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Summary Of Chapter 6 Of The Great Gatsby

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In chapters four through six of The Great Gatsby, the reader is introduced to the real Gatsby who was incredibly poor in his early life. At the beginning of chapter six, Nick explains to the reader Gatsby’s real upbringing. Nick explains, “James Gatz — that was really, or at least legally, his name… His parents were shiftless and unsuccessful farm people — his imagination had never really accepted them as his parents at all. The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself” (Fitzgerald 62-63). Gatsby’s desperate longing for something more than what he had at such a young age urged him to create the persona of “Jay Gatsby” from the ordinary James Gatz. Comparably, the young Gatz spent much …show more content…

The reader learned that Gatsby was an apprentice of a sort to a rather rich middle-aged man named Don Cody. Gatsby traveled with him, learned from him, and admired him until Cody passed away. Nick explains the wealth Gatsby was supposed earn recounting, “And it was from Cody that he inherited money — a legacy of twenty-five thousand dollars. He didn’t get it…[but] He was left with his singularly appropriate education; the vague contour of Jay Gatsby had filled out to the substantiality of a man” (Fitzgerald 64). Although Gatsby was not able to access the money left to him by Cody, the education he was provided with allowed Gatsby to gain wealth and status to purchase his estate at West Egg. Moreover, Gatsby never attempts to hide his wealth from anyone, especially Daisy. As Nick is returning to his home he spots a bright light and thinks his house is aflame only to realize it is Gatsby’s estate, “Turning a corner, I saw that it was Gatsby’s house, lit from tower to cellar. At first I thought it was another party…with all the house thrown open to the game. But there wasn’t a sound. Only wind in the trees, which blew the wires and made the lights go off and on again as if the house had winked into the darkness.” (Fitzgerald 53). Gatsby wants his wealth to be noticed because he wants to prove to Daisy

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This all makes the life of Gatsby appear to be an entire facade. One way in which Jay Gatsby puts on a false front is when he is talking about his money and how he has come to gain all of his wealth. He tells Nick that he inherited all of his money from his family in the Midwest. In the novel, Gatsby says, “My family all died and I came into a great deal of money.” (Fitzgerald 70)

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After only knowing Nick for a couple of days, Gatsby invites Nick to lunch with him. Gatsby wants to clear up any rumors Nick has heard about him at Gatsby’s party and during the car ride to lunch he opens up to Nick about his past. Gatsby reveals that he comes from “wealthy people in the middle west” who were “all dead now” so he “came into a good deal of money”(Fitzgerald 65). Gatsby has only known Nick for a short amount of time as stated previously but is so eager to tell Nick about his life. The people that come to Gatsby’s parties know close to nothing about Gatsby or his past which is why people often gossiped about how Gatsby became so wealthy.

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Society has given birth to several great individuals who pursue great dreams. These individuals rely heavily on their personalities and accomplishments to be considered great. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby finds great amounts of money and success following his own desired journey rooting from nothing. Daisy Buchanan, the love of his dreams, is Gatsby’s main goal for pushing through life, willing to go to any lengths to gain her love back. Nick Carroway, a close friend to Gatsby, analyzes how Gatsby portrays his personality and actions through close observation.

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The short quote stated above is a flat out obvious lie as it is furthermore concluded in the novel that Gatsby did not inherit any money from his parents what so ever, but through bootlegging, an illegal process of smuggling alcohol into establishments. As the story goes on, Gatsby’s true identity gets exposed as it is announced when Nick Carraway says, “James Gatz-that was really or at least legally, his name. He has changed it at the age of seventeen. His parents were shiftless and unsuccessful farm people.” (102 Fitzgerald).

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Gatsby believes that money can buy him whatever his heart desires. Gatsby’s misunderstanding of the way money functions in the society he lives in results in the failure of his attempt to gain both status and the

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Not many people truly knew him, Nick however, was his next door neighbor and got to know the real Gatsby. Nick reveals to the reader, “Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God — a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that — and he must be about His Father's business, the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty. So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen-year-old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end. " Gatsby was a self made wealthy man who desperately tried to escape his beginnings.

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This is big lie number one, Gatsby is really from a family of dirt-poor farmers. Gatsby got so wealthy through the business of bootlegging. Gatsby also tells Nick, “I was brought up in America but educated at Oxford because all my ancestors

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The novel of The Great Gatsby portrays events that contribute to the character’s past having to do with their romances, lifestyle, and even their social class. Various characters in the novel have their past affect their decisions in present time, some being affected positively while others are affected negatively. The narrator Nick Carraway introduces Gatsby as a fine, wealthy man, but nobody really knew what lead him to his social standing. It was expected for him to have inherited his money, but in this case it was not like that at all Jay Gatz better known as Jay Gatsby, is a major character in the novel who uses his past to better himself. Years back, Gatsby met a girl whom he fell in love with, Daisy, but he was ashamed of not being able

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He did not accept where he had came from ,and felt that his history must be more important. In chapter six, the protagonist and narrator of the novel, Nick, informs the readers that Gatsby’s parents were “shiftless and unsuccessful farm people”

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As said by other critics, “Jay Gatsby's determination to establish a new identity for himself sets him apart from the other characters in the text” (Verderame). Gatsby grew up as a poor farmer boy. Born into poverty from the beginning, Gatsby cared little for his family and was determined to leave them behind for a new life. This tragic past encourages Gatsby to entirely start a new life by changing his identity and personality before the reader is even introduced to the character. “So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen year old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end” (98).Critics say, “In doing so, Gatsby has proven to himself that he can successfully change the story of his past” (Scisco).

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“James Gatz — that was really, or at least legally, his name… The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God.... So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen-year-old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end.” ( 99) Gatsby was just a ideal, a dream that was conceived from James Gatz , a poor boy. He changed everything, lied about his past and truly believed that he was Jay Gatsby.

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980 Words | 4 Pages

Although, unlike the majority of the characters in the novel, including Nick, Tom, and Daisy, Gatsby was not born rich, he envisioned a prosperous future for himself and dedicated his life towards achieving it. As said by Nick, “he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen year-old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end” (98). He wasn’t born into wealth, whatever Gatsby had, he acquired himself. He represented achieving the American Dream, the concept of building oneself from nothing, and reaching a point of happiness, whether that exist in money, a person, or a job. Gatsby embodied the definition of greatness, which can be defined as intense and grand, his parties, his house, the facade of his lifestyle, and him in general represented this flamboyant being, that was always talked

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Nick describes Gatsby “a son of God—a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that—and he must be about His Father 's business, the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty. So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen year old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end” (Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby 98). He compares Gatsby and Jesus Christ to show how he created his own identity. After he reinvented himself as a rich man, Gatsby had to maintain his image, so he went to the extremes to make as much money as he could. These extreme ways of making money worked very well for him, but the

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Gatsby is a wealthy man who lives in West Egg. He tells Nick that he is “the son of some wealthy people in the Middle West” (Fitzgerald, 65). He later states, “I was brought up in America but educated at Oxford, because all my ancestors have been educated there for many years. It is a family tradition” (Fitzgerald, 65). This is what Gatsby wants Nick to believe but, in reality, Nick tells the reader that Gatsby was a man by the name of James Gatz and he was the son of unsuccessful farmers.

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1373 Words | 6 Pages

While on the surface, Gatsby does have a ‘rags-to-riches’ story, it is not a virtuous one; he amasses his wealth through illegal channels by working with Meyer Wolfsheim, and never fulfills his dream, Daisy. Also, He changes his name from James Gatz to Jay Gatsby when he first encounters Dan Cody. Because Gatsby has to take on an entirely different persona to achieve success, disguising his poor upbringing and suggesting that James Gatz could never achieve the American dream. Gatsby first attempts to earn his financial success by performing menial labor for Cody, but when Cody’s ex-wife swindles Gatsby out of his inheritance, he turns to illegal means of getting rich. Not only does Gatsby illegally gain his wealth my selling grain liquor over the counter, but he also does so under the direction of Meyer Wolfsheim, breaking two essential qualities of the self-made man, virtue, and independence.

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