The Great Gatsby Time Analysis

One of the themes in The Great Gatsby is time; Gatsby tries as hard as he can to make Daisy his again, just like she was in the past. In the preface written by Matthew J. Bruccoli, he states that Fitzgerald uses 450 time words, "including 87 appearances of time. Episodes are reinforced by time symbolism," Bruccoli writes (Fitzgerald, XV). Fitzgerald describes Tom and Daisy's lawn as "jumping over sundials." The various groups that came to Gatsby's parties were recorded on a "timetable." When Gatsby finally sees Daisy after all this time, he knocks over a clock. At Gatsby's house, he rouses his organist, Klipspringer, to play the organ, a song that goes, "In the meantime, In between time…." Gatsby seems obsessed with the past: a past he wants to reclaim. It destroys him in the end.
One theory is that the clock that Gatsby knocks over could symbolize time as a

cane. Anyone who reads the book knows that Gatsby didn’t think he could go to Daisy before he had become a better man- acquiring wealth and making something of himself. Eventually, he contacts Nick, Daisy’s second cousin, and comes up with a plan to throw a party and get Nick and Daisy to come. Fitzgerald writes that Gatsby was waiting impatiently with “his head leaned back so far that it rested against the face of a defunct mantelpiece clock.” (Fitzgerald, 87). Gatsby leaning against the clock could be symbolism for him using time to support his courtship of Daisy.
Another theory is that the clock and the act of it being knocked over to show that some things are more important than money. The fact that the clock is broken may serve as a symbol that money will break you if you give into it, or that money is trivial. The Washington Post said that, “Tom and Daisy smashed up things and creatures […] and retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together.” (Yardley, 1)
Yet another theory is that the clock is suggestive of Gatsby having a Cronus Complex.

Cronus was a Titan in Greek mythology that had control over time. Gatsby seems to believe that he has this ability, too. Nick tells him that he “can’t have the past.” Gatsby replies with “Yes I can! Yes I can, Old Sport!” When the clock breaks, some believe that that symbolizes Gatsby’s constant attempts to change the past. Fitzgerald makes time a huge theme in The Great Gatsby. The fact that the clock is already broken represents the fact that all of Gatsby’s plans are futile and hopeless.
A final theory is that the lock is representative of Gatsby’s unwillingness to stop chasing after Daisy. Gatsby had uses his entire life, all of his time, to get materialistic things to woo Daisy. The broken clock is a reflection of how his efforts to win Daisy over were broken and wasted as well. After he knocks it down, he begins to offer up apologies, and Nick tells him that its ok because the clock was already broken. Nevertheless, Gatsby still puts it back. some would see this as a reference to Gatsby’s stubbornness to let Daisy

go.