Essay for English
How are women portrayed in Chapter Seven of The Great Gatsby?
The Great Gatsby is a novel of triumph and tragedy, noted for the remarkable way its author captures a cross-section of American society. In this essay I will talk about how the women are portrayed in chapter 7 of The Great Gatsby. The three women I will be analysing are Daisy Buchanan, Jordan Baker and Myrtle Wilson.
In chapter 7 of The Great Gatsby Daisy is the most mysterious, and perhaps most disappointing, character. Although Fitzgerald does much to make her a character worthy of Gatsby's unlimited devotion, in the end she reveals herself for what she really is. Despite her beauty and charm, Daisy is merely a selfish, shallow, and in fact, hurtful, woman. In chapter 7 Daisy kisses Gatsby with her husband witnessing the act. When Jordan describes her as a "low, vulgar girl," Daisy replies, "I don't care!" This shows that Daisy as an uncaring attitude and this is certainly underscored when Daisy knowingly allows Gatsby to be suspected of the murder of Myrtle, also this proves my point that she is selfish but she can’t do anything because she is hurt, and she don’t know what to do. However this also implies to the reader because the reader will feel sympathetic to Daisy and how she is feeling. Fitzgerald has built the character of Daisy in this way so that the reader will bring interest to the story and so that the reader will also feel compassionate for Daisy and gets an understanding of what Fitzgerald is saying and what he is trying to portray in the story. Also when Daisy says the phrase ‘I don’t care!’ she is proving the point that she is a careless woman with no care in the world. The adjective ‘vulgar’ could mean a lot of things like lacking sophistication or good taste, but also meaning making explicit and offensive reference to sex or bodily functions; coarse and rude. This means you can tell what Jordan Baker thinks of Daisy because the word ‘vulgar’ illustrates that Jordan was saying Daisy is a rude, disgusting and spiteful individual. Fitzgerald has used an interesting sentence structure in this quote because he has The writing techniques I think Fitzgerald has used is the sentence structure because he has written the quote with assurance and he has used a wide range of effective vocabulary and varied, well-constructed sentences in his story. In the American Dream women want to be happy and live a wealthy life, this connects to Daisy because Daisy lives her American Dream with Tom as her husband, who has a lot of money. She does not have any long term aims in her life. Having that kind luxury around her, she lives for the moment, and does not think about the next one. At one point in the novel, Daisy recalls her own childhood and describes it as white. The colour white is oftentimes associated with purity, hope, and innocence. Therefore, the reader can identify Daisy Buchanan as a pure, naive, and innocent character. But actually she isn’t. When you read The Great Gatsby at the start and Daisy is introduced the reader thinks that she is going to be a nice person because of the way speaks but she turns out to be a selfish, shallow person and it wasn’t expected at all. Daisy wants to be someone who is romantic, who cares about adventures more than propriety, who is brave enough to actually not go home to her husband, Tom, when she tells Gatsby she wants to stay. If Tom's tragedy is that he's too much of a bore to want these things, Daisy's is that she wants them but doesn't have the courage or the passion to pursue them. Fitzgerald describes daisy like she is a seemingly harmless women with a soft voice and charming manor, but she is really the character behind everything bad that happens. Daisy is also a comparison to Fitzgerald’s wife Zelda. They are both beautiful young ladies from the south, and are also materialistic, shallow and selfish. In many ways, Daisy is Fitzgerald’s ways of showing his belief that woman are more
