Explore the view Gatsby is to be pitied rather than admired
Fitzgerald narrates ‘The Great Gatsby’ through the character of Nick Carraway, told ‘after two years’ of the tragedy’s occurrence. Throughout the novel he experiences both pride and distrust of Gatsby and so despite his promise to ‘reserve all judgements’, he is inevitably bias towards his friend. The novel opens with these conflicting feelings towards Gatsby as Nick shows him as pitiful, ‘it was what preyed on him’ and admirable with his ‘extraordinary gift for hope’. Gatsby is portrayed as both a victim and a man of brilliant aspirations.
Bigger than the dream of Daisy is what Gatsby stands for, the American Dream and its ultimate inaccessibility. The novel ends with Nick saying that despite everything, ‘tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms further’ as Fitzgerald seems to still condone the act of keeping hopeful, colossal dreams. The quote embodies the true nature of the American Dream itself and how if anything is possible, fulfilment is impossible. The dream is about always wanting more, always trying to run faster and stretch further because dreams don’t have to be limited. At first, all Gatsby wants is Daisy’s love, but
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This is responsible for a lack of strong catharsis, accompanied by the fact Gatsby never deserves to die. Here, he may be pitied for his tragic outcome and admired for never giving up and because he dies trying. The traditional Aristotelian tragedy is modified by Fitzgerald as there is much more psychological and motivational complexity in the characters; Gatsby is arguably both to be pitied and admired because of the ambiguous nature of his actions: a criminal in love, slave to an unrealistic hope. Because the moral of the story is also uncertain, dreams are both condone and condemnable, and the narrator seems to be bias despite his many promises, Gatsby would appear to be