Myrtle In The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1926 was a novel written about the symbolic events that occurred during the 1920’s. Fitzgerald used the novel to expose the upper class of that era for their greed and power thirst, but showed it through a narrative point of view. Nick, a character in the novel was used as a filter for the story. There was never a scene where Nick was not present, but his almost unbiased point of view allowed the story to be told by a main character that ultimately didn’t matter. The novel represents so many symbols in so many ways but one of the most prominent would have been the American Dream, Victimization, and violence. Fitzgerald used so many objects and people to represent these themes from cufflinks …show more content…
Depending on how you viewed the novel or how you interpreted it, there is an idea that everyone is a victim and often no one wins. There is also the idea the rich are victims of circumstance and the poor are victims of the rich. One obvious victim of The Great Gatsby would be Myrtle. Myrtle can be seen as a victim of her own circumstances. She is caught between a web of Tom’s lies, false promises and near the end her husband’s delusions. Myrtle believes she will truly end up with Tom, but what she doesn’t realize is the hope for a life with Tom, is a false one. At the party at Tom and Myrtle’s apartment one of Tom’s lies is revealed with the conversation between Nick and Myrtles sister“’It’s really his wife that’s keeping them apart. She’s a Catholic, and they don’t believe in divorce.’ Daisy was not a Catholic, and I was a little shocked at the elaborateness of the lie.” (TGG pg36). Tom’s lies were so extravagant that they would fool almost anyone into thinking he couldn’t escape his marriage. Tom also keeps Myrtle devoted to him by promising marriage “’When they do get married,’ continued Catherine, ‘they’re going out West to live for a while until it blows over.’”(TGG pg36). George Wilson was another victim shown in the novel. George fell victim to many things, but the one that lead to his death was his own delusions. After Myrtles death he begins to lose his sanity this can be seen on page 152 when he confronted Myrtle about her affair. “’I spoke to her,’ he muttered, after a long silence. ‘I told her she might fool me but she couldn’t fool God. I took her to the window’- with and effort he got up and walked to the rear window and leaned with his face pressed against it- ‘and I said “God knows what you’ve been doing, everything you’ve been doing. You may fool me, but you can’t fool God!” Standing behind him, Michaelis saw with a shock that he was looking at the eyes of Doctor T. J.

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