The great gatsby
Francis Scott Fitzgerald
Samenvatting
In the novel The Great Gatsby, by F.Scott Fitz Gerald, the character named Jay Gatsby shows
throughout the novel some very great character traits. The extremely rich Jay Gatsby is a highly-
motivated, alienated, and a dishonest person. Gatsby knows what he wants, and will work as
hard as he needs to get it. He is almost alienated to his own world due to his behavior and
actions. Gatsby demonstrates in the novel that he is a dishonest person by lying to his friends,
which ends for Gatsby is a surprising way, dying. Jay Gatsby, a man who grew up on a farm in
North Dakota, has one, and always had one dream: marrying the beautiful Daisy Buchanan.
Gatsby will do anything for her, which includes having the biggest parties at his house in West
Egg, New York, in the hope that Daisy would attend one. “Gatsby bought that house so that
Daisy would be just across the bay,” said Jordan Baker to Nick Carraway, Gatsby’s neighbor.
Gatsby is highly-motivated for living the American dream; rich, big house, and a beautiful wife.
He needs and wants Daisy. Gatsby asked his neighbor, and good friend, Nick Carraway to
arrange a meeting. “He wants to know if you’ll invite Daisy to your house some afternoon and
then let him come over,” asked Jordan Baker one day to Nick. Not only is Gatsby motivated for
Daisy, but he is also highly-motivated for money. He thinks that money can buy happiness, that
when he has money Daisy will come back to him, and divorce Tom Buchanan because she loves
him more. The major thing that shows Gatsby is rich is his huge mansion. “I want you and Daisy
to come over to my house,” Gatsby said, “I’d like to show her around”. Gatsby is so in his own
world that he thinks by showing Daisy he has money she will come back to him forever. Gatsby
is so busy working on his own needs that he is alienated in the real world he lives in. When he
gives parties he does not enjoy them with the people, or his friends, but he spends them alone.
He wonders off in his own world. “My eyes fell on Gatsby, standing alone on the marble steps
and looking from one group to another with approving eyes”. Gatsby invites people to his parties
that he does not even know, or know him. “As soon as I arrived I made an attempt to find my
host but the two or three people I asked his whereabouts stared at me in such an amazed way
that I stunk off in the direction of the cocktail party,” said Nick Carraway who attended one of the
first parties Gatsby organized. It amazed Nick that he gave such big events to people who had
no idea who this rich Gatsby was, and even said that he once killed a man. This really shows
that Gatsby alienates himself from others, and does his own thing. Lying is something Gatsby is
good in doing. In the novel he already starts out lying to his neighbor Nick. Even tough they are
good friends; he still lies, because he thinks that is what he needs to do. “I’ll tell you God’s truth,”
Gatsby told Nick, “I am the son of some wealthy people in the middle West-all dies now. I was
brought up in America, but educated at Oxford because all my ancestors have been educated
there for many years.” This is such a big lie, which shows that he is not honest to people close to
him. The truth is that Jay Gatsby comes from a poor family from North Carolina. He was a
fisherman and attended St. Olaf’s school in Minnesota. Gatsby became rich when his friend Dan
Cody died and left all his money and yacht to Gatsby. Gatsby then decided to move to West
Egg, to be close to Daisy and make his dream come true. He should never have seen Daisy
again, or lie to Tom, Daisy’s husband, about him and Daisy having an affair because again, this
shows dishonesty. Eventually, Gatsby dies because of his own untruthfulness, and not telling the
truth who drove the yellow car the day Myrtle Wilson got killed.Jay Gatsby knows what he wants
in his life; the gorgeous Mrs. Daisy. She is all Gatsby has ever lived for. It’s the reason for his
highly-motivation why he wanted to become rich so badly, why he lived in West Egg, New York,
and why he gave big parties at his house. He alienates himself from the real world, and believes
he can relive the past. Being dishonest does not always help you in a good way, and for Gatsby
it turned out in his disadvantage. Gatsby had a dream which he tried to let come true, but for all
, the wrong curves he took in his life, it ended up affecting him in a different way he expected. He
died knowing his dream would never come true.
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