To begin, the affair that occurred between Tom and Myrtle was a catalyst for the events that led up to Gatsby's death. Tom Buchanan is the wealthy husband of Daisy, the woman that Gatsby passionately pursues throughout the novel. However, Tom is involved in an illicit affair with Myrtle Wilson. He liked her because she made him feel as though he was strong and important, and he felt like he was doing Myrtle a favour by saving her from a mundane life. They exchanged conversation through her husband’s garage, to alleviate suspicion from their partners. This is, until Tom loses balance of two relationships, stated by Nick, “His wife and his mistress, until an hour ago secure and inviolate, were slipping precipitately from his control.” Tom felt …show more content…
Tom, who prides himself on his power and control, is suddenly confronted with the reality that his influence over his relationships is deteriorating. This is a direct threat to his ego, within his marriage and in his affair. In an attempt to take control of his marriage, Tom invites Gatsby, Nick and Jordan to a hotel in the city. He manipulates the situation by continuously threatening and belittling Gatsby, revealing his participation in organised crime, and forcing him. By doing so, he crushes the relationship that exists between them. Moreover, Tom urges Gatsby to take his own car home, and insists upon taking Daisy with him. He feels as though he is underlining his dominance and confidence in their relationship, suggesting Daisy will ultimately choose him over Gatsby. This is the origin of the most dangerous act in the entire novel. “He ran over Myrtle like you'd run over a dog and never even stopped his car” (Fitzgerald 136). This quotation illustrates Tom’s manipulation. He tells Wilson that Myrtle died because of …show more content…
Daisy participates in a continuous affair with Gatsby, ignorant of the fact that she had been married to Tom. She undermines his suspicion and leads Gatsby on. The evil lies within her, for loving Gatsby, but not more than the wealth and status associated with Tom. A prime example of this is when Gatsby shows Daisy his collection of shirts. He hopes to impress her with his wealth and success, yet she merely responds by saying “They’re such beautiful shirts”, she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds. “It makes me sad because I’ve never seen such – such beautiful shirts before.” Daisy's reaction conveys her shallowness. Gatsby’s shirts were the embodiment of everything he thought she admired. Yet, she responds by crying, indicating her higher concern with material possession, than with Gatsby. It highlights Daisy's superficiality and suggests that she does not truly care for Gatsby on a deeper level. Thus, if Daisy had been honest with Gatsby and revealed how she truly felt, the severity of the affair could have been avoided and Gatsby’s life could have been saved. In addition, while Gatsby and Daisy were both present in the car when Myrtle had been run over, it was Daisy who was driving. By her letting Gatsby take responsibility for her actions, she entangles him in the consequences of the act. Additionally, if she had not continuously engaged in the affair, her husband would never have felt the
A Scandalous affair marks the life of Myrtle Wilson and Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby by F. Scotts Fitzgerald. During the novel Mrs. Wilson and Mr Buchanan disregard their spouses in order to have an affair. Both characters play a significant part in the novel making their development by the reader needed to understand the novel. Fitzgerald uses language in order to develop the charecters Tom Buchanan and Myrtle Wilson in separate ways.
While comparing and contrasting Daisy Buchanan and Myrtle Wilson, I will be focusing on all aspects of the characters. Physically they are very different, but by demonstrating their distinct physical differences, Fitzgerald is allowing us to pick favorites early on. Daisy and Myrtle share a number of similarities and many differences in their daily lives, such as how they look, act, and handle conflict.
Same Goal, Different Route in The Great Gatsby A more thorough investigation of The Great Gatsby is necessary to uncover a well-disguised theme by Fitzgerald in this work. Upon a simple read through one would probably not notice the great similarities of Jay Gatsby and Myrtle Wilson, but the two characters seemed to have the same agenda for their lives. While Gatsby took the route of acquiring money at all costs to join the upper class of society and to be acceptable in the eyes of a woman, Myrtle chose to make her way up in society at the cost of her marriage by attaching herself to money. The underlying question is who had the most success. As a young man, Jay Gatsby was poor with nothing but his love for Daisy. He had attempted to
She became used to him being unfaithful to her that she suggests to him after leaving him during Gatsby wild party “ and if you want to take down any addresses here’s my little gold pencil” (105). Tom and Myrtle relationship caused problems more in Myrtle life rather than Tom’s because unlike Tom’s wide, Wilson was unaware about her unfaithfulness and reacted way differently by becoming sick. In Nick’s perspective, he explains, “He had discovered that Myrtle had some sort of life apart from him in another world, and the shock had made him physically sick” (124). Wilson behaves in way by having her locked in a room until he gets the car to move away but soon enough for jealousy to strike among Myrtle about Tom and his wife which later causes her death. Her death occurred because of the greatly amount of envy she has towards Daisy and her lifestyle with Tom. The feelings that she felt showed upon her by having “…one emotion after another crept into her face like objects into a slowly developing picture” (124). This single small affair between Tom and Myrtle became something bigger than expected by a heart broken husband, dishonesty, and death among a mistress. This crime is much relatable to many affairs in the world that ends really bad divorces and trust issues from the dishonesty from their significant
When he first meets Daisy, Gatsby becomes infatuated with his idea of her, or rather, the false persona that she creates of herself. In fact, Gatsby reveals that “she was the first ‘nice’ girl he had ever known” (155). Gatsby was so impressed with Daisy mainly because of her wealth and her status; it is what he wants. However, Daisy chooses Tom Buchanan over Gatsby, solely because of his social status. As a result, Gatsby revolves his whole life around her: he becomes wealthy, creates a new image of himself, and buys a house across the bay from Daisy. For instance, he fabricates lies about how “ [he is] the son of some wealthy people in the middle-west” (69) and how “ [he] was brought up in America but educated at Oxford” (69) in order to impress her. These lies end up altering others’ perspectives of him - not necessarily in a positive way - and impacting his life as a whole. Daisy unwittingly transforms Gatsby into a picture-perfect image of the 1920s: lavish parties, showy cars, and a false illusion of the attainment of the American Dream. Despite Gatsby’s newfound wealth and success, he never fully accomplishes his dream: to get Daisy. Gatsby’s final act for the sake of Daisy has no impact on her feelings towards him. When Gatsby claims that he crashed into Myrtle and killed her, Daisy carelessly lets him do so, which ultimately results in his death. To make
Many of the occurrences in The Great Gatsby produced far-reaching effects for several of the characters. Of these occurrences, one of the most influential and important incidents was the death of Myrtle Wilson. While her life and death greatly affected the lives of all of the main and supporting characters, her death had a very significant effect on the lives of Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby.
Tom had money, Daisy knew this. She acknowledged that his money was inherited and that held the love in their relationship. She found that Gatsby grew up underprivileged, and he was supposed to inherit money from a man by the name of Dan Cody, but that opportunity fell through. Gatsby attempts to depict his life as though he inherited his money, but “even Daisy appears unable to cope with the reality of Gatsby’s lower class background”(W) Everyone that attends Gatsby’s lavish parties realize, “Gatsby is never truly one of the elite—his dream is just a facade”(W). As hard as Gatsby tried, everyone could see through his fabrications and lavish parties, most importantly Daisy. She knew his true background and didn’t love him because of it. She wanted a man whose money was inherited, not earned like Gatsby’s. “Both Gatsby and Tom Buchanan, Daisy's husband, possessed wealth. Gatsby at least used his wealth to seek out beauty and claim it for himself. Buchanan the lecher lacked any larger goals. In the end, Daisy chooses to remain with Buchanan, and Gatsby is murdered by the deranged husband of Myrtle Wilson, Buchanan's mistress, who had been accidentally run down and killed by Daisy. Buchanan serves as Gatsby's executioner; he allows George Wilson to believe that Gatsby had killed Myrtle” (Trask). Since his love for Daisy was steadfast, Jay Gatsby took the blame for killing
She is feeling low and wants to drive to get her mind off things, not surprisingly Gatsby let her charm him once again. On the way back to The Buchanan’s, a woman runs in the middle of the road and Daisy doesn’t slow down. Daisy hits her and kills her, but the most tragic part was that she didn’t stop. Tom sees all the commotion on the way back and stops by. Tom discovers it is his mistress who Daisy hit; he begins to talk to Mr. Wilson her grieving husband. Mr. Wilson describes the car and Tom tells him it was Gatsby. Gatsby let everyone believe that knows what happened, what Tom said is true, and Daisy’s selfish ways doesn’t stop him. A few days later, Mr. Wilson hunts down Gatsby and shoots him, and right after shoots himself. Daisy never spoke the truth, and her and Tom leaves town immediately. Daisy’s selfishness and pride make her directly responsible for Myrtle Wilson’s death; and indirectly responsible for George Wilson’s and Gatsby’s. Neither Daisy nor Tom goes to Gatsby’s funeral because ‘they were careless people who smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back to their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together and let other people clean up the mess they
Tom suspects that Gatsby and Daisy are having a relationship, but has no evidence to prove it. However, whenever Tom would leave the room, Daisy would immediately run into Gatsby’s arms to show her affection. To their dismay, Tom sees this: “She had told him that she loved him, and Tom Buchanan saw” (Fitzgerald 126). This leads to a confrontation between Gatsby and Tom, where Gatsby boldly declares that “Your wife [Daisy] doesn’t love you …She’s never loved you. She loves me” (Fitzgerald 139). Gatsby feels untouchable, and his confidence in Daisy’s love for him allows him to declare this to Tom. However, Tom slowly gains control of Daisy, reminding her of the experiences they shared together. Realizing this, Gatsby becomes desperate, and attempts to force Daisy into saying things she doesn’t believe, but Daisy tells Gatsby the truth: “’Even alone I can’t say I never loved Tom… It wouldn’t be true’” (Fitzgerald 142). Gatsby is delusional because his only thought is proving to Tom that Daisy doesn’t love him, and fails to realize that he is slowly losing Daisy. He is once again so absorbed by Daisy that he fails to realize what is going on around him. Even after Daisy runs over a woman murdering her in cold blood, Gatsby is willing to take the blame for her, and states “of course I’ll say [to the police] I was [driving]” (Fitzgerard 154). Gatsby still loves Daisy after she commits murder, which is a testament to his obsession and delusion over her. Gatsby is willing to go to prison and lose everything because Gatsby still believes that Daisy loves him despite Tom proving
For example, “...Tom Buchanan and his girl and I went up together to New York...for Mrs.Wilson sat discreetly in another car” (26). Even though Tom is close to Myrtle, he knows how detrimental it would be to his reputation if one of his rich friends saw him with Mrytle, so he makes her sit in another car. Likewise, Tom realizes the recklessness in his choices he is doing because it is both bad for himself, if someone in the “secret” society finds out he has a mistress. Also, it is bad for Daisy because she is getting cheated on without even knowing. Along with Gatsby and Tom, Daisy also commits reckless behavior when she does not go to Gatsby’s funeral. All his life, Gatsby acquired wealth and a huge mansion on the Long Island Sound right across from Daisy’s house, just to impress Daisy. He even hosted extravagant parties to attract Daisy to his house. After Daisy decides she does not want to go to Gatsby 's funeral, Nick Carraway concludes, “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy--they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast
George Wilson, who was the husband of Myrtle, knew nothing of the affair until later on. Also if Tom never had an affair with Myrtle the Daisy may not have had an affair with Gatsby which inevitably led to the death of both Myrtle and Gatsby. On page 124-125 Myrtle, while locked in the upstairs room, sees Tom driving the yellow car( Fitzgerald). Later on in the book, Myrtle ran out in front of the yellow car thinking that Tom was driving it (Fitzgerald Page 139). This set off a chain of events leading to the physical death of Gatsby. George was being driven to the brink of insanity because of the death of his wife, so when Tom told George that it wasn’t him, but Gatsby who was driving the yellow car, George thought he knew who to blame (Fitzgerald Page 140). Tom wanted to get the blame off of himself so he threw Gatsby to the dogs, but he may have fully believed that Gatsby was driving the yellow car when it hit Myrtle. To sum it up, however, Tom made George believe that Gatsby killed his wife which ended in the murder of Gatsby and the suicide of
Throughout the novel, one of Tom 's biggest careless acts was when he cheated on Daisy. Tom is a cocky, confident man shown many times throughout the novel like when Nick arrived at his house and "Tom Buchanan in riding clothes was standing with his legs apart on the front porch" (Fitzgerald 6). His stance showed his arrogance, and how highly he thought of himself because of his wealth. Tom was a man who often acted without thinking things through, like having an affair with Myrtle. Despite both Tom and Myrtle being married, they both had affairs. Tom doesn 't hide his affair from Nick and introduces him to his mistress Myrtle at Wilson 's garage. Tom doesn 't seem to care if anyone finds out because he feels as though nothing would change due to his wealth. While at Myrtle 's husbands garage, Tom tells Myrtle to meet him at the train station. They end up going to their apartment in New York City that they keep for their affair. While at the Morningside Height 's apartment Myrtle starts to talk about Tom 's wife Daisy, ""Daisy! Daisy! Daisy!" shouted Mrs. Wilson. "I 'll say it whenever I want to! Daisy! Dai-"" (Fitzgerald 37). Tom didn 't like Myrtle overstepping her boundaries and to show
Daisy’s character is built with association of innocence and purity. Narrator in the novel mentions, “They were both in white, and their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house” (18). In this passage, the narrator talks about Daisy and Daisy’s friend, Jordan. They both were dressed in white, which represents the purity and innocence. Daisy’s exterior beauty is pure and innocence, but her interior self represents false purity and innocence in the novel. When Daisy and Gatsby reunites after five years, they seem to have found their love for each other, although Daisy loves the attention. Daisy is aware of her husband’s affair but still does nothing about it. Daisy’s response to Gatsby’s wealth proves the love Daisy has for money, especially the shirts. Narrator mentions in the novel, “Suddenly, with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shorts and began to cry stormily” (92). This describes that’s for Daisy the shirts represents wealth. Daisy bows her head into the shirts representing her interest in wealthy materialism. Daisy doesn’t cry because of the pure affection unlike Gatsby.
Tom Buchannan, Daisy’s husband, has two mistresses throughout this story. He has Daisy, and Myrtle Wilson. Given the situation Tom is in he will not come out completely happy, he must lose one if not both of his women. When Myrtle was hit by the car Tom was in shock, he had just lost his mistress. After the bystanders at the scene describe the automobile that murdered Myrtle, Tom recognized that vehicle, as Gatsby’s. Little ...
Myrtle is, as Daisy, impressed with Tom's wealth and appearance, but, like Jay Gatsby, is stuck in a fantastic, idealized perception of her object of affection. Even when abused and trampled over by Tom, Myrtle continues to adore him, just as Gatsby continues to dote upon Daisy after being obviously rejected by her. As far as ethical considerations, Gatsby tends to prove himself a sincere and caring person, while Daisy and Tom just destroy the lives of two people and then leave town to escape the consequences of their actions.