Examples Of Carelessness In The Great Gatsby

Fitzgerald shows disillusionment and carelessness to be a cause of moral decay. According to Nick, Tom and Daisy never thought about the consequences of their actions, as they “were careless people… They smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.” This decay of moral value and carelessness can be seen when Daisy, who is meant to love and care for Gatsby, is prepared to allow him to take the blame for Myrtle’s death. It is then shown again after the death of Gatsby as “she and Tom had gone away early that afternoon, and taken baggage with them,” Daisy didn’t bother to show up to Gatsby’s

funeral or even send flowers, she and Tom simply just leave town to avoid trouble, which shows she is prepared to do anything that means she is okay, even if it means being selfish and careless. Similarly, in ‘The Diamond as Big as the Ritz,’ although the greatest dishonesty or immorality comes from the attainment and maintenance of the wealth, it is accepted by other characters, such as John Unger. He demonstrates no disapproval of the family’s scandalous behaviour, as he falls in love with Percy Washington’s sister and enjoys the luxury. In ‘The Great Gatsby,’ Nick continues to enjoy Gatsby’s friendship despite discovering the source of his wealth.
The green light at the end of the dock represents the decay of Gatsby’s hopes and dreams. “...he stretched out his arms towards the dark water… I glace seaward-and distinguish nothing except a green light.” Gatsby associates the light with Daisy and it represents everything he wants to achieve – his longing for her, wealth and for the acceptance as a somebody. It is seen as the American Dream for Gatsby and it shows that, although the American Dream may seem like it is possible, it is actually more likely to be unreachable, like the light, which can be seen but has the ocean in the way as a barrier. This shows that the American Dream is decaying and is backed up by the fact that Gatsby ends up with his dreams failing. The bowl in The Cut-Glass Bowl is portrayed to decay Evelyn’s beauty, happiness and family. Evelyn gets less beautiful while the bowl stays the same, showing her up as she recedes “gradually into middle age”. Her daughter has to have her hand amputated because of a cut caused by the bowl, it causes a drunken row to end a party and also the discovery of her son’s death. Evelyn even ends up dying while trying to get rid of the destructive present.
The obsession over material wealth is a big cause of the decay of social and moral values. “His speaking voice, a gruff husky tenor, added to the impression of fractiousness he conveyed. There was a touch of paternal contempt in it, even toward people he liked—and there were men at New Haven who had hated his guts.” Fitzgerald portrays discriminative Tom with a negative view. He is ‘paternal’ due to his wealth and thinks that he has the right to tell everyone else how to behave, just because he is rich. A decay of moral values can be seen in Tom in the way he treats others because he acts like he is the bossy father of all other people. We also discover only later on in the story that Gatsby has come by his great wealth through immoral and illegal means. He ultimately loses what he most desires and is killed as a result. The same thing is shown in ‘A Diamond as Big as the Ritz’, where moral decay is shown to have been suffused through three generations of the Washington family as a result of their determination to maintain the wealth at the exclusion of all other considerations after their chance discovery of the world’s biggest diamond.
The valley of ashes is used by Fitzgerald to represent the moral and social decay caused from the determination to maintain the wealth of the rich, as the wealthy, upper class live carelessly with the regard only of their own pleasure.

It also represents hopelessness and poverty, “where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of ash-grey men, who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.” This illustrates how all of the population of the valley of ashes want to leave but they can’t, because of their poverty, and it shows how the American Dream is impossible to achieve. In some ways, Myrtle dies trying to escape the valley of ashes, which shows the decay of her life and the decay of the American

Dream.
The whole era of the 1920s in general is also presented as having decaying social and moral values due to obsession over material wealth.

The recklessness of people’s pleasure is illustrated by Gatsby’s parties, where the rich go to carelessly pursue their own pleasure. Fitzgerald portrays this as leading to the corruption of the American Dream because of how noble goals are being replaced with the desire for pleasure and money. This can also be linked with the goals of the Washington’s in ‘The Diamond as Big as the Ritz,’ as knowledge of the world’s biggest diamond’s existence, would immediately remove its value, which is why they have such a great obsession with keeping it a secret. They surround themselves with luxury and selfish pleasure and their obsession over material wealth even leads to Washington killing his children’s friends, after having them stay for luxurious summer holidays, to keep the diamond a secret. John Unger discovers that he, as with the previous guests of the Washingtons, will be killed rather than allowed to return to his boarding school or family, and risk betraying the family’s evil secret. The primary purpose of Gatsby’s wealth seems to be to present it to the world and share it as a way of accessing society. The Washington family conceals its wealth. But in both cases it is the source of the wealth that is the primary deception. In the Washingtons case, rather than share or reveal the diamond mountain they destroy the diamond mine taking with

it, the mansion, attackers and everything.
It seems likely that in more than one way that, written three years earlier, ‘the Diamond as Big as the Ritz and other stories’ informed the themes and development of ‘the Great Gatsby.’ There is at least one direct comparison, where a room in the Washingtons’ mansion is described as a “platonic conception.” This term is used again when Nick describes Gatsby – “The truth was that Jay Gatsby, of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God—a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that—and he must be about His Father’s business, the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty. So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen year old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end.” Nick compares Gatsby with Jesus, and according to Spark Notes “Fitzgerald was probably influenced in drawing this parallel by a nineteenth-century book by Ernest Renan entitled The Life of Jesus.” In it, the “book presents Jesus as a figure who essentially decided to make himself the son of God, then brought himself to ruin by refusing to recognize the reality that denied his self-conception.”
More religious imagery is used by Fitzgerald towards the end of The Diamond as big as the Ritz where there is a reference to Braddock Washington being similar in status to God. In an attempt to preserve his wealth and his way of life, from his attackers, he attempts the peculiar effort of a “bribe to God!” His approach to God is described as having a “quality of monstrous condescension,” which sums up his whole rotten and alien way of life. Ultimately his bribe ends up failing, and his attackers close in.