Daisy Selfish In The Great Gatsby

The word selfish is defined as, “devoted to or caring only for oneself; concerned primarily with one's own interests, benefits, welfare, etc., regardless of others” (Selfish). When people act selfishly they care for themselves and what they get out of everything. In F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, Daisy's indecisiveness, selfishness, and longing for the past romance causes Gatsby's death.
Daisy's selfishness is a root cause of Gatsby’s death. She is a very young woman that isn't well matured yet, and does not understand the concept of love and has many mixed feelings. Whenever Daisy hears Gatsby’s name, she gets attached to it. She lacks the closure she needs in order to move on from Gatsby, to her now husband, Tom. “Jordan tells Nick

Daisy remembers the good times that she and Gatsby shared. While she remembers that, she also thinks about how she and Tom are going through some rough patches at the moment. “... she, like Gatsby, cultivated fond memories of a dream lover” (Fryer 51). Both of them forget that they haven’t seen each other in five years, and people change in that amount of time. Gatsby thinks he knows Daisy, but after that amount of time, she was different. “Gatsby is determined to repeat the past, but in the five years since their first meeting in 1917, Daisy has hardened and become incapable of fulfilling his dreams” (Tate 94). Gatsby cannot change Daisy into being the woman he once loved, he just has to settle for her because he thinks it’ll all get back to normal. In reality, though, that is the way she now is. Even when faced with a crime that she commits, Daisy lets other people handle it for her because she doesn’t want to get in trouble or take responsibility for her own actions. “She accidentally kills Myrtle Wilson while driving Gatsby’s car, and she agrees to let Gatsby take the blame” (Tate 97). Gatsby is the man that wouldn’t treat her wrong and has risked himself before for the sake of her when he entered illegal businesses to get money. Daisy obviously knows that he will pay some sort of consequence for claiming that he killed a woman. She is greedy and only cares

Clearly, when Tom disrespects Daisy she gets upset, but also doesn’t leave him. “A woman who felt less would react less” (Fryer 51). Daisy clearly has feelings for Tom because over five years of marriage it would be hard to not gain any feelings for someone. “Daisy has had a little “heart-to-heart talk” with Nick, and in it she has disclosed that she is vulnerable to emotions, and that she has been deeply -perhaps irreparably - hurt” (Fryer 52). Daisy even realizes that she isn’t in a good relationship. While she is hurt, she does have feelings for Tom. “She becomes involved with him, but when he urges her to leave Tom, she backs down” (Tate 97). Daisy has connected with Tom as well as Gatsby and doesn’t see why she has to prove her love to Gatsby. "Oh, you want too much!" she cried to Gatsby. "I love you now – isn't that enough? I can't help what's past." She began to sob helplessly. "I did love him once – but I loved you too" (Fitzgerald 132). Daisy reveals that she really doesn’t understand her own feelings and why she can’t just pick one man and go with it. She loves them both and her heart can’t decide because it’s so broken from her whole life of