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The Great Gatsby Research Paper

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Joelian Fowler Patrick Lynch English 11 3 May 2024 Modernism In Literature: The Great Gatsby Spiritually Empty Fitzgerald’s universe in The Great Gatsby represents all that is least noble, least worthy, and least heroic in mankind. Jay Gatsby is an overzealous, delusional bootlegger. Tom Buchanan is an overly racist hypocrite in which nothing bad happens. Nick Caraway, the overly righteous and also hypocritical man, says he’s great at judging and is unbiased. The Great Gatsby reflects the Modernist sensibility that man is spiritually empty. For example, Jay Gatsby embodies The Sin of Evny, and is a delusional man who believes he can simply sweep away a married woman from the wealthy Buchanan family, who has a child, and everything to lose. “after she was free, …show more content…

An additional example is Tom Buchanan. Tom Buchanan can be labeled as committing two acts of great sin. His sins are the Sin of Pride and the Sin of Lust. “So Tom Buchanan and his girl and I went up together to New York—or not quite together, for Mrs. Wilson sat discreetly in another car.” and “‘the polo player.’‘Oh no,’ objected Tom quickly, ‘Not me.’” Both of these quotes adequately put on display the two sins Tom committed, the first is pride and how he is shameful of his accomplishments and the “polo player” comment bothers him very much. The second one would be Lust, he goes out and has multiple affairs with Myrtle, and it’s not even the first time he has done this. The final example of the big three characters in this story, is Nick Caraway. Nick Caraway’s sin is The Sin of Sloth, Nick willingly sits by and idly allows Tom to have his affair with Myrtle and doesn’t let Daisy in on exactly what Tom is doing, and also allows Gatsby to come to tea with himself and Daisy which he knows he shouldn’t allow because Daisy is married to

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In the book The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald, the author creates hypocritical characters such as Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby which helps create the theme of dishonesty amongst the wealthy. Tom Buchanan, an extremely wealthy thirty year old man, who is “one of those men who achieved such an acute, limited excellence at twenty-one that everything afterwards savors an anti-climax” lacks the high moral standards that he has come to expect from people around him (Fitzgerald 8). Early on in the novel, the reader learns that Tom is having an affair with Myrtle Wilson. Daisy, Tom’s wife, is aware of Tom's mistress, although she acts as if she does not know about his affair. But when Tom learns of Daisy’s affair, he is flabbergasted.

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His hypocritical personality heavily impacts our view of him. We learn early on in the story that Tom is cheating on his wife with Myrtle. In an attempt to discredit Jay, Tom tries to persuade Daisy into loving him but has a hidden agenda and does not want Daisy to leave as the society will view him negatively. “I couldn’t forgive him or like him, but I saw that what he had done was, to him, entirely justified”. Nick claims that Tom had justified his reason for telling George the assumed culprit behind Myrtle's death.

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In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, the American Dream is shown as a false ideal through many of its characters, including the two main characters. This is shown through Jay Gatsby whose riches fail to lead him the happiness, and Daisy Buchannon who thought a family would make her happy but is left unsatisfied and broken. Word Count: 57 Jay Gatsby had achieved the American dream by going from the average life to extreme wealth by working for it, but it just proved that ideal wrong by not granting him happiness. For example, when Nick looks back at Gatsby at the end of the novel and he says, “He had come a long way to the blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him” (180).

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Romanticism Kills The idea of love is often considered one of the most powerful forces in the world, usually associated with good, however F. Scott Fitzgerald uses The Great Gatsby to show otherwise. Through the main character, Jay Gatsby, Fitzgerald shows the extent people with the romantic mindset will go to pursue their desires, while pushing boundaries. Due to his romantic mindset, Gatsby creates an illusion of Daisy that prevents him from seeing the reality of their relationship, leading to his ultimate demise. Myrtle Wilson, similarly, is used to further explore the dangers of romanticism, but from a different and less viewed perspective. Myrtle's romantic pursuit of a life beyond her given social class ultimately leads to a gruesome

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If his mind is not occupied by his mistress Myrtle, he is drowning in thoughts of Gatsby’s suspected crime-filled life. “Indeed, Tom Buchanan's sources appear most reliable in his characterization of Gatsby's drug store chain as ‘just small change’ compared to his stolen bonds” (Pauly 116). Buchanan is a hypocrite towards Gatsby. He denounces Gatsby’s life actions as being morally evil but Tom’s actions are no different than Gatsby’s in the sense that both men are unfaithful to themselves and their nearest relationships. Tom is competing with Gatsby through deception and treachery, and their dangerous habits wound them

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