Daisy's Use Of Materialism In The Great Gatsby

1. Materialists
 Description of Buchanan’s house: “Georgian colonial mansion … The lawn started at the beach and ran towards the front door for a quarter of a mile”
“…he’d bring down a string of polo ponies” (8)  lap of luxury, excessive wealth
 Myrtle’s transformation:
"…with the influence of the dress her whole personality had also undergone a change. The intense vitality... was converted into impressive hauteur"(31)  indicates how the material (dress) can transform her social status from the poor girl that lived in the Valley of Ashes into a woman of an upper social class, she leaves behind her lower class trappings and in with the specific material possession adopts a new personality
 Description of Gatsby’s parties:
“On buffet tables,

garnished with glistening hors d’oeuvres, spiced baked hams crowed against salads of harlequin designs and pastry pigs and turkeys bewitched to a dark gold” (40) same patterns of excess and opulence, drinks introduce the theme of LIQUIDS which signifies the moral instability of the social class, Material possessions do not only introduce materialism itself, but with symbolic relations
“little party” Nick’s ironic comment that emphasizes even more the surplus
 Excess in Daisy’s wedding:
“He came down with a hundred people in four private cars, and hired a whole floor of the Muhlbach Hotel, and the day before the wedding he gave her a string of pearls valued at three hundred and fifty thousand dollars.” (76) Tom’s attempt to impress Daisy with his material possession allows again an insight to his character, one could say that it takes of form of bribing to win Daisy’s love.

Love and marriage should not be based on wealth or luxury, it is a union between individuals to spend the rest of their lives together. Tom’s superficiality is evident, he undervalues marriage because he thinks he can buy his way in

it.
 Gatsby’s shirts:
"…shirts of sheer linen and thick silk and fine flannel…shirts with stripes and scrolls and plaids in coral and apple green and lavender and faint orange…They're such beautiful shirts, she sobbed, her muffled in the folds.

It makes me sad because I've never seen such beautiful shirts." (92)  another attempt of Gatsby’s to show off his wealth to Daisy that is prone in material pleasures and appreciative in great display of materialism. She isn’t weeping for lost love, she is weeping at the overt display of wealth she sees before her.
 “Her voice is full of money‘…That was it. I‘d never understood before. It was full of money – that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals‘ song of it…High in a white palace the king‘s daughter, the golden girl…” (119)  Gatsby understands that after all he erroneously defined her merely by who she was, but by what she had and what she represented. His first feelings were created by the aspiration and admiration of Daisy’s wealth, materialism was the reason the Gatsby was first attracted to Daisy.

2.

Superficial
 “A breeze blew through the room, blew curtains in at one end and out the other like pale flags…The only stationary object in the room was an enormous couch on which two young women were buoyed up as though upon an anchored balloon.” (10)  Fitzgerald sets the women in a dreamlike setting to emphasize their inability to deal with reality, dressed in white to signify a void of something, most probably a void of intellectualism
 “All right…I’m glad it’s a girl. And I hope she’ll be a fool – that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool” (19)  Daisy’s superficiality is clear, she does not want her daughter to have an in-depth and critical thinking instead she prefers her to be of low intellectual ability. Daisy’s mentality is that though beauty and looks you can get away with even murder, as she did. She is all about appearances and does not care about the nature of what is under her skin.
 “But we heard it, so it must be true” (22)  her main way of acquiring information and knowledge is through gossip and rumors, they succumb to the power of suggestion
 “Sometimes they came and went without having met Gatsby at all” (42)  the nominally glamourous guests are in fact shallow, they are not even interested to meet their generous and hospitable host that provides them with such entertainment, they take advantage of him without a care
 Owl Eyes: “Absolutely real – have pages and everything. I thought they‘d be a nice durable cardboard. Matter of fact they‘re absolutely real. Pages and—here! Lemme show you.” (46)  Owl eyes has spent a lot of time among the newly rich and knows them well to have come into conclusion that they are by large appearances and looks, not essence
 “You must see the faces of many people you’ve heard about…Perhaps you know that lady,” (105)  Gatsby tries to impress Daisy by showing off his guests. This suggests that for him, himself, finds only acquaintances of great importance, that is why he uses them as means of winning Daisy back