Moral Decay In The Great Gatsby

Nick Gaudet

Mrs. Patterson

LA III - Period 6

7 November 2017

The Root of All Evil

Money. The root of all evil. The one thing that truly drives us away from our moral compass. This is depicted in The Great Gatsby, an American novel which takes place in the 1920s. Narrated by Nick Carraway, a typical New Yorker who works in stock broking, the book portrays a young man named James Gatz or, Gatsby, who is trying to win over the love of Daisy after recently becoming wealthy. However she is married to a man named Tom Buchanan and unfortunately, the fight for Daisy’s affection takes a tragic turn, Gatsby’s death. F Scott Fitzgerald's brilliant writing gives us an idea as to how a sudden surge in money can bring such drastic changes in a person's

This happens as “Gatsby’s house was still empty when Nick left—The grass on his lawn had grown as long as his. One of the taxi drivers in the village never took a fare past the entrance gate without stopping for a minute and pointing inside.” This shows that the people who went to Gatsby’s parties and “knew” him were just there for his entertainment and didn’t care for him as a person. The image that is painted for us shows disrespect because it tells us that Gatsby was just a tourist attraction to these people. Another example of moral decay due to money happens when Daisy discovers Gatsby’s closet “While we admired, he brought more and the soft rich heap mounted higher-- shirts and scrolls and plaids in coral and apple-green and lavender and faint orange, and monograms of Indian blue. Suddenly, with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shirts and began to cry stormily.” Once again we see that Daisy really only cares about his money as she cries when she sees his expensive shirts, this is when she realizes how wealthy Gatsby is. Both of these quotes express imagery which Fitzgerald used expertly. It ties in the story and really makes us feel the tension and sorrow in the