up. Daisy and Tom left with no message. After running into Tom shortly, Nick learns that Tom was the one who misguided Wilson into believing Gatsby was the one who ran over Myrtle. Disgusted by East Egg’s corruptedness, Nick reflects on Gatsby's character and compares it to that of the first American settlers before moving back to Minnesota.
An individual’s social status and wealth can greatly influence the course of their love life and romantic relations. This circumstance was especially common in eras like the Victorian Era, the Georgian Period, and during the Roaring 20s, where social strata and wealth were important factors in people’s relationships and marriage. For instance, Jay Gatsby’s relationship with Daisy Buchanan stresses and emphasizes the corrupted desire for wealth that many people possess. According to Gatsby’s recollection of his past love life with Daisy, their relationship was limited due to Gatsby’s poor family condition and lack of wealth and recognition. When Gatsby left for war, Daisy had already gotten engaged to Tom, a wealthier man with a stable income and a high position in the economy. Later on, when Nick once again introduces the two to each other, Daisy sees a rich, wealthy man instead of the poor, socially troubled person she had expected. Despite Daisy’s visible reason for getting back together with Gatsby, he is blinded by his love for her and immediately accepts her in any way possible. Gatsby is confident that Daisy would accept him as long as he was rich, despite Nick’s continuous attempts to awaken him from his dreams: “‘I wouldn’t ask too much of her,’ I ventured. ‘You can’t repeat the past.’ ‘Can’t repeat the past?’ he cried incredulously. ‘Why, of course you can!’” (Fitzgerald, 6). However, as soon as Daisy learns of Gatsby’s illegal source of income, she immediately ditches him, leaving him to cover up for her own crimes. The author, in a way, critiques the desire for power and fortune that Daisy Buchanan possesses, and Gatsby's inability to see through the mask behind money-oriented people. This circumstance is repeated throughout many novels, with one of the more notable ones being Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen. Many relationships in Pride and Prejudice are limited by social boundaries, oppressing many relationships based on an individual’s social strata. In many novels, including The Great Gatsby, social status is the main factor that impacts and changes the direction of people’s future lives.
In many relationships, the male party often seeks more power and control over the other, rather than presenting equal relations with one another. Both Jay Gatsby and Tom Buchanan are hypocritical and overly expectant in different ways when it comes to the pursuit of Daisy’s love. For one, Gatsby, who is stuck in his past recollections of his relationship with Daisy, expects her to immediately get on good terms with him. Even though Daisy was married to a wealthier and more socially distinguished man and lived in a stable household, Gatsby had high expectations for her. He believes that she wouldn’t hesitate to leave a stable life and take a risk to be with him instead. When Gatsby finally manages to strike up a decent relationship with Daisy, he wants her to immediately cut relations with Tom. “‘Gatsby walked over and stood beside her. ‘Daisy, that’s all over now,’ he said earnestly. ‘It doesn’t matter anymore. Just tell him the truth—that you never loved him—and it’s all wiped out forever.’” (Fitzgerald, 7). He persuades Daisy to tell Tom that she “never loved him”, neglecting the fact that Daisy might be unwilling to sacrifice a stable life to be with Gatsby. Similarly, Tom is hypocritical when he discusses his marriage with Daisy and his secret affair with Myrtle. Tom’s outrage when he discovers Gatsby’s affair with Daisy reflects his own relationship with Myrtle: “‘Who are you, anyhow?’ broke out Tom. ‘You’re one of that bunch that hangs around with Meyer Wolfshiem.’” (Fitzgerald, 7). While showing evident control over Daisy and her relationship with Gatsby, Tom maintains his affair with Myrtle simultaneously, indicating his hypocrisy. Despite the fact that he was the first one to strike up a relationship with someone else whilst being married, Tom makes it seem as if all the blame and responsibility are on Daisy for openly rejecting him to be with Gatsby. Instead of pursuing equality and peace in a relationship, people often times request more control over the other.
Oftentimes, true love in relationships is portrayed as unstable and fragile, and is often presented as an illusion rather than reality. Jay Gatsby’s love for Daisy is illusional and is rooted only in his memory from the past, and his desire not to let go. Gatsby’s obsession with Daisy is the key factor that leads to his downfall, highlighting to unreliability and instability of ‘true love’. Gatsby’s only relationship with Daisy was when he had social recognition and wealth, but he believed that she would stay with him forever after. His blindness and denial that Daisy had long lost her love for him led him to tragedy and death. Gatsby is willing to sacrifice his wealth, his dignity, and even potentially his life to let Daisy live well, despite the fact that she would never return this affection to Gatsby. Similarly, while Myrtle possessed such high hopes for her and Tom’s future life, away from her ill-tempered and poor husband, Tom Buchanan only saw her as a mere tool that was already wasted. “Her expression was curiously familiar … her eyes, wide with jealous terror, were fixed not on Tom, but on Jordan Baker, whom she took to be his wife.” (Fitzgerald, 7). Myrtle, being so fixated on her future life with Tom, sees his wife as the one breaking their relationship, while she, in reality, was the third wheel. Pure yet nonexistent love is common in multiple Victorian literatures, with each leading to tragedies due to its fragile and unstable stature. In Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, Catherine, despite loving Heathcliff, chooses to marry Edgar over him because he could give her a life that Heathcliff could never give her. Heathcliff’s relationship with Catherine was nonexistent: “The entire world is a dreadful collection of memoranda that she did exist, and that I have lost her!” (Brontë, 33). When a romantic relationship is held together purely on love and mutual feelings, it can be easily influenced by external factors, like the need for wealth and social recognition.
The Great Gatsby narrates the story of Nick Carraway, a man who has recently moved into West Egg in New York from Minnesota. Throughout his days living there, Nick meets multiple people with different backgrounds and personalities. The novel reveals the influence of social status on love, hypocrisy and pursuit of control in relationships, and the instability of true love. The society within this novel is undeniably corrupted and controlled through people’s social classes and wealth. This corrupt state inevitably influences people’s romantic relationships and love life, forcing people to choose their lovers based on their wealth and social recognition. Daisy and Tom Buchanan’s marriage is structured primarily upon Tom’s wealth and high position in the social hierarchy. Meanwhile, despite Gatsby and Daisy’s love for one another in the past, their relationship quickly diminishes due to Gatsby’s poor conditions. The failure of Gatsby and Daisy’s love highlights the instability of pure love compared to that of stable love. His pursuit of Daisy may seem like a slim chance or opportunity to him, but in reality, his obsession with her is only built upon an idealized dream and his desires. Gatsby’s high expectancy of Daisy also portrays the hypocrisy and control that men sometimes seek in relationships. Gatsby expects Daisy to leave her stable life with Tom immediately and to risk her social dignity and wealth for him. Similarly, Tom makes Daisy take responsibility for her affair with Gatsby while maintaining his secret relationship with Myrtle, revealing his hypocrisy and overly high expectations of Daisy.
Works Cited
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. “The Great Gatsby”, Project Gutenberg
Austen, Jane. “Pride and Prejudice”, Project Gutenberg
Brontë, Emily. “Wuthering Heights”, Project Gutenberg
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