Think about being separated from the one you love. You thought this person would be in your life forever and always. You may have spent days and weeks thinking and planning your future together, but then one day they disappear from your life. That person has moved on, and chose to live a life that no longer including you. It would be assumed in most cases that the love of your life is no longer the person they were before, so should you stick around and try to win them back? In the case of Gatsby and Daisy, Gatsby did not realize Daisy would be different, and although he still thinks he is in love with Daisy, is he in love with her for who she is now, or the idea of everything she used to be the answer may shock you, and this is all due to the unreal expectations he has for her to fill. Because Gatsby is not in love with who she is at the time they are reunited. Instead, he is caught up in the idea of who she used to be. The actions of Gatsby, how he talks about her, and the relationship between Gatsby and Daisy once they are back together again show who Gatsby is really in love with, and that is the old Daisy. Looking at the way Gatsby talks about Daisy makes us question which Daisy Gatsby is really in love with. Throughout the book, Gatsby is constantly reminiscing on the past, and others begin to take note, specifically Nick. “He talked a lot about the past, and I gathered that he wanted to recover something some idea of himself, perhaps that had gone into loving Daisy” (111). The references that Gatsby constantly makes to taking back the past makes us think about the obsession he has with the idea of previous times. If Gatsby is so caught up with his life before and everything and everyone in it, how could he possibly loving ... ... middle of paper ... ...ough for him. He would always love Daisy the way he did from the beginning, but things were not the same for her. Gatsby’s love life has become surrounded by ideas from the past. No longer is he able to fall in love with the moment, but instead he is held up on what have and should have been. He spends his time reminiscing on old times and previous relationships while he has also been building up a new life in order to return to the past. The unreal expectations he has for Daisy prove to us that he has trouble letting go of his old romantic ideas. Gatsby doesn’t want to accept and love this new Daisy, and instead he is hoping for the Daisy he knows to come back. But people change and there can be no expectations for someone to continue to remain the same after a number of years. Instead we must let go of the past and embrace the future for everything it could be.
In the beginning, Gatsby was a poor army boy who fell in love with a rich girl named Daisy. Knowing from their different circumstances, he could not marry her. So Gatsby left to accumulate a lot of money. Daisy, not being able to wait for Gatsby, marries a rich man named Tom. Tom believes that it is okay for a man to be unfaithful but it is not okay for the woman to be. This caused a lot of conflict in their marriage and caused Daisy to be very unhappy. Gatsby’s dream is to be with Daisy, and since he has accumulated a lot of money, he had his mind set on getting her back. Throughout the novel, Gatsby shows his need to attain The American Dream of love and shows his determination to achieve it. You can tell that Gatsby has a clear vision of what he wants when Nick says, “..he stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling. Involuntarily I gla...
Gatsby is unrealistic. He believes he can relive the past and rekindle the flame he and Daisy once had. He is lost in his dream and accepts that anything can be repeated, "Can't repeat the past…Why of course you can!" (116, Fitzgerald). For Gatsby, failure to realize this resurrection of love is utterly appalling. His whole career, his conception of himself and his life is totally shattered. Gatsby's death when it comes is almost insignificant, for with the collapse of his dream, he is spiritually dead.
Gatsby has many issues of repeating his past instead of living in the present. A common example of this would be his ultimate goal to win Daisy back. He keeps thinking about her and how she seems perfect for him, but he remembers her as she was before she was married to Tom. He has not thought about the fact that she has a daughter, and has been married to Tom for four years, and the history there is between them. The reader cannot be sure of Gatsby trying to recreate the past until the reunion between him and Daisy. This becomes evident when Nick talks to Gatsby about how he is living in the past, specifically when Nick discusses Daisy with him. “‘I wouldn’t ask too much of her,’ Gatsby ventured. ‘you can’t repeat the past.’ I said. ‘Can’t repeat the past?’ he cried incredulously. ‘Why of course you can!’” (110). This excerpt shows how Gatsby still has not learned that eventually he will have to just accept the past and move forward with his life. If he keeps obsessing about Daisy, and trying to fix the past, more of his life will be wasted on this impossible goal. Througho...
...id not necessarily want Daisy back, but the time he had with Daisy all those years ago. He wanted to relive his past. He wanted to have his past self love the past Daisy in the past years, and it cannot be because time has moved them forward. After his first secret meeting with Daisy, Gatsby talks
...so it is that a love started, and reunited has ended in tragedy, in Shakespeare famous words they were Star-crossed lovers, Gatsby and Daisy. The two things that had predicted their fail from the beginning were two things that were glaringly apparent to everybody around the pair except themselves. The first is that Daisy is not simply the woman that Gatsby is in love with but rather the man's religion, an idol of indefinite beauty. The second is that Gatsby believes that because when they were young and in love, that now after she has been married five years and had a child that Daisy will come back to him, and they could start where they left of at.. In the end Gatsby accomplished one thing, and that was to prove that Nick was right, it is impossible to repeat the past.
In The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Nick’s unreliability as a narrator is blatantly evident, as his view of Gatsby’s actions seems to arbitrarily shift between disapproval and approval. Nick is an unreliable and hypocritical narrator who disputes his own background information and subjectively depicts Gatsby as a benevolent and charismatic host while ignoring his flaws and immorality from illegal activities. He refuses to seriously contemplate Gatsby’s negative attributes because of their strong mutual friendship and he is blinded by an unrealized faith in Gatsby. Furthermore, his multitude of discrepancies damage his ethos appeal and contribute to his lack of dependability.
Daisy is not pure and perfect like Gatsby thought she was in the past. From Gatsby's illusions of the past preoccupying all his thoughts, he forgets about the key dimension he exists in which is the present. Although Gatsby was persistent on reliving the past, Gatsby vaguely lived for the present. This is apparent when he cancels his biology by leaving home, changing his name, and leaving his heritage behind which was not done by following the past.
At the end of chapter six when Nick and Gatsby are talking about Daisy, Nick says to Gatsby, “I wouldn’t ask too much of her,”… “You can’t repeat the past.” (Pg. 110). Nick is trying to make Gatsby see that somethings are best left in the past. But Gatsby does not think this possible as he states, “Can’t repeat the past?”… “Why of course you can! “If Gatsby truly loved he would not care about the past and recreating it, the present and the future with Daisy would be all that matters to him. True love focuses on who the person is now in the present and who they are going to be in the future not their past selves. The past is just memories to cherish not something to try and recreate. Gatsby in his own way loves Daisy but the love he feels for her is just something of the past. In chapter seven as well when the characters begins to gather in the hotel suite during their trip to the city, more evidence of Gatsby’s love for old Daisy comes to light. As Tom and Gatsby fight over Daisy, she yells at Gatsby. “I love you now- isn’t that enough? I can’t help what’s past.” (Pg.132). Gatsby’s attempts to recreate the past are demonstrated again in this part of the novel. It is not enough for Gatsby to have Daisy love him now he needs her to have loved him back then as well when she did not know if he was alive or dead. Gatsby’s love for Daisy is eminent throughout
Daisy and Gatsby spend five years away from each other and when they get back together, the circumstances change. Daisy gets married to Tom Buchanan. Gatsby has no option except for grabbing Daisy’s attention. The love that the readers realize is passionate however this love changes into a forbidden one because Daisy is now married. Gatsby tries his best to convince Daisy that everything will go back like they used to, but she doesn’t seem to agree. The past cannot be repeated. Tom sees the love between Daisy and Gatsby but he does not say anything until the right time. The circumstances that are happening to both Daisy and Gatsby make their love forbidden. As much as Gatsby is very rich, he does not seem to be enough because he’s new money
Love makes people do crazy things. Gatsby spent 5 years waiting to see Daisy again. When Gatsby moved to West Egg he threw many parties in hopes that Daisy would show up, but she never did. After an extensive amount of time Nick finally got Daisy over to see Gatsby again. Gatsby had spent all this time thinking about what he would do when Daisy finally arrived at his home, then when she finally did he almost backed out. He dissatisfied himself with everything that he had and thought that bringing Daisy over for tea was a mistake. He had his doubts about Daisy; he thought that he wasn’t good enough to have her and that he would dishearten her. Gatsby was stuck on a love that was all made up in his mind; a love that would only bring tears and disillusionment.
His naivety that Daisy will once again love him as well as his stubborn personality and his belief that a person can ‘repeat the past’ plays a key part in Gatsby’s death. He is so blinded by his dreams of wealth and glamour that he fails to distinguish Daisy’s true feelings for him. Daisy complains, ‘Oh, you want too much’ which highlights Gatsby’s greed and ambition for wealth. He wants more than Daisy’s love. He wants society to believe and accept his fakery; he wants to achieve ‘thoroughness’ and ‘realism’ in his story. Daisy exclaims that she ‘loves’ Gatsby but to him that ‘isn 't enough’
When he sees that she had changed, he and Nick analyze her. “‘She’s got an indiscreet voice,’ I remarked ‘It’s full of-- I hesitated. ‘Her voice is full of money’ He said suddenly. 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”(120). In the quote, Gatsby’s characterization is added to when saying he only wanted Daisy because she was the manifestation of his life goals. Daisy was the final piece in Gatsby’s dream of having it all. His desire for her was no more than an ambition to fulfill his dreams. He finds himself disenchanted when she is not who he expected her to be. He often depicted her as a trophy to obtain. In his strive to reach a higher level of status, he aims for daisy. The trophy wife. However he fails to acknowledge that Daisy was a person who had her own life, such as a kid and a husband. Thus because of his expectations for Daisy, he ends up not being satisfied with what she was able to give him, her love. Gatsby demands to be her sole love. “‘’Oh you want too much! She cried to Gatsby. ‘I love you now- isn’t that enough? I can’t help what’s past!’ she began to sob helplessly. ‘I did love him once-but I loved you too’ Gatsby’s eyes opened and closed. ‘You love me too?’”(132). Gatsby demands that she loves him only with the fullest of hearts. He demands that she admit that she never loved Tom, this is too much to say because it is not true. Gatsby is upset by this and emphasizes that she loved him TOO. Not necessarily the only one she ever loved. This adds to the characterization of Gatsby clearly presenting what he wants from Daisy, that she is a prize to be won. Nothing else really. He only wants her as a sign that he has achieved the American dream. Furthermore this proves Fitzgerald’s claim
relationship grows, Daisy is no longer capable of concealing the affection she has for Gatsby.
Starting from the first day that he meets her, Gatsby does everything within his power to please Daisy. Nothing has changed for him as far as his feelings for Daisy are concerned, even though it has been five years since their first meeting, and despite the fact that she has married Tom Buchanan. He “revalue[s] everything in his house according to the amount of response it...
The Great Gatsby presents the main character Jay Gatsby, as a poor man who is in love with his best friends cousin, Daisy Buchanan. Gatsby was in love with Daisy, his first real love. He was impressed with what she represented, great comfort with extravagant living. Gatsby knew he was not good enough for her, but he was deeply in love. “For a moment a phrase tried to take shape in my mouth and my lips parted like a dumb man’s”(Fitzgerald 107). Gatsby could not think of the right words to say. Daisy was too perfect beyond anything he was able to think of. Soon Gatsby and Daisy went their separate ways. Jay Gatsby went into the war while telling Daisy to find someone better for her, someone that will be able to keep her happy and provide for her. Gatsby and Daisy loved one another, but he had to do what was best for her. Gatsby knew the two might not meet again, but if they did, he wanted things to be the same. “I 'm going to fix everything just the way it was before”(Fitzgerald 106). He wanted Daisy to fall in love with him all over again. Unsure if Daisy would ever see Gatsby again, she got married while he was away. The two were still hugely in love with one another, but had to go separate ways in their