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The Great Gatsby Psychoanalytic Analysis

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Evelina Kochubey Professor Roberts English 1B 14 March 2018 Dysfunctional Love: F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby” and Psychoanalytic Criticism One of American’s “finest works of fiction by any of this country’s writers” is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel: The Great Gatsby (J. Yardley). It is written from the perspective of the character, Nick Caraway who talks about the love relationships between the characters in the story. In the book Critical Theory Today, Lois Tyson describes, “The Great Gatsby [is] one of the great American love stories”; however, psychoanalytic critics may see the love relationship among the characters in the story as dysfunctional love (39). Psychoanalytic criticism is seeing the world “that it is comprised of individual …show more content…

Being distressed over Tom’s involvement with Myrtle, it may seem that Daisy desires an emotional relationship with her husband. Jordan tells Nick about Daisy after her honeymoon that reinforces this interpretation: I’d never seen a girl so mad about her husband. If he left the room for a minute she’d look around uneasily and say “Where’s Tom gone?” and wear the most abstracted expression until she saw him coming in the door. She used to sit on the sand with his head in her lap by the hour, rubbing her fingers over his eyes and looking at him with unfathomable delight. (76-77; ch. 4) However, through the psychological lens, it points out the history of Daisy’s “delight” in her husband as a different …show more content…

Tom being very rich in which he has acquired from his ancestors – the “old money”- brags a lot about his money, wealth, and status to others. For example, he brags to Nick about his house and stables, introduces Myrtle to Nick and others, belittles those who are not the dominant race, and plays around with George Wilson if he will sell the car to George, implying that he would not make a profit of reselling it. We can see that Tom is not emotionally secure, and therefore talks about whatever he has to make himself feel better. Even the women Tom is acquaintance with- all from low classes-has the indication that he tries to boost his insecurity by “controlling

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Jennifer Pham Miss Kelsey Hopson H English I 107 11 December 2014 The Great Gatsby Book Report Love, at times, can drive a person crazy. Sometimes, it is good while other times, not so much. This love is displayed in Jay Gatsby, the main character of the book, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. As Gatsby’s character is further developed, the realization of him being attached, abstracted, and retrospective comes into light.

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In Tom and Daisy's three-year-long marriage, they knew what to expect from one another. Tom was presumed to cheat on Daisy with many women and still have an entitled personality while Daisy was to be meek and nonchalant about his infidelities. Although, there was previously tension

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Daisy attempts to fill her love thirsty heart with money and social status with Tom, thus giving her superficial happiness. Daisy marries Tom to fill her cold heart with all of his wealth; their “pomp” wedding included many servants and guests along with a wedding gift of a “string of pearls valued at three hundred and fifty thousand dollars”, showing the true reason for Daisy’s love toward Tom (Page 75-76). Daisy and Tom throw an impromptu wedding, which seems to give off its own sense of superiority without much effort. Daisy is being showered with greater wealth than she ever has before, and she loves it. When Daisy is focused on the wonderful wealth given to her by Tom, she is able to ignore her inner feelings; however, when she is reminded of the hollowness of her marriage, she sinks into a temporary depression.

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In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald portrays love, obsession, and objectification through the characters Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan. Some might say their love was true and Gatsby’s feelings for her was pure affection, while others say that he objectifies and is obsessed with her. Perhaps Gatsby confuses lust and obsession with love, and throughout the novel, he is determined to win his old love back. At the end of the novel, Gatsby is met with an untimely death and never got to be with Daisy. The reader is left to determined if Gatsby’s and Daisy’s love was pure and real, or just wasn’t meant to be.

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Early on, it seems as though Daisy is content with her husband Tom, and what he has to offer such as his

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His selfish idealization of Daisy led to his loneliness, and ultimately to his

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Gatsby Thematic Essay In the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, lots of connections are drawn through various thematic subjects presented in this novel. One of these connections is between love, wealth, and social status, which are all very prominent subjects within The Great Gatsby. The relationships between various characters within the pages of this written work make one message very apparent: Love can be regarded as flimsy and deceitful when it is dictated by one’s wealth and social status.

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The Great Gatsby is a novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald and narrated by a man named Nick Carraway. This novel was written with the intent of showing the readers how morally corrupt the 1920s were. Throughout the novel, characters abandon their moral values for a materialistic lifestyle. The novel depicts a great picture of the roles men and women played in the 1920s. Even with the changing roles of men and women, they continued to rely heavily on whom they were married to and what social class they belonged to.

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In the present time, Daisy is moved on and married, with a child in a beautiful grand home. Her relationship with Tom can be speculated to be based on her wanting to gain his finances or that he can support her like no one else can. Daisy portrays an idealistic vision of herself, and , throughout the story, shows a selfish and narcissistic persona at times. Daisy and Gatsby

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Daisy is a victim of denying what is below the surface. This is seen in many different aspects throughout the novel. By approaching reality in a deeper way, everything will automatically become more complicated in countless ways. Even as readers, we do not know everything there is to know, especially when dealing with Jay Gatsby, but what we do know still manages to be contradicted by the complicated character of Daisy. It is recognizable that Daisy continually denies reality for her own convenience within her individual relationships mainly involving Tom and Gatsby, which deal with Tom’s affair, the situation of Gatsby, the feeling of regret following the realization of her first love, and her past of loving Tom.

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As we get to know throughout the novel, both of them have an affair, Daisy meets again with her old love, Gatsby, and Myrtle is the mistress of Tom. Daisy comes from a wealthy upper-class family and she has been raised in privilege while Myrtle has to fight for everything she has. Myrtle is attempting to give the impression of a wealthy, high-class woman, but she does not have the figure of a high-class woman. She has a “thick fish figure” (25) which connotes that she is not a skinny type nor beautiful. The appearance of Daisy is the contrast of Myrtle.

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The Great Gatsby Literary Analysis “They were careless people…” says Nick Carraway, the narrator of The Great Gatsby. In a story depicting the 1920s during a time of prosperity, growth, and the emergence of the America as a major global power, this statement may seem to be contrary. But in reality, Nick Carraway’s description of his friends and the people he knew, was not only true, but is an indication of those who were striving for the American dream. F. Scott Fitzgerald suggests that the American Dream is foolish, the people who pursue it are immoral and reckless, and this pursuit is futile. First, F. Scott Fitzgerald proposes that the American dream is foolish.

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1. The psychoanalytic analysis in general Psychoanalytic criticism was developed by Austrian neurologist and the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. His theory is based on conscious and unconscious functioning, stages of growth, developments in human behavior and normal and abnormal experiences. If we apply some psychoanalytic techniques like flashbacks, childhood memories and regression, we can uncover the hidden meanings, motivations, repressed dreams and wishes within the text. Major principles of Freud’s theory are the models of human psyche, the psychosexual stages, defense mechanism, the Oedipus complex, dreams and dream symbols.

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Not only do these descriptions of Tom appear when Nick is directly talking about him; throughout the whole book, he places Tom in a similar light. When Tom meets Nick, Myrtle, and the McKees’ in an apartment, Nick still goes as far as to say that, “Tom looked at [Mr. Mckee] blankly” (32). And Tom is also constantly portrayed as controlling, such as when “Tom carried [Wilson] into the office, set him down in a chair, and came back.”, and then said, “ ‘If somebody’ll come here and sit with him,’ he snapped authoritatively” (141). When describing Tom’s conversations, his expressions, and even his simplest actions, Nick exaggerates Tom’s masculinity and aggressiveness.

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Daisy, is a woman which born and married to wealth and she has no values and no purpose in life. Her hope of happiness seems dull when she realizes that she is marrying the wrong person. Early in the novel, Daisy finds out a secret that Tom his husband hiding something from her. Jordan says, “She might have the decency not to telephone him a

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