Examples Of Doubleity In The Great Gatsby

The Double Lives of Daisy and Gatsby in The Great Gatsby

There are many sides to a person. People are complicated creatures, and not one of us in this world ever completely tells the truth. There are some people, however, who take it farther. Whether by accident or on purpose, sometimes the lies get so big, so complicated, so intricately woven that it turns a person into someone completely different. Suddenly, there is more than one reflection to a person. Like mirrors bouncing off of each other, these reflections see deeper into a person than their single, one-dimensional reflection.

In the Great Gatsby, the characters are all inherent liars. They live not only double, but sometimes multiple lives. Specifically, Daisy and Gatsby are the biggest

He changed his name and made it his goal to literally become someone else. Before he was Jay Gatsby, he was James Gatz, son of two unsuccessful farmers (Fitzgerald, 76). James Gatz, however, was not someone that he wanted to be. Gatsby dreamed of being wealthy. In fact, he valued wealth so much that he changed from James Gatz to Jay Gatsby and build an entirely new persona so that he would leave no traces of his old, poor life behind . As Nick said, “The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself’ (Fitzgerald,

The truth is, she may have loved Tom at one point but she never loved him enough and never for long enough. In fact, on her wedding day, she had second thoughts. Her friend, Jordan, found her drunk in her bed and screaming about changing her mind about marrying Tom (Fitzgerald, 59-60).

Other than not loving Tom as much as she said she did, she was also in love with Gatsby. Gatsby was a large part of Daisy’s double life, caused in part by both of them hiding their love from Tom. Not only that, but she also hit on Nick a few times. One example is when Tom walked out of the room, and she quickly kissed Gatsby. A few minutes before, she had also offered to kiss Nick (Fitzgerald, 89). This is more evidence of her being unloyal, although on the outside she seems to be a loyal girl. Thus, two sides of the same person.

Throughout The Great Gatsby, many rumors about Gatsby fly around. No one next to Nick, and eventually Daisy, knows much about him. This allows him to essentially be whatever people think he is.There are rumors that he killed someone (Fitzgerald, 35) and rumors that he’s a bootlegger (Fitzgerald, 48). None of these rumors can be proven, but none can be disproven either, leaving Gatsby able to steer people’s perception of him any which way he chooses. This leaves him wide open to create multiple versions of