Francis Scott Fitzgerald & Ernest Hemingway

CHARACTERS:

Jay Gatsby: The main character is a young man, around thirty years old, who rose from an impoverished childhood in North Dakota to become a fabulously wealthy, even though he achieved this goal by participating in organized crime, including distributing illegal alcohol and trading in stolen security. Though Gatsby has always wanted to be rich, his main motivation in acquiring his fortune was his love for Daisy, whom he met as a young military officer in Louisville before leaving to fight in World War I in 1917. Gatsby immediately fell in love with Daisy’s aura of luxury, grace and charm and lied to her about his own background in order to convince her that he was good enough for her. She promised to wait for him when he left for the war, but married Tom Buchanan in 1919, while Gatsby was studying at Oxford in an attempt to gain an education. From that moment on Gatsby dedicated himself to winning Daisy back and his acquisition of wealth, his purchase of the mansion on West Egg and his

Weekly parties are all merely means to that end. Most of these information are introduced fairly late in the novel, Gatsby's reputation precedes him and he does not appear in a speaking role until Chapter 3. Fitz initially presents him as the aloof, enigmatic host of the extravagant parties thrown at his mansion, he appears surrounded by luxury, courted by powerful men and beautiful women and he is the subject of many gossips throughout New York which made him a kind of legendary celebrity before he is ever introduced to the reader, while Gatsby's background and the source of his wealth are revealed only in Chapters 6 and 7, where the reader receives definitive proof of Gatsby's criminal dealings. As a result, the reader's first impression of Gatsby is not that of a lovesick, naïve young man, as emerges during the later part of the novel. An important part of Gatsby's personality is the theatrical quality of his approach to life: he has literally created his own character, even changing

His name from James Gatz to Jay Gatsby to represent his reinvention of himself; he has an extraordinary ability to transform his hopes and dreams in reality and this talent for self-invention is what gives Gatsby his quality of greatness, indeed the title The Great Gatsby is reminiscent of such magicians as The Great Houdini and The great Blackstone, suggesting that the persona of Jay Gatsby is a masterful illusion. As the novel progress and Fitz deconstructs Gatsby's self-presentation, Gatsby reveals himself to be an innocent, hopeful young man who stakes everything on his dreams, not realizing that his dreams are unworthy of him. He invests Daisy with an idealistic perfection, but his dream of her disintegrates, revealing the corruption that wealth causes, much in the way Fitz sees the American dream crumbling in the 1920s, as America's powerful optimism, vitality and individualism become subordinate to the amoral pursuit of wealth.

1. Gatsby is contrasted most consistently with Nick;
2. ...

Whereas Tom is a cold-hearted, aristocratic bully, Gatsby is a loyal and good-hearted man;

Though Gatsby’s lifestyle and attitude differ greatly from those of George Wilson, they share the fact that they both lose their love interest to Tom.

Nick Carraway: If Gatsby represents one part of Fitz’s personality, the celebrity who pursued and glorified wealth in order to impress the woman he loved, then Nick represents another part: the quiet, reflective Midwesterner adrift in the lurid East. As a result of his relationship to Gatsby and Daisy, he is the perfect choice to narrate the novel, which is a sort of personal memoir of Nick’s experience with Gatsby in the summer of 1922. He is also well suited to narrating the story because of his temperament: as he tells the reader in Chapter 1, he is tolerant, open-minded, quiet, and a good listener and as a result, others tend to tell him their secrets. Gatsby in particular, comes to trust him and treat him as a confidant. Nick generally assumes a

Secondary role throughout the novel, preferring to describe and comment on events rather than dominate the action; often he functions as Fitz's voice, as in his extended meditation on time and the American dream at the end of Chapter 9.

As Nick plays a role inside the narrative, he evidences a powerful internal conflict that he does not resolve until the end of the book: on the one hand, Nick is attracted to the fun-driven lifestyle of New York, on the other hand, he finds that lifestyle grotesque and damaging. This inner conflict is symbolized by Nick's romantic affair with Jordan Baker: he is attracted to her vivacity and her sophistication just as he is repelled by her dishonesty and her lack of consideration for other people. Nick states that there is a quality of distortion to life in New York, and this lifestyle makes him lose his equilibrium, especially early in the novel, as when he gets drunk at Gatsby's party in Chapter 2. After witnessing the destruction of Gatsby's dream and presiding.

Over the appalling spectacle of Gatsby's funeral, Nick realizes the fast life of revelry on the East Coast is a cover for the terrifying moral emptiness that the valley of ashes symbolizes. This insight demonstrates a new maturity gained by Nick, who returns to Minnesota in search of a quieter life structured by more traditional moral values.

Daisy Buchanan: Partially based on Fitz's wife, Zelda, Daisy is a beautiful young debutante in Louisville, who was extremely popular among the military officers stationed near her home, including Gatsby, who lied about his background to Daisy, claiming to be from a wealthy family in order to convince her that he was worthy of her. He won her heart and they made love before Gatsby left to fight in the war, and Daisy promised to wait for him, but in 1919 she chose to marry Tom Buchanan who came from a solid, aristocratic family and who could promise her a wealthy lifestyle. To Gatsby, Daisy represents the paragon of perfection, she incarnates the charm, wealth,

Sophistication and aristocracy that Gatsby desired as a child; in reality, she is fickle, shallow, bored and sardonic. Nick characterizes her as a careless person who smashes things up and then retreats behind her money. She proves her real nature when she chooses Tom over Gatsby in Chapter 7, then allows Gatsby to take the blame for killing Myrtle even though she was driving the car; finally, rather than attend Gatsby's funeral, Daisy and Tom move away, living no forwarding address. Like Zelda Fitzgerald, Daisy is in love with money and material luxury, she is capable of affection (she seems fond of Nick and occasionally seems to love Gatsby sincerely), but not of sustain loyalty or care; she is indifferent even to her own infant daughter, treating her as an afterthoughts when she is introduced in Chapter 7. In Fitz's conception of America in 1920s, Daisy represents the amoral values of the aristocratic East Egg set.

Tom Buchanan: He is above all characterized by physical and mental

hardness: Tom's body is a cruel body with enormous power that he developed as a college athlete, as Nick explains, and this strength give him an air of danger and aggression, as when he hurts Daisy's fingers or Myrtle's nose. Tom's physical appearance is echoed in his mental inflexibility and single-minded way of thinking about the world; and he remains unshakable regarding his troubled marriage with Daisy: at the end of the book, even after it becomes clear that both Tom and Daisy have cheated on each other, Tom maintains that they have always loved each other and that they always will, no matter what. So Tom's physical and mental hardness produce a brutish personality that uses threats and violence to maintain control and, according to Nick, it relates to the larger arc of his life. Tom was a nationally known football star in his youth, but after his time in the spotlight ended everything else in his life felt like an anticlimax. In Chapter 1, Nick claims that Tom has always sought to

TOM: Tom Buchanan is a wealthy and arrogant man who represents the old money elite. He is physically imposing and has a commanding presence. However, beneath his confident exterior, Tom is deeply insecure. He longs to recapture the thrill of his youth, and his failure to do so infuses his life with a sense of melancholy, which contributes to Tom's evident victim complex. When he learns about Daisy's history with Gatsby, he has no reasonable cause to feel victimized since he himself has an extramarital affair, nevertheless jealousy gets the better of him and he once again uses threats and demands to reasserts a sense of control.

JORDAN: Jordan Baker is described by Nick as mysterious, aloof, and yet alluring. She belongs to the upper crust of society, although she moved to the east coast from somewhere in the Midwest. She has quickly risen among the social ranks to become a famous golfer, a sport played mainly among the wealthy. However, her rise to social prominence is founded on lies. Indeed, she cheated to win her first major golf tournament, and she is also incurably dishonest. According to Nick, Jordan constantly bends the truth in order to keep the world at a distance and protect herself.

herself from its cruelty.

When he encounters her for the first time in Chapter 1, Jordan appears distant, statuesque and beautiful, even regal but with an air of fragility, as if she's posing. Jordan's cynical and self-centered nature marks her as one of the new women of the Roaring Twenties; such new women were called flappers and they became famous for flouting conventional standards of female behavior. Flappers distinguished themselves physically by bobbing their hair, dressing in short skirts, and wearing a lot of makeup; they also listened to jazz music, smoked cigarettes, openly drank alcohol and drove cars and, most scandalous of all, they were known for their casual attitudes toward sexuality. So Jordan's presence in the novel draws attention to the social and political turbulence of the Jazz Age, and she represents a new path for women. Whereas Daisy is the object of men's fantasy and idealism, Jordan exhibits a hard-hearted pragmatism that, for Nick, links her more forcefully to the real.

Myrtle Wilson: She desperately seeks a better life than the one she has: she feels imprisoned in her marriage with George, a downtrodden and uninspiring man with whom she lives in a garage in the squalid valley of ashes. Myrtle attempts to escape her social position by becoming a mistress to the wealthy Tom Buchanan, who buys her gifts, including a puppet, and rents her an apartment in Manhattan where she play-acts an upper class lifestyle, dressing up, throwing parties and expressing disgust for servants. Myrtle seems to believe that Tom genuinely loves her, and would marry her if only Daisy would divorce him, but Nick knows that Tom would never marry her and the asymmetry of the relationship makes Myrtle a more sympathetic character than she would be otherwise. To Tom, Myrtle is just another possession, and when she tries to assert her will, he resorts to violence and puts her in her place. Although the book is full of tragic characters who don't get what they want, Myrtle's fate is the