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The Great Gatsby


Who is the central character of “The Great Gatsby”, Nick or Gatsby? Why?


1. Characterization of Nick2. Characterization of Gatsby3. Result


At first we want to introduce Nick and Gatsby, two of the main characters of the book, to give you a better understanding of their behaviour and about our opinion who is the central character. After this we will write a result.


1. Nick


Nick is born in a middle western city and grews up in a wealthy family. He has a good education. His father always tells him not to judge other people, who have no advantages in their childhood. For that Nick is respected and can make friends easily. But also he isn’t perfect because he doesn´t listen always to the stories of his friends.In 1915 he graduates from Yale and participates in the first World War. Frustrated and disgusted by the western provincialism he decides to go East in 1922 and to learn the bond business. He wants to live in a more fashionable area and to get to know the upper class. For that he moves to West Egg and lives in an “eyesore”
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between two big mansions (p. 9/l.24). At the end Nick leaves West Egg on account of moral frustration. He has learnt that money is more important for the upper class than love. For the rich people, like Tom and Daisy, materialism plays an important role. They create the illusion of being better, more valuable and deserving than other people. Fitzgerald uses Nick as the first person narrator and so he is mainly a passive observer. Nick is a reliable narrator because he doesn’t only tell the story from his point of view, but also through other characters like Jordan, when she tells us about Daisy’s past (p.74 /5 – 77/10). His reports are in complex sentences with a touch of irony. His character traits are tolerance, a certain snobbishness and self-irony. Nick is an admirer of romantic and Gatsby, whom he despises at the beginning. Nick is in the perfect position to tell the story, because he is Daisy’s cousin, he was together with Tom at Yale and his house is next to Gatsby´s. He knows the characters well enough to give us the main information about them. Although Nick doesn’t like most of the characters and their behaviour he doesn’t make any judgements. During his first visit at Daisy’s and Tom’s house he gets to know Jordan, a famous golf player, and falls in love with her. Jordan is actually a careless, bored and arrogant woman, who is willing to do everything to win (p.59/1). But Nick doesn’t care, which shows that he is only sexual interested in her. It’s only her outward appearance which makes her attractive! One important thing, too, is that Nick is Gatsby´s only friend at the end. He is the only one who knows him really and tries to organize a dignified furneal. Although he despises some things about Gatsby, he understands him in a certain way.


2.Gatsby


Gatsby is described as a self-assured, eccentric, ambiguous, romantic, sensitive, lonely, mysterious, ambitious and generous man. He is a new rich and so he wants to show everybody that he can buy everything with his money. But his intention is not actually to present his money and his wealth, but to win back his love Daisy. He creates the dream that she comes back because of his great and pompous mansion which is furnished according to her taste. He doesn’t realize that this is not the suitable way. Gatsby can impress Daisy, but it is the wrong way to see what love is. That doesn’t make him a bad person, you can see that he is blinded by love. He would do everything for Daisy. He bought the big mansion to give parties in hope that Daisy would appear one day. Gatsby is actually a good host, he always prepares his parties well. But he as himself never appears and celebrates with his guests. Most of his guest aren’t even invited, but he doesn’t care. You can compare him with a disco owner who has a certain intention. In this case, it would be to conquer Daisy.His mansion is situated next to the water, so that he can see the green light, which belongs to Daisy’s dock. The green light is a symbol that Daisy is near to him. Nobody really knows who Gatsby is, there are a lot of speculations about his past. For example that he had killed a man, that he was a bootlegger or that he was a German spy during the war. There is a lot of gossip about him. In Chapter IV and VI Gatsby informs Nick about his past. He tells him that he is the son of some wealthy people in the middle-west, but they are all dead now. He brought up in America but educates in Oxford, because of the family tradition. After the death of his family he gets some money and lives in all the capitals of Europe. One day he sees the beautiful yacht of the millionaire Cody. Gatsby borrows a row boat to warn Cody of an innpendiny storm. Cody take the 17 year old boy for the job of a steward, mate and secretary. When Cody dies, he leaves the boy a legacy of 25.000 $. Cody makes Jay Gatsby. Before he meets Cody his name was James Gatz. In Chapter IV we also get to know about Daisy’s and Gatsby´s love. Daisy was eighteen and the most popular young girl in Louisville. She is dressed in white, and young officers from Camp Taylor demanded the privilege of monopolizing her that night (page 74). Once Jordan saw Daisy and Gatsby, they were in love. That was in 1917. Then Gatsby had to go to war, but Daisy promised to wait for him. The time was too long for her and in the end she married Tom. Another reason for that was that “rich girls don’t marry poor boys” and Gatsby wasn’t rich at that time. Five years later Daisy and Gatsby meet again and he is still blinded by love. He is willing to do everything for Daisy, even to say that he was driving the “death-car” which kills Myrtle in the end. This sacrifice becomes a disaster for him. Mr. Wilson kills Gatsby in his swimming-pool in revenge for his wife.


3. RESULT (Who is the main character?) :


We think that Gatsby plays the most important role in the novel, it’s a very special role. He is introduced very late. His first appearance is in Chapter III at one of his parties (p.49/l.28). Before that, only Nick tells us information about him. On the one hand Nick admires his neighbour because of his wealth, the big parties and his romantic readiness, on the other hand he despises him, because he thinks Gatsby is unable to understand what true love is. He sees also a materialist in him. In our opinion Gatsby plays the central character because the whole book is built up around his life and the love for Daisy. Nick is responsible to tell the incidents in the right order, so that we understand what is going on. He plays the central role in narration but not in the book. We also get to know about Nick’s past and his wishes, but that’s not the point. Nick tries to be part of the upper class and builts up a relation to the famous golf player Jordan Baker. In the end they finish their relationship because they recognize that they don’t fit together. Jordan is only materialistic and finds her profit in everything, but Nick expects more than that. He believes in true love, although he had tried to be like a man of the higher society. He recognizes that materialism and love couldn ´t lead to happiness. That is the point that Gatsby doesn’t see. Another hint for Gatsby as the main character is the title “The Great Gatsby”. Fitzgerald wouldn’t have chosen this title if another character would be the most important person. Fitzgerald had also to chose somebody who explains us details in the context and who is credible. Nick has to play this part but that’s not the most important role.


Quelle: -"the great gatsby" -Lektürenhilfe