For many American citizens, wealth represents the ideal American dream, something many strive for but not everyone achieves. The novel, “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is set on Long Island in the fictional town of West Egg in 1922. Fitzgerald focuses on the representation of old money, which is families that have been wealthy for generations, and new money, which is self- made money on current trends, through the character’s motivations and interactions or relationships with others. Throughout the novel, Fitzgerald uses the nature of wealth and status to show its dehumanizing or corrupting nature with characters through differences in wealth and how they came about it. Analyzing Daisy Buchanan, one of the main characters, Fitzgerald uses her actions to show the corrupting effect of wealth on people. An example of this is when Gatsby invites Daisy over for a tour of his house, which ends in Gatsby throwing out clothes from his closet. “Suddenly, with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shirts and began to cry stormily. “They're such beautiful shirts," she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds.” (Fitzgerald Chapter 5) Here, Daisy lacks something that most normal humans would have, empathy. She does not care about Gatsby’s unmistakable love for her, but rather the display of …show more content…
One of the main themes of The Great Gatsby revolves around wealth and how it affects the actions and thoughts of people who were born with it. Specifically with Daisy, she only cared about social status, how she could get away with doing things the poor would get jailed for, and how she regards others knowing they did not come from wealth. Many qualities that a humane and uncorrupt human would have, Daisy lacks. Throughout the whole book, characters who were born wealthy prove themselves to be corrupt and deceiving in some way, such as with their morals or their