Why Is Money Important In The Great Gatsby

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Money, love, and family is what is deemed to be necessary in this world in order to accomplish a happy life, it was a different story for the characters of The Great Gatsby. In this story by F. Scott Fitzgerald those 3 primary things are what broke Gatsby, Daisy, and Tom. What Gatsby wanted most was to have Daisy be his, he attained money although he was missing the other two. Daisy and Tom are both cheaters, but will never leave each other no matter how unhappy they may be. A flaw in each of these characters is that they never came to realize how money and materialism had taken control of their lives. The greatest damage that money did to their lives was how money shaped them, how it caused them to buy extravagant items to no avail in the …show more content…
Money can be a very powerful determinant of one’s life in general. Fitzgerald in a way proved that when he wrote about those two characters. In the book,Gatsby parents were rarely talked about when he was alive and there was little information about them. It wasn’t till the end that his father was mentioned. He said that they were dead and that’s were he got all his money from, but that was it about his parents. It’s very obvious how once Gatsby had money he disregarded his relationship with the people who raised him and focused on what mattered most to him, gaining more money and Daisy. (Put quote 1). This quote shows that because he knows that his mother and father are unsuccessful, he never really accepted them for not being rich and giving him a ‘good’ life. Money doesn’t let him see eye to eye with his family when before he most likely didn’t care that they were not rich. Fitzgerald intentionally mentions his parents briefly and until the end has Gatsby father appear to allow readers to remember they exists, since most of the focus was on the unrequited lovers. It’s also shown more when Gatsby doesn’t mention his family and focuses more on his love life. Daisy is another character that let money shape her to who she is. Before she got married to Tom, she had received a letter from Gatsby and was full on set on leaving Tom. The night before …show more content…
Gatsby gained money in very sketchy ways and he gained big money from it because he was able to provide for luxurious party’s. Another interesting things that Fitzgerald does is not provide detail on how Gatsby really gained money, it’s all up to the readers assumption. Aside from the party’s, he had a mansion with very expensive details to it. When Gatsby was showing Daisy and Nick around his mansion, Nick gave a briefly description of it and it said, “We went up−stairs, through period bedrooms swathed in rose and lavender silk and vivid with new flowers, through dressing−rooms and poolrooms, and bathrooms with sunken baths intruding into one chamber where a disheveled man in pajamas was doing liver exercises on the floor” (Fitzgerald 85). It’s very luxurious and Fitzgerald included them for its purpose. That was to impress Daisy and to convince her to leave Tom. There is no other reason as to why he has all of it besides Daisy. It’s very well explained throughout The Great Gatsby that Gatsby loves Daisy and wants her to leave Tom, but that doesn’t happen because he rushed it and Daisy knows she cannot leave Tom because of her child. The whole reason why he acquired money in such bad ways was to be a capable man who would be able to provide for all of Daisy ambitions. Gatsby believe that he could have her because of the possessions
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