The Great Gatsby Summary and Analysis

Chapter 1
Summary
The chapter begins with a reflection by Nick, the narrator, about himself. He explains that, on his father's
advice, he is very tolerant and usually reserves his judgments. Nick Carraway comes from a wealthy Midwestern
family and studies at Yale, a very prestigious university. After fighting in World War I, he decides to travel to New
York City to learn the "bond business" (2011:29).
The story begins in the spring of 1922, when Nick settles in West Egg, a town on Long Island, twenty miles
from New York City. Nick clarifies that West Egg houses the nouveau riche, that is, the recently enriched
bourgeoisie who do not have aristocratic origins or an established social position. His bungalow is located next to
Gatsby's mansion, which he describes as “a real imitation of some Normandy Hotel de Ville” (2011:32), and as a
“colossal affair” (2011:32). He characterizes Gatsby, “the man who gives his name to this book” (2011:28), as a very
hopeful human being, with a “high sensitivity to the promises of life” (2011:28).
Nick heads to East Egg, the most luxurious and aristocratic town on Long Island, to eat at Daisy and Tom
Buchanan's house. Daisy is her second cousin and Tom has been her classmate at Yale. Tom is an American football
player who comes from a very rich family in Chicago and lives his professional climax at the age of 21. Nick doesn't
know why marriage is settled in the East. They have just spent a year in France and their house is a Georgian
colonial mansion overlooking the bay.
At Daisy's house Nick meets Jordan Baker, a friend of the hostess who is slender, upright and with an air of
boredom. Nick finds Daisy and Jordan dressed in white laughing on a couch. Daisy murmurs to him: “I'm paralyzed
with happiness” (2011:36). Nick remembers being told that Daisy mumbles so people have to lean towards her.
At the table, Daisy tells Nick about her three-year-old baby and asks him about his bond business. Nick tells
her that, while in Chicago, they sent greetings to her. Tom gets into the cousins' conversation and answers for Daisy
that they are not going to return to Chicago, but rather they are going to stay and live in the East.
When Nick tells Jordan that he lives in West Egg, she asks him if he knows Gatsby. Daisy interrupts: “What
Gatsby?” (2011:39). Tom then expresses his concern about the decline of society and formulates ideas he finds in a
book called The Rise of the Colored Empires by Goddard. They are notions of white supremacy, that is, the idea that
white people are superior to people of other ethnicities and therefore should be the ruling class.
Suddenly, the butler comes in looking for Tom: he has received a phone call. Daisy tells Nick that she's glad
to have him in her house, but then leaves the table. Miss Baker tries to overhear Tom's conversation and tells Nick
that Tom has a lover in New York. Tom and Daisy return to the table.
As they walk up to the front porch, Daisy tells Nick that when her daughter was born and she was told it was
a girl, she wished she was stupid: “that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” ” (2011:46).
When Jordan says goodbye to go to sleep, saying that she is playing in a tournament the next day, Nick recognizes
her as the professional golf player she is. You've seen it on billboards.
Daisy wants to get Nick and Jordan together. He tells his cousin that he has heard that he is engaged, but he
denies it. Nick returns to his home in West Egg. It's a hot summer night. He sees a figure emerging from the shadow
of his neighbor's mansion and thinks it is Gatsby. He finds him staring at a tiny, distant green light coming from a
dock. When he looks at it again, it vanishes.
Analysis
The first chapter begins with the introduction of Nick, the narrator of the story. In the first paragraph it is
anticipated that Gatsby is the protagonist, and it is stated that he is a character who problematizes Nick's vision of the
world. Although he says that Gatsby “represents everything for which I feel deep contempt” (2011:28), he also
suggests a certain respect and admiration, highlighting his receptivity and his ability to remain hopeful.
 Except for Gatsby, all the main characters of the novel appear at the dinner that takes place at Daisy and
Tom's house, including Myrtle, Tom's lover, who appears through a phone call and who the narrator calls “ the fifth
diner” (2011:45). Daisy introduces Jordan, her childhood friend, and Nick, her second cousin. In the conversation
that night Gatsby is mentioned: Jordan asks Nick if he knows him and Daisy then asks who he is. Nick describes his
mansion and clarifies: “it was Gatsby's mansion. Or rather, since I did not know Mr. Gatsby, it was a mansion
inhabited by a gentleman of that name” (2011:32). Doubts about the identity of the protagonist are already sown,
thus, in the first chapter, establishing a difference between the characters who know him and those who do not.
In this event distinctions are also made between East Egg and West Egg. Daisy and Tom live in the
aristocratic and consolidated area of Long Island, while Nick and Gatsby live on the west side, that of the nouveau
riche. The class differences in this novel are located in the territory and define the spaces, and Nick mentions the
“bizarre and not a little sinister contrast between the two” (2011:32). Gatsby's mansion is vulgar because its
dimensions and luxuries are exaggerated. Nick describes it as “a colossal affair by any standards” (2011:32). It has
an anachronistic style for the time, it imitates a French construction and has a tower and a marble pool. In contrast to
the ordinariness of Gatsby's mansion, the Buchanans' house is a “cheerful white and red Georgian colonial mansion
overlooking the bay” (2011:34). That is, it has a traditional English style. With this description, the narrator
inaugurates a relationship between the color white and a certain elevated or well-off status that will extend
throughout the novel. The color white will also appear in the shiny windows and on Daisy and Jordan's dresses.
A resident of East Egg, Tom is the character who represents the privileges of the wealthy class and the
interest in preserving the status quo. On the other hand, descriptions of Nick usually focus on his physical strength:
“the enormous power of that body” (2011:34), his “cruel body” (2011:35). In opposition, Daisy, his wife, contrasts
with her fragility and sympathy. In this first meeting she appears cheerful and superficial. For example, when Tom
begins his racist speech about global decline, Daisy interrupts him: “Tom is getting really deep” (2011:41). It does
not express a problem with the husband's racist and conservative ideas, but with the depth of the topic of
conversation. Thus, Daisy appears as a happy woman, little connected to the real scene and distracted by her own
thoughts. She presents traits of what was called a flapper at the time: a type of woman who lived in the Jazz Age and
spoke out against traditional morality.
Regarding gender roles, the novel sheds light on the growing independence of women at the time and the
inevitable resistance that arises from the most conservative sectors of the population. In this chapter, Jordan appears
as an independent and single woman. Given this, Daisy wants to arrange a marriage for her with Nick. This gesture
shows how singleness, for a woman of her age, is not viewed well by the society of the time. Tom says: “They
shouldn't let her run around the country like that” (2011:48). What Jordan needs, according to Tom's conservative
and classical conception, is a husband who will prevent him from moving freely around the country playing golf
tournaments. Although Daisy does not speak with Tom's violent and brutish ways, she reinforces her ideas when she
says that Nick is going to take care of her and that “the home influence is going to do her very good” (2011:48).
Finally, the appearance of Gatsby's silhouette in the last scene of the chapter reflects the ethereal character of
the protagonist. Gatsby is actually a character invented by himself, a simulation game between reality and illusions.
In this sense, it is significant that in his first appearance in the novel, the narrator only sees a figure emerging from
the shadow of the mansion. Nick recognizes him by his “slow movements and the firm position of his feet on the
grass” (2011:50). Gatsby is seen only as a silhouette, a rhythm and a movement; its most impalpable part. Nick looks
at him as he looks at the green light coming from the dock at Daisy's house. Although it is not clear where the light
comes from, the first appearance of the character already shows him looking towards the horizon, as if in a dream,
and then fading into the darkness.
Episode 2
Summary
The second chapter begins with the description of an important space in the novel: the valley of ashes that is
halfway between West Egg and New York. It's an in-between space, full of dust, smoke and dirt, with one road and
few run-down businesses. There is a street with three stores that is “adjacent to absolutely nothing” (2011:54). A
poster is described with two large eyes drawn with yellow glasses. They are the eyes of doctor TJ Eckleburg, blue
and enormous, who “continue brooding over the solemn garbage dump” (2011:53).
 One afternoon, Nick travels by train with Tom to New York. When the train stops in the valley of ashes,
Tom grabs his elbow and forces him off the train. He insists that he meet Myrtle, his lover. Nick points out that his
determination borders on violence, but he still accompanies him over a railway fence “under the persistent gaze of
Dr. Eckleburg” (2011:53). They enter the machine shop and greet George B. Wilson, its owner, a blonde and timid
man. Then Myrtle, Wilson's wife and Tom's lover, enters. She is a robust and sensual woman, according to Nick. She
walks past her husband, ignoring him, and greets Tom, looking him in the eye. When Wilson leaves the room, she
arranges with Tom to take the next train to New York and meet him later in the city.
They see a child putting rockets in a row on the train tracks because the 4th of July, American Independence
Day, is almost there.
Wilson thinks Myrtle is going to New York to visit her sister. She sits separately from Nick and Tom on the
train and changes her dress. In New York, Myrtle sees a man who sells dogs and tells Tom that she wants one. He
asks for a police dog and the man gives him one more similar to an Airedale. Tom pays and the three continue
towards Fifth Avenue. Nick tries to leave, but they insist that he accompany them to the apartment. Myrtle tells him
that she is going to invite her sister, Catherine.
They arrive at an apartment on 158th Street. It has a small living room, a dining room, a bathroom and a
bedroom. Myrtle says she's going to invite the McKees and Tom takes a bottle of whiskey out of a locked dresser.
Nick, Tom, Myrtle, Catherine and the McKees start drinking alcohol. Nick clarifies that that day he got drunk for the
second time in his life, and that is why “everything that happened has a blurred, misty tinge” (2011:59).

Nick describes Catherine as a slender, red-haired girl in her thirties. He then characterizes Mr. McKee as a
pale, effeminate man. He is a photographer who lives with his wife. Mrs. McKee compliments Myrtle and chats with
her husband about how to photograph her, how to change the light, and how to style her hair for the photo. Myrtle
complains that the young man she asked for ice doesn't arrive and curses the laziness of the lower classes.
Catherine asks Nick where he lives, and when Nick mentions that he lives in West Egg, she tells him that she
was at a party at Gatsby's. Adds a rumor: “they say he is Kaiser Wilhelm's nephew or cousin. That's where all their
money comes from” (2011:62). She then whispers to Nick that neither Tom nor Myrtle can stand the people they
have married. Catherine tells him that Tom can't leave Daisy because she is Catholic and doesn't believe in divorce.
Nick knows that this is not true and is shocked by “the ornamentation of the lie” (2011:64). Later, Myrtle says that
she married Wilson because she thought he was a gentleman. She says, disappointed, that she discovered that he
rented a suit for his own wedding.
Nick tries to leave the apartment, but every time he tries “I would get entangled in some crazy, loud
argument that would drag me back, as if with ropes, to my chair” (2011:66). Myrtle approaches him to tell him about
her first meeting with Tom. Nick is clearly drunk and loses track of time: “It was nine o'clock; almost immediately
afterwards I looked at my watch and discovered that it was ten o'clock” (2011:67). The room fills with smoke and
people come and go. Tom and Myrtle argue over whether or not she can name Daisy. Tom doesn't want me to name
her, he gets angry and breaks her pineapple's nose. Catherine and Mrs. McKee help Myrtle, and Nick leaves the
apartment. Wait for the train at Pennsylvania Station at four in the morning.
Analysis
A significant detail about the narrative style of the novel begins to be defined when Tom and Nick get off the
train in the valley of ashes. The narrator first anticipates an event and then relates it. That is, first he says: “There is
always a pause of at least a minute, and it was because of that that I met Tom Buchanan's lover for the first time”
(2011:53). Then, in the next paragraph, he returns to that same event but narrates it, dwelling on the details: “one
afternoon I went by train to New York with Tom and when we stopped next to the piles of ashes, he jumped up and ,
grabbing my elbow, he literally forced me out of the car” (2011:53). The narrator first anticipates the event and then
narrates it in more detail. In this way, it nullifies the surprise or intrigue of what happens and stops at the way in
which the events develop. In this same chapter he repeats the resource. First he says: “Myrtle pulled her chair closer,
and suddenly her warm breath poured out on me the story of my first meeting with Tom” (2011:66). Below is
Myrtle's monologue about this first meeting: “It was in those two small seats, facing each other, which are always
the last ones left free on the train. I was going to New York to see my sister and spend the night. Tom was dressed in
evening clothes, with patent leather shoes, and I couldn't take my eyes off him, but if he looked at me, I pretended to
read the advertisement above his head” (2011:66).
Continuing with the narrator, it is interesting that Nick clarifies that that day he got drunk for the second time
in his life, and that is why “everything that happened has a blurred, misty tinge” (2011:59). In this way, he warns
readers to distrust him. Then he again gives hints about his ineptitude as a narrator: “It was nine o'clock; almost
immediately afterwards I looked at my watch and discovered that it was ten o'clock” (2011:67). Finally, he reflects
on his role as an observer: “in the city our line of yellow windows must have provided its share of human secret to
the casual observer from the darkened streets, and I was him too, looking up and wondering. I was inside and
outside, at the same time bewitched and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life” (2011:66). Nick highlights the
relationship between the outside and the inside of the scene in tune with his oscillation between his role as narrator
and his role as a participating character.
On the other hand, in the second chapter two important symbols appear in the novel: the valley of ashes and
the eyes of Dr. Eckleburg. This valley is a gray and dirty space where working class people live, covered in ash.
Poverty in this novel is represented in a garbage dump, as if it were the waste of the wealthy classes. As Harold
Bloom understands, in this novel the ordinary is conceived as horrible and hopeless (2006). That is to say, there is a
class factor that determines that this space is described as “ugly” and vacant. Although the narrator tries to define
himself as a character who does not judge, the ways of describing the spaces filter his own judgments. In the same
way, already inside the apartment with Myrtle, Tom, Catherine and the McKees, Myrtle complains because the ice
boy does not arrive: “-I told that boy about the ice. - Myrtle raised her eyebrows in despair at the laziness of the
lower classes -. This people! You have to follow them all the time” (2011:62). In the narrator's description there is a
judgment about the behaviors of the lower classes that reinforces Myrtle's complaint.
Dr. Eckleburg's eyes look at the people from that sign and function as a conscience, a judge or a witness to
the small society of the valley of ashes. Nick points out that the poster's already worn eyes “continue brooding over
the solemn garbage dump” (2011:53). It is repeatedly mentioned that life in that place happens “under the persistent
gaze of Dr. Eckleburg” (2011:53), as if people lived under surveillance. Even the eyes are personified when the
characters look at them. For example, Tom speaks “exchanging a gesture of displeasure with Dr. Eckleburg”
(2011:56).
Just as the lower classes live controlled by these eyes of the cartel, members of the upper classes also have no
privacy. They cannot keep secrets because there is a circulation of rumors that makes it impossible. For example,
Catherine thinks that Tom and Daisy don't separate because she is very religious, when that is not true. It is also
mentioned several times that Tom's affair is known to everyone. Also, gossip about Gatbsy's identity resurfaces at
Tom's party. Catherine tells Nick, about him, that “they say he is Kaiser Wilhelm's nephew or cousin. That's where
all their money comes from” (2011:62). What is truly important to reveal is not who this man is but how he achieves
that fortune. Significantly, Catherine replicates something she heard but does not explain where she gets the
information from. This meeting accounts for the number of rumors circulating in the wealthy social groups of Long
Island. At the same time, the enigma about Gatsby's past helps create tension that drives the plot forward.
Finally, this chapter includes an episode of gender violence. Tom gets angry at Myrtle because she mentions
Daisy, his wife, and hits her on the nose with a pineapple. The way in which the event is narrated is very concise,
without adjectives or extensive descriptions: “In a brief, deft movement, Tom broke her nose with the palm of his
hand” (2011:67). Bloom understands that the way of narrating this event is similar to Hemingway's theory of
omission, which involves omitting all the essential details of the events so that readers imagine the rest, making them
participants in the story (2006). We can say that, here, the prose resembles Tom's stroke: “brief and skillful”
(2011:67)
Chapter 3
Summary
In the third chapter, Nick attends a party at Gatsby's mansion. Nick describes it: “in its blue gardens, men and
girls came and went like moths among the whispers and the champagne and the stars” (2011:69). It highlights all the
preparation that the holidays involve: the suppliers of fruit and colored lights, the orchestra, the cars that take guests
from the train station and the gardeners who groom the mansion's lawn. He also mentions the eight servants who
clean and tidy up the mansion every Monday after the holidays.
A driver drives by Nick's house one Saturday morning and gives him a note inviting him to the party at
Gatsby's that night. The note speaks of the honor it would give Gatsby if he attended “his 'little party' that night”
(2011:72). Once there, Nick considers that he is one of the few people who have actually been invited. Understand
that people come to the mansion without invitation. Nick wanders, uncomfortable, among many unknown people.
He is impressed by the number of young English people mixed with “the sober country nobility” (2011:75) of East
Egg and with more humble people. He looks for his host but cannot find him. When he asks some people if they
have seen Gatsby, the others stare at him, amazed.
Leaving the house, he finds Jordan standing on the steps, “leaning back and looking with contemptuous
interest at the garden” (2011:73). He approaches her to talk to the only person he knows at the party. Jordan grabs
her hand and continues talking to two girls in identical yellow dresses. They see trays of cocktails passing by as they
go down to the garden. A girl named Lucille tells Jordan that the last time she was at Gatsby's she tore her dress and
then received a new one at her house. The other girl in yellow says that there is something strange about Gatsby;
distrusts their efforts so as not to have problems with anyone. Again gossip is told about him: “someone told me that
he was believed to have once killed a man” (2011:74), “he was a German spy during the war” (2011:74) and “he was
in the American army during the war” (2011:75).
Jordan and Nick search for the host inside the mansion. They find in the enormous Gothic library an
alcoholic man with owl-eyed glasses looking through the books. The man highlights that the books “are absolutely
true” (2011:76). He grabs a Goddard book, the same one Tom discussed with Nick at dinner at his house.
Meanwhile, in the garden, the orchestra plays jazz and several women and dancers dance. Nick is getting
drunk: “I had drunk two glasses of champagne and the scene had transformed before my eyes into something
significant, elemental and profound” (2011:78).
A man looks at him, tells him that his face looks familiar, and asks if he has been in the Third Division
during the war. Nick says yes. They realize that they have seen each other before. They talk about the war. Nick
thinks that the man must live in the neighborhood, because he tells him that he had just bought a hydrofoil that he is
going to try out the next day, and asks if he wants to accompany him. He calls him “comrade” (2011:79). Nick
thinks about asking her name, but at that moment Jordan joins the conversation. Nick says that it is an unusual party
because he does not know the host personally, and the man responds: “I am Gatsby” (...) “it seems that I am not a
very good host” (2011:79). Nick is embarrassed, but Gatsby smiles, understanding, and assures him that there is no
problem. Then a butler approaches notifying him of a call from Chicago and Gatsby vanishes into the crowd. Nick is
surprised, because he expected Gatsby to be “a ruddy, portly middle-aged person” (2011:80). Nick asks Jordan
questions about who Gatsby is and she replies, “now you've gotten on with it” (2011:80). She then mentions that
Gatsby has told her that he had been to Oxford, but that she does not believe him. Nick is curious about Gatsby's
identity. At that moment the orchestra begins to play jazz.
The butler approaches Jordan and tells her that Gatsby wants to talk to her alone. She follows the man to
meet the host. Nick is left alone and it's two in the morning. He looks at the party and sees several couples fighting.
He heads to the lobby and sees Jordan and Gatsby leaving the library. Jordan tells Nick that he heard surprising
things, but it's a secret. Then she gets lost among the people and Nick feels embarrassed for being among the last
guests. Nick greets Gatsby, but the host quickly leaves: the butler is looking for him on a call from Philadelphia.
Nick leaves the mansion and sees many people gathered around a new coupe that is missing a wheel because it has
been in a crash. The driver is the man with the owl glasses and he gets out of the car completely drunk. Meanwhile,
several cars honk their horns to leave the party. Nick walks home and looks at the mansion: “A sheet of moon shone
above Gatsby's house, making the night as magnificent as before and surviving the laughter and noise of the still
glowing garden” (2011:88).
The narrator clarifies that his story may make readers believe that he only lives by partying or getting drunk
in the city when in reality he spends most of his days working. He tells about a brief love affair and states that: “I
began to like New York, the lively, adventurous feeling there at night, and the satisfaction that the constant blinking
of men and women and machines gives to the restless eye” (2011:89). He stops seeing Jordan Baker for a while but
meets her again in the middle of the summer and confesses to feeling a “tender curiosity” about her (2011:90). He
discovers that she is “incurably dishonest” (2011:91), but he is still attracted to her.
Analysis
The third chapter begins with the most famous passages of the novel: the descriptions of the festivals. The
narrator constructs lists with very specific items and combines words in strange ways. For example: “yellow cocktail
music” (2011:70) and “floating rounds of cocktails” (2011:70). According to Tredell, Fitzgerald's narrative style can
be characterized as romantic modernism (2007). That is, there is a combination of images and rhythms derived from
19th century romantic poetry with the precision, awareness and references of 20th century modernism. In order for
this definition to be understood, it is important to remember that romantic poetry places emphasis on imagination,
emotions, subjectivity and ambiguity. On the other hand, modernist prose and poetry, whose exponents are James
Joyce and TS Eliot uses simple speech with vivid images. In this case, the narrator's descriptions give an account of
the magical atmosphere of alcohol, lights, music, opulence and jazz that is concentrated in Gatsby's mansion. There
are “enough colored lights to turn Gatsby's enormous garden into a Christmas tree” (2011:70) and “turkeys
transformed by a spell into dark gold” (70). Nick continues: “already halls and halls and verandas are garish with
primary colors and hair cut in strange new ways, and shawls beyond the dreams of Castile (70). It lists
heterogeneous objects quickly and agilely, in tune with the crescendo of the party. He then clarifies: “By midnight
the hilarity had increased” (2011:78).
The atmosphere of lack of control of the festivities is configured in communion with a period climate of
economic opulence and prohibition of alcohol consumption. The parties, therefore, have a tinge of illegality that
increases the explosion of the guests. Several examples of flappers appear at parties, a type of woman who is the
protagonist of “the crazy years” in the United States. Flappers are women who defy traditional morality who are
therefore commonly considered to be shameless or fast. Nick finds, for example, “a large number of single girls
dancing individually” (2011:78), that is, women who transgress the classic mandate of marriage as the obligatory
horizon of life. Jordan Baker is an example of a flapper. When Nick finds her at the party, he sees her posing: “she
stood on the marble staircase, leaning somewhat backwards and looking with contemptuous interest towards the
garden” (2011:73). Jordan represents a flapper because she is a single woman who has a professional job and who,
as the quote indicates, seeks attention. She appears to be a mysterious and seductive woman.
This chapter highlights for the first time the idea that Gatsby's character is a facade. In the first description of
him, several verbs and adjectives account for the idea of a constructed image: “it seemed,” “impression,” “transmit,”
“I believed” (2011:80). Although Nick still does not know the truth about Gatsby's identity, he senses his ability to
be admired and a certain control over the image he conveys of himself: “I had a strong impression that he chose his
words carefully” (2011:80). ). Suspicions about the construction of Gatsby's identity are glimpsed here in the
language Nick uses to describe him. Significantly, Nick is surprised when he meets him, because he does not match
his previous idea of what he would be like (“a ruddy, portly middle-aged person” (2011:80)).
At the party, gossip revolves around Gatsby's personality and sows an enigma that pushes the narrative
forward. The guests mention that he has been in the war, that he has been a German spy, and that he has murdered a
man. One woman even names the source from which she got the rumor: “I heard a man say that who knew
everything about him, he grew up with him in Germany” (2011:75). Nick also begins to take an interest in Gatsby, to
which Jordan replies: “now you've started on the subject” (2011:76), as if it were a community intrigue, a “romantic
speculation that inspired gossip about him.” ” (2011:75). It is significant that romanticism is mentioned regarding the
identity of the protagonist, since a common interpretation of The Great Gatsby is to think of the novel as a
celebration of romantic hope in America, as if Gatsby were the last romantic hero of civilization, prior for it to make
its way into the modern world. In this sense, Gatsby would be a romantic hero who must encounter the modern
world. According to Harold Bloom, the novel is not only about Gatsby's romantic dream, but also about the decline
of the American dream. That is, the novel advances both possibilities: in the frustration of the man who builds
himself in a materialistic world and in the faith in Gatsby's dream of love, which leads him to desire economic
wealth.
Chapter 4
Summary
 One Sunday morning at Gatsby's party, Nick hears new gossip about the identity of the host: they say that
“he is a bootlegger” (2011:93) and that he is the nephew of Von Hindenburg, second president of the Weimar
Republic.
Then, one morning in late July, Gatsby invites Nick to lunch in New York. He looks for him around his
house with his Rolls Royce. Nick finds him impatient and punctilious. They comment on the car, which is deep
cream, shiny, and monstrously large. In the car, Gatsby asks Nick what his opinion is of him. As Nick evades the
question, Gatsby tells him that he wants to tell him his life story, so that he doesn't get carried away by gossip and
get “the wrong idea because of all the ideas you hear” (2011:97).
Then Gatsby begins his story. He tells her that he is the son of rich people from the Midwest, and that they
are all dead. He has always lived in the United States but studied at Oxford. At that moment, Nick remembers that
Jordan doesn't believe Gatsby went to Oxford, and he agrees with her, because there's something about the way he
tells it that makes him wonder. When asked what part of the Midwest he comes from, Gatsby answers that San
Francisco, a city that is not, in fact, there. Gatsby continues his story about a large family inheritance and his
youthful travels through Europe. Nick holds back his laughter because he doesn't believe him: “the phrases
themselves were so trite that they evoked no image except that of a 'character'” (2011:98). Gatsby continues his story
about the decorations he earned in the war. Nick disbelieves the story but is fascinated by Gatsby anyway. He shows
him a piece of metal that proves his participation in the war and Nick is surprised, because it is authentic.
Gatsby announces that he is about to ask him a favor. She tells him that Jordan Baker is waiting for him for
tea that afternoon, and that she will tell him what she needs. Nick is upset because Gatsby arranges to meet Jordan
without telling him. They continue the journey by car and cross the dark valley of ashes. On the Queensboro Bridge,
a police officer stops them, but when he recognizes Gatsby he apologizes and lets them go. Gatsby confesses to Nick
that he has done the commissioner a favor in the past.
In the old Metropole, a basement on Forty-second Street, they meet for lunch with Mr. Wolfsheim, a short
Jewish man who works with Gatsby. Mr. Wolfsheim understands that Nick is looking for a business connection, but
Gatsby makes it clear that he is not. Nick tells Gatsby that he'd rather Gatsby talk straight to him than bring Jordan
into the middle of it. Gatsby responds by flattering Jordan and then vanishes, leaving Nick alone with Mr.
Wolfsheim, who comments on Gatsby's stay at Oxford and describes him as a “man of excellent breeding”
(2011:106). When Gatsby returns from talking on the phone, Mr. Wolfsheim says goodbye. Gatsby tells Nick that
this man is a gambler and has fixed the 1919 World Series.
Nick finds that Tom Buchanan is at the same restaurant and goes over to say hello. Nick introduces Gatsby
and Tom. They shake hands tensely and suddenly Gatsby disappears.
When Nick meets Jordan at the Plaza Hotel, she tells him a story about her past in Louisville, where she
spent her teenage years and forged her friendship with Daisy. Both worked as volunteers for the Red Cross. One
afternoon in October 1917, Jordan saw Daisy talking to a lieutenant, whom he had never met before, in a white
sports car. That man was Jay Gatsby, and he looked at Daisy completely in love. Then Gatsby left to fight in the war
and Daisy promised him that she would wait for him. However, in 1918 she met Tom Buchanan and married. When
Jordan entered Daisy's room, half an hour before the wedding dinner, he found her drunk and crying. He had a bottle
in one hand and a letter in the other. Daisy asked Jordan to tell Tom that she had changed her mind. Jordan found
Daisy's mother and they put her in the bathtub. Daisy said nothing more. She got ready and married Tom without
commenting on this episode. Then, they went on their honeymoon for three months. When Jordan found her, upon
his return, he saw her madly in love with her husband: “it was moving to see them together: it made you laugh
silently, with fascination” (2011:111). A week later, Tom had an accident with his car. They found him with a maid
from the Santa Barbara Hotel. In April of the following year, Daisy had her daughter. Jordan explains to Nick that
Daisy heard Gatsby's name again six weeks ago, at dinner at her house. At that time, Jordan linked Gatsby to the
man in the white sports car in Louisville.
Jordan and Nick stroll through Central Park in a victory. Nick thinks it's a strange coincidence that Gatsby
and Daisy meet again, and Jordan explains that it's not; Gatsby bought that house to have Daisy on the other side of
the bay. At that moment, Nick realizes that the green light Gatsby is looking at has to do with Daisy. What Gatsby
asks Nick is if he can invite him and Daisy to his house one day. Jordan tells her that Gatsby is afraid of being
rejected and that he has hoped to find her at one of his parties, but she hasn't gone. When it gets dark, Nick kisses
Jordan in Central Park.
Analysis
The fourth chapter delves into the conflict of Gatsby's identity. The topic of reality and illusion appears on
the figure of the protagonist. Nick disbelieves several things that Gatsby tells him, such as his stay at Oxford and his
origins in the Midwest. Gatsby tells him that he comes from San Francisco when that city is not in the Midwest and
something in the way Gatsby talks about Oxford makes Nick distrustful. There also appears, in Gatsby's story, a
certain concern to clarify doubts about himself. He even presents him with evidence that he has participated in the
war, showing him a piece of metal that says “Major Jay Gatsby, for extraordinary valor” (2011:99), which is read by
Nick as suspicious. Nick is very skeptical of Gatsby's story.
Gatsby tells Nick about his past because he doesn't want him to get “the wrong idea because of all the ideas
you hear” (2011:97). Gatsby knows about the rumors circulating about himself and wants to control the narrative,
but Nick discovers that everything there is a fabrication: “the phrases themselves were so hackneyed that they
evoked no image except that of a 'character'” (2011 :98). Nick's suspicions about the type of work Gatsby does or the
ways in which he made his fortune grow when the policeman stops them crossing the Queensboro Bridge and lets
them go. Nick thus understands that there is a certain complicity between his friend and the police.
Furthermore, his doubts about the legality of Gatsby's businesses increase when he meets Meyer Wolfsheim.
This character embodies the criminal element of the novel and is characterized with the physical traits stereotypically
assigned to Jews: a large nose and short height. These qualities are hallmarks of the anti-Semitic caricatures
circulating in the 1920s. Anti-Semitism in the United States at that time was in vogue; A large part of the population
blames the Jews for the economic ills of the time. In tune, Wolfsheim's character functions as a stereotype of a
criminal Jew. The novel presents this stereotype without any criticism, replicating the prejudices of the time.
On the other hand, this chapter reveals the love story that Gatsby and Daisy have before the war. Jordan tells
the story with several romantic clichés: Gatsby is presented as the ideal lover, an attractive and brave soldier who
must go fight for the country, and Daisy as a young and beautiful millionaire woman. As Bloom understands, Gatsby
does not fall in love with Daisy or love, but with a particular moment in his story that he wants to relive (2006).
Gatsby wants to revive the relationship between a Red Cross volunteer and a soldier in Louisville before the war,
because this is the happiest moment of his life. His place as a soldier allows him to become romantically involved
with a young woman of a very high class that he would not have access to without his uniform. In this sense, Gatsby
climbs the social pyramid after the war to be “worthy” of his lover again. He buys that exaggerated mansion to
impress her, and chooses it in that specific place to be in front of his house. Following Bloom, Fitzgerald constructs
a character whose romantic vision of the world must confront the cynicism and decadence of the modern world
(2006). Gatsby gets into illegal businesses to get rich, because the way to get his beloved in the modern world is
through economic success.
Faced with Jordan's story, Nick reacts with ambivalence. He oscillates between admiration and disgust about
Gatsby. He gets angry first because Gatsby lies to him about his origins and arranges for Jordan to tell him his story
and ask him for the favor behind his back. The novel suggests that Gatsby seeks to establish a friendship with Nick
when he discovers his kinship with Daisy. There is something utilitarian in this relationship: Gatsby needs Nick to
get closer to his girlfriend.
This chapter also reveals the relationship between the green light that Gatsby sees from his mansion and his
love for Daisy. It is one of Gatsby's "enchanted objects" (2011:130). This light symbolizes, for the protagonist, the
path towards Daisy, towards his romantic dream. As his love for Daisy is the heart of a broader dream that has to do
with the American dream, with being a successful and prosperous man, the green light functions as a guide for the
protagonist that sets the course of his future.
Finally, throughout the novel the color white is linked to the wealthy class and black to the humble classes.
In this chapter, the class meaning that colors have on the trip that Gatsby and Nick make from West Egg to New
York City becomes evident. When they pass through the valley of ashes, they see “dark deserted taverns”
(2011:101), and when they cross the bridge they see “the city rising on the other side of the river in white heaps and
sugar cubes” (2011:101). The valley appears in dark tones and the city in the white color of sugar. Furthermore, on
this bridge they come across a limousine driven by a white driver carrying two black men. Thus, we see an inversion
in the traditional power relations that mean the black population is subordinate to the white population. This suggests
a first disruption of the status quo of American society at the time. In the same order of things, after that episode,
already in the city, Nick confirms that Gatsby is a rich but criminal man and this goes against Nick's idea that the
rich are fundamentally "good" or honorable.
Finally, in Jordan's story, Daisy appears in the past in Louisville dressed in white and chatting with Gatsby in
a “white sports car” (2011:109). The tone of the upper classes appears again. The color white persists, even in the
letter that Daisy holds in her hand hours before her wedding, which “was falling apart like snow” (2011:111).
Although it is not made explicit, the letter appears to come from Gatsby.

Chapter 5
Summary
When Nick returns home that night, he finds many lights coming out of Gatsby's mansion; The entire
peninsula shines with light, but there is no music. This is not a party. Gatsby appears in the garden and Nick
confirms that he will call Daisy the next day to invite her to his house. Gatsby summons him to do a confidential
business with him: “a little side business, a kind of complement” (2011:117). Nick rejects the offer, which he
considers “obvious and tactless in exchange for a service to be provided” (2011:118). Gatsby insists but, faced with
Nick's refusal, he goes home. The next day, Nick calls Daisy to invite her to his house and tells her not to bring Tom.
The day of their meeting it rains torrentially. At eleven o'clock, a gardener who Gatsby sends to cut the grass
arrives at Nick's bungalow. Nick goes out to buy flowers and food and look for “the Finnish woman” (2011:119), an
employee who works in his house. It is unnecessary because at two in the afternoon “an entire greenhouse arrives
from Gatsby's house, with innumerable containers in which to place them” (2011:119). At three o'clock Gatsby
appears in a white flannel suit and tie. He is pale and it shows that he has had little sleep. At three thirty the rain
stops. Gatsby seems agitated and wants to go home because, according to him, “no one comes to have tea”
(2011:120). Just then they hear the noise of an engine outside: it's Daisy's car.
Daisy appears wearing a lavender tricorn hat and a “bright, ecstatic smile” (2011:120). Nick greets her, they
enter the house and find the living room empty. Then there is a noise at the front door, and Nick finds Gatsby “pale
as death, with his hands buried like weights in his jacket pockets” (2011:121) and his feet stuck in a puddle.
The conversation between the three is clipped and strange. Gatsby continues standing “in tense falsification”
(2011:122) and Daisy sits “scared but graceful” (2011:122). Gatsby accidentally knocks over a mantel clock. Nick
and Daisy talk while Gatsby looks “conscientiously from one to the other with tense, unhappy eyes” (2011:123).
When Nick leaves them alone, Gatsby follows him to the kitchen and tells him that this meeting was a terrible
mistake. Nick tells him they're just embarrassed. Gatsby returns to the living room and Nick leaves through the back
door and stays in the garden, under an immense black tree that covers him from the rain.
When Nick enters, he finds his guests sitting on the couch, looking at each other “as if there had been a
question” (2011:125). Daisy's face is full of tears but Gatsby is glowing: “a new well-being radiated from him”
(2011:125). Gatsby then invites them to his house and mentions that it has taken him three years to earn the money
to buy it. Nick asks if he hasn't inherited it, and Gatsby hesitantly replies that he has lost much of his inheritance in
the panic of the war.
They walk towards the mansion and Daisy admires the gardens and construction. Gatsby gives them a tour.
Nick notices that Gatsby doesn't stop looking at Daisy for a moment. Then he opens his closet and shows them his
suits, shirts and ties. He throws them away as Nick and Daisy admire them. Daisy starts crying: “I get sad because I
have never seen shirts so… so beautiful” (2011:129), she says.
Gatsby tells Daisy that, if there were no fog, they could see the green light on at the end of the pier from
there. Gatsby seems absorbed by what he just said. Nick thinks the significance of the green light fades at that
moment.
 Nick walks around the room and notices a photograph of an older man in a sailor's suit. Gatsby tells him that
he is Dan Cody, his best friend for many years. Daisy calls him to watch with her through the window at the foamy
clouds over the sea. Nick says goodbye and leaves them alone.
Analysis
The beginning of the chapter raises questions about Gatsby and Nick's relationship: Is Gatsby simply using
Nick to get closer to Daisy or does he really have affection for her? Gatsby offers his neighbor a business connection
in exchange for the favor of inviting him and Daisy to his bungalow. This offering gives an account of how Gatsby
uses money and power to manipulate the people around him. The protagonist's insecurity has to do with assuming
that his mansion or his millions are necessary to have friends or even romantic relationships. Gatsby has already lost
Daisy for class reasons and remains an outsider in the circles of wealth and power of East Egg, even though he is a
millionaire.
The fifth chapter focuses on Daisy and Gatsby meeting after five years apart. The focus is on how Daisy's
gaze is fundamental to the construction of Gatsby's character. Gatsby takes his girlfriend to his mansion to impress
her and shows off his wealth with her. Nick notices that Gatsby keeps looking at her because he wants to see her
reactions to his objects: “he revalued every thing in the house according to the measure of the response he got from
her beloved eyes” (2011:128). This visit shows how the character that Gatsby designs for himself is motivated by
romantic hope and is built to suit his beloved.
Furthermore, this chapter exposes how Gatsby's idea of Daisy deviates from reality. After five years of
waiting, there is an overestimation of his lover. When Nick comes to see them off that afternoon, he sees a perplexed
expression on Gatsby's face and considers that “there must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy fell
short of her dreams; not because of her, but because of the colossal vitality of the illusion that he had” (2011:133).
Reality is not enough because its ideal is unattainable. Therefore, what the novel suggests is that just as Gatsby is
constructed as a character equal to Daisy's yardstick, Daisy is transformed into an idealized object of desire that
Gatsby uses to move forward. In this sense, Lehan considers that the goal is not to possess Daisy but to desire her
(1970). Significantly, when Gatsby appears to have recovered it, the green light loses its significant brightness. The
green light that guides Gatsby toward his goal loses its cloak of meaning when he manages to thrill Daisy: “now it
was a green light on a dock again. His count of enchanted items had decreased by one” (2011:130). Although no
type of romantic consummation between the lovers is made explicit, when Gatsby displays his shirts and Daisy cries
for beauty, something of their connection is consummated. From that day on, they resume their relationship.
This chapter details the creative process that Gatsby goes through when designing himself, his beloved and
even his meeting: “He had thrown himself into that illusion with a creative passion, making additions to it all the
time, adorning it with each bright little feather that will drift along its path” (2011:133). This passage gives an
account of how Nick, a first-person narrating voice, can explain how other characters' minds work. In this case,
according to Tredell (2007), Nick imaginatively enters Gatsby and discovers a feeling of his interiority. For example,
Nick detects, during Daisy's visit, “a slight doubt about the character of his present happiness” (2011:133) in Gatsby.
The tension between the ideal and the real increases in this episode. Gatsby doesn't finish enjoying it because he
wishes for impossible things, like that Daisy doesn't have a daughter or isn't married to Tom. In this sense, what
Gatsby wants is to relive the past, fall in love with a Red Cross volunteer and marry her in Louisville and act as if he
and Daisy had never been separated. In this sense, it is significant that Gatsby, nervous about his encounter with
Daisy, hits a clock in Nick's house, in tune with his desire to stop time and the impossibility that this implies.
Continuing with Daisy's visit to the mansion, significantly the color white does not exist in Gatsby's house.
The color of the upper social class does not proliferate in a mansion in West Egg, an area of the new rich without
established social relationships. Instead, there are several mentions of brightness, light and sparkles. Daisy arrives at
Nick's bungalow with a “bright smile” (2011:120), and her hand is dotted with “shimmering droplets” (2011:121).
The glow appears throughout the novel, enveloping the character of Gatsby, perhaps highlighting the mantle of
fantasy that covers his entire world. Still in Nick's bungalow, Gatsby “literally glowed” (2011:125) in a room with
“glints of sunshine” (2011:125), and Nick says he smiles “like an ecstatic patron of recurring light” (2011: 125).
Then, from his mansion, Gatsby tells Daisy: “look how the whole front catches the light” (2011:126). There is a
semantic field that has to do with the reflection of the light that surrounds Gatsby and is linked to the tension
between reality and illusion: since there is no transparency in the character, there is brightness.
 Finally, an interesting detail in the description of Gatsby's mansion is the anachronism it presents. Nick
comments that Gatsby's gothic mansion looks like it belongs to a feudal prince. It is suggested that Gatsby lives in
20th century America as a 15th century European aristocrat. On the one hand, Gatsby tries to climb the American
social pyramid and, on the other, he lives in a mansion that alludes to a bygone era when the boundaries between
classes were more rigid and uncrossable.
Chapter 6
Summary
A young reporter arrives from New York to Gatsby's mansion to learn the truth about his identity and his
past, but Gatsby does not answer his questions. His fame has grown due to the number of people who attended his
parties that summer.
The narrator goes back in time to Gatsby's story. Nick says that he has a “Platonic conception of himself”
(2011:135) that leads him to invent his own story and remain faithful to it until the end. His real name is James Gatz
and he comes from a family in rural North Dakota. James Gatz changed his name at age 17, after seeing the yacht of
Dan Cody, a millionaire who had made his fortune in the Yukon gold rush. The protagonist's dreams of personal
growth intensified when he met Cody. They traveled on their yacht through the West Indies and Barbary for five
years, until Cody died and left Gatsby an inheritance that he was never able to collect. The narrator clarifies that
Gatsby tells him this later, but decides to reveal it at this point in the narrative “to disprove those first wild rumors
about his background” (2011:138).
After a few weeks without seeing him, Nick goes to Gatsby's house and, at that moment, Tom Buchanan
arrives with a couple from East Egg, Mr. Sloan and his wife, after horseback riding. Gatsby welcomes them, happy,
and offers them drinks and cigarettes. Nick, on the other hand, is uncomfortable about the meeting between Tom and
Gatsby.
Tom and Daisy attend Gatsby's party the following Saturday. Tom is uncomfortable during the night and is
rude to Daisy. Daisy and Gatsby dance and then cross to Nick's house and talk for half an hour while Nick makes
sure no one sees them. Nick gets drunk and states: “almost the last thing I remember was standing with Daisy
watching the film director and his Star” (2011:145). Daisy doesn't feel comfortable in West Egg. Nick describes her
as “appalled by his crude vigor” (2011:145). Tom asks Nick if Gatsby is a smuggler and explains that “a lot of these
nouveau riche are nothing more than big smugglers” (2011:146). He tells Nick that he will find out and then refers to
the people at the party as a “zoo” (2011:146).
Nick explains that what Gatsby wants is for Daisy to tell Tom: “I never loved you” (2011:148). When Nick
suggests to Gatsby that he can't repeat the past, he replies, "Of course you can!" (2011:148).
Analysis
The narrator of the novel shows, in the sixth chapter, his present enunciation: “He told me all this much later,
but I put it here with the idea of denying those first crazy rumors about his background” (2011:138) . Nick writes the
story two years after that summer of 1922. It shows that he is still loyal to Gatsby and has appreciation for him. For
that reason he wants to dispel the rumors about him. At the same time, it exposes a certain control in the image that
readers must form about Gatsby. In this way he manipulates the intrigue of the novel and tells Gatsby's true past.
Nick explains that Gatsby forms a “Platonic conception of himself” at the age of 17 (2011:135). That is, he
invents an ideal version of himself because he doesn't want to live the real one. For Jimmy Gatz, Jay Gatsby is the
manifestation of an ideal projected by a child who wants to be rich and successful. As Nick explains, “his parents
were lazy, unsuccessful country people: his imagination had never truly accepted them as parents” (2011:135).
Jimmy does not accept his present and, therefore, builds a new future: he sets up a new identity. In this sense, Gatsby
embodies the American dream: dissatisfied with his material conditions, he creates the life he wants, which includes
economic success and social advancement.
The archetype of the "self-made man" is a particular type of the American dream that characterizes men who
are successful on their own terms, without help from external constraints. Benjamin Franklin, one of the founding
fathers of the United States, is considered the greatest example of a self-made man. Originally, this myth refers to
men who, like Gatsby, are born in poor environments or with few possibilities and manage to escape poverty and
excel in their areas of work. They are usually characterized as persevering men, who work hard and who do not have
inherited fortunes or class privileges that facilitate their arrival in positions of power. Gatsby is an iconic character of
this type of archetype in American literature, as he represents a poor boy from the American Midwest who becomes
a millionaire celebrity in Long Island society.
In this sense, Gatsby belongs to the class of the "new rich." This is a pejorative term that refers to people who
previously belonged to lower social classes and managed to climb the social pyramid thanks to building a fortune.
This money allows them to access a level of consumption of goods and services similar to those of the upper classes.
However, the novel clearly distinguishes between the "new rich" and the aristocrats, who have not only a fortune, but
also a system of values, contacts and traditions belonging to the historically rich and powerful classes. Gatsby's
meeting with Tom Buchanan and the Sloan couple reflects the contempt that aristocrats feel for the "new rich" and
the hostility that exists towards "men who build themselves." Both Tom and the Sloans condescend to Gatsby
because of his humble origins. Although Gatsby is incredibly rich, perhaps richer than Tom, he continues to be
considered socially inferior by the aristocrats.
Although both social groups live in separate spaces - the aristocrats in East Egg and the "nouveau riche" in
West Egg - Gatsby's parties configure a space where guests from different origins coexist. This chapter describes the
first party the Buchanans attend at Gatsby's mansion. During the event, Nick gets drunk and states: “almost the last
thing I remember was standing with Daisy watching the film director and his Star” (2011:145). He thus recognizes
himself, at times, as an unreliable narrator. Furthermore, it makes it clear that the Buchanans are not comfortable
with the class heterogeneity that exists among the characters at the party. Accustomed to living in a bubble made up
of people of the same social status, Gatsby's party forces them to live with personalities from different origins. Daisy
“was horrified by West Egg” (2011:145), “she saw something horrible in the very simplicity that she couldn't
understand” (2011:145). Nick says that what Daisy finds horrible at the party is seeing people who aren't pretending.
Both Daisy and Tom are isolated by their wealth and live in a world of restrictions, decorum, and posturing that has
nothing to do with Gatsby's ways of attending parties.
Daisy seduces strangers and sings during the party. Given this, Tom makes sexist comments about his wife:
“My God, maybe I'm old-fashioned in my ideas but these days women are out there too much for my taste”
(2011:141). Faced with small signs of independence from his wife, Tom tries to censor and subjugate her, following
traditional gender values.
Finally, it is clear in this chapter that Gatsby confuses the boundary between reality and illusion. He
expresses to Nick that he wants Daisy to tell Tom that she doesn't love him, and he thinks that, in this way, he can
change the past: “Once she had erased four years with that phrase” (2011:148) they could come back. to Louisville
and get married “just like it was five years ago” (2011:148). Nick describes him as crazy and then admits: “I
gathered that he wanted to recover something, some idea of himself perhaps, that he had invested in loving Daisy”
(2011:149). As suggested before, the idea that Gatsby does not fall in love with Daisy or love, but rather with a
particular moment in their history together that he wants to relive, becomes evident again here (2006).
Chapter 7
Summary
When curiosity about Gatsby's true identity is at its peak, the protagonist stops celebrating the holidays. Nick
approaches the mansion, but the butler won't let him enter. He only tells him that Gatsby is not sick. The Finnish
woman who works at Nick's house informs him that Gatsby has fired all the employees in his house and replaced
them with new ones. Gatsby calls Nick and tells him that Daisy visits him in the afternoons and that he wants to
avoid rumors. She then invites him to lunch at Daisy's house.
On the hottest day of summer, Nick goes to Daisy's house, where he meets Gatsby, Tom, and Jordan for
lunch. Daisy kisses Gatsby on the mouth as Tom leaves the room. The nanny arrives with Daisy's daughter and
Gatsby is surprised to see the girl.
Tom realizes that there is a romantic relationship between Daisy and Gatsby by the way they look at each
other. Gatsby then tells Nick that Daisy is indiscreet and that her voice “is full of money” (2011:159). Nick reflects
on this: “She was full of money: that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in her” (2011:159). Next, Daisy
asks if they want to go to the city, and Tom says yes, but then comments: “I don't see the point of going to the city
(...) women put every idea in their heads” (2011 :159).

They prepare to go. Tom grabs a bottle of alcohol and wraps it in a towel. Gatsby suggests that they all drive
into town in his car, but Tom asks him to let him try it out and offers to drive his coupe. Daisy doesn't like the
suggestion. Tom presses her towards Gatsby's car but she replies: “you take Nick and Jordan. We follow them in the
coupe” (2011:160). In the car with Jordan and Nick, Tom is furious and says that he has done research on Gatsby.
They approach the valley of ashes and see the eyes of Dr. T's poster. J. Eckleburg. They stop at Wilson's garage to
fill up on gas and see the coupe that Gatsby drives with Daisy towards the city. Wilson tells Tom that he is moving
west because his wife was having an extramarital affair. Leaving the garage, Myrtle watches them from the window
with an expression of “jealous terror” (2011:164), since she thinks that Jordan is Tom's wife. Tom feels very nervous
because both his wife and his lover are leaving him.
To escape the heat of the city, the group hires a suite at the Plaza hotel. The room is spacious and stuffy even
though it is four in the afternoon. When Tom asks Daisy to stop nagging about the heat, Gatsby defends her: “Why
don't you leave her alone, buddy?” (2011:166). Tom is upset that Gatsby calls him “comrade” and Daisy tries to
calm him down. Jordan changes the subject: he talks about the heat and mentions the wedding happening at the
hotel. They hear the wedding march coming from the hall below. Daisy remembers her own wedding in Louisville.
Tom asks Gatsby many questions about his time at Oxford and accuses him of lying. Gatsby says that he was in
Oxford in 1919, only five months: “it was an opportunity that some of us officers were given after the armistice”
(2011:169). Nick observes that Gatsby is very confident. Tom asks Gatsby: “(...) what kind of trouble are you trying
to make in my house after all?” (2011:169). When Daisy asks Tom to control himself, he explodes and calls Gatsby
“Mr. Nobody from Nowhere” (2011:170). He exposes the affair that his wife has with him and relates it to the end of
civilization. Later, Daisy asks Tom to go back to her house but he ignores her. Nick also suggests returning to Long
Island.
Gatsby tells Tom: “his wife doesn't love him (...) She never loved him. “He loves me.” (2011:170). Then he
continues: “she only married you because I was poor and she was tired of waiting for me” (2011:171). Tom asks
Daisy questions in a fatherly tone, but Gatsby answers for her. He tells her that they have loved each other for five
years. Tom answers that Daisy loves him and that her problem is that “sometimes she gets stupid ideas in her head
and she doesn't know what she's doing” (2011:172). Daisy replies, “You're disgusting” (2011:172), and asks Nick if
he knows why they left Chicago, suggesting that Tom was having an affair. Gatsby approaches Daisy and asks her to
tell Tom that she has never loved him. Daisy looks at Nick and Jordan as if she had not realized what she was doing,
as if “she had never, at any point, intended to do anything” (2011:172). However, she says she has never loved him.
Daisy tries to light a cigarette but her hand shakes. He tells Gatsby that he is asking a lot of him, that he loves
him but that he has also loved Tom. Gatsby looks at her, surprised. Daisy then admits that she loves them both and
Gatsby wants to talk to her alone, but Tom won't let them. He promises that he will take better care of her from that
day on, but Gatsby tells him that Daisy is leaving him. Tom denies it: “except for a common scammer who would
have to steal the ring he put on his finger” (2011:174). Daisy wants to leave the hotel but Tom asks Gatsby again
who he is, and he confesses that he has investigated him. Gatsby insists that his wife does not love him and Tom
attacks him by saying that he illegally sells cereal alcohol in his pharmacies. Gatsby defends himself by comparing
that job to that of the banker Walter Chase. Tom gets angry because Gatsby constantly calls him “comrade.” At that
moment, Gatsby begins to speak to Daisy, defending himself against Tom's accusations. She withdraws into herself
and asks Tom to return to the house. He tells her to go back to Gatsby in the car and clarifies: “I think he realizes that
his presumptuous little flirtation is over” (2011:176).
Gatsby and Daisy leave the room, and at that moment, Nick remembers that it is his birthday. At seven in the
afternoon he heads back to Long Island with Tom and Jordan. In the valley of ashes, they see a crowd standing on
the road. They get closer and discover that Myrtle is dead because she was hit by a car. There is a young man named
Michaelis, who is the main witness in the case. He was in Wilson's garage in the moments before the accident.
Wilson told him that he had his wife locked in the house and Michaelis saw Myrtle run out onto the road, wave her
hands, scream and be hit by the car. The newspapers call it “the car of death” (2011:178) because it did not stop after
hitting her. Tom, Jordan and Nick see Myrtle's body wrapped in a blanket on the workbench in the workshop.
Michaelis says the car came from New York and was yellow, big and new. Tom realizes that it is Gatsby's car.
They continue the journey towards East Egg and Nick sees tears on Tom's face. They arrive at the Buchanan
house and Tom is happy because Daisy is home. Jordan enters but Nick is left waiting for a taxi outside. He feels
disgusted and wants to be alone. At that moment he finds Gatsby in the bushes on the path. He asks if the girl is
dead, and Nick tells him yes. Gatsby informs him that Daisy was driving the car: “when we left New York, she was
very nervous and thought that driving would stabilize her” (2011:185). He tells her that the girl approached the car as
if she knew them, as if she wanted to tell them something. He tells her that he is going to wait until Daisy goes to
sleep to make sure Tom doesn't hurt her. Nick approaches the house to confirm that there are no signs of commotion
and sees the Buchanan couple through the crack in the windowsill, sitting, holding hands. He tells Gatsby that
everything is calm and goes home. Gatsby stays on the path under the moonlight.
Analysis
The seventh chapter contains the climax of the story: the confrontation between Gatsby and Tom for the love
of Daisy that results in Gatsby's dream and his conception of himself beginning to break. Additionally, it includes the
death of Myrtle Wilson at Daisy's hands when she drives Gatsby's car, Daisy's failed abandonment of Tom, and the
end of Nick and Jordan's relationship.
During their stay in the suite at the Plaza Hotel, the love triangle between Tom, Daisy and Gatsby is stressed
to the maximum. It's interesting how the strategy Tom uses to discredit his opponent is to check his past. He
questions the source of Gatsby's wealth because he knows that is what matters most to Daisy. When she learns of
Gatsby's false aristocratic origin, she regrets her affair. Once again, the contempt that the aristocracy has for the
"new rich" who come from humble families appears.
Earlier, at the Buchanan house in East Egg, Gatsby says that Daisy's voice shows her wealth. Significantly,
Gatsby finds traces of money in his lover's voice, which is a channel that defines people's presence and individuality.
Gatsby says that Daisy is indiscreet because she is full of money. On this, Nick reflects: “She was full of money: that
was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in her” (2011:159). In this way, Nick justifies Daisy inviting her lover
to eat with her husband and exposing their affair. Nick discovers, at that moment, how Daisy's sensuality and
attractiveness are based on her money, and how she has a certain impunity because her wealth protects her from the
consequences of her actions. As Bloom understands, it is important that this revelation of the symbolic link between
Daisy and money is detected by Gatsby, because he recognizes that Daisy represents the wealth and elegance that he
longs for (2006).
The appearance of Daisy's daughter puts a strain on Gatsby's refusal to accept that Daisy and Tom do indeed
have an emotional bond. This girl is proof that time has passed and that Gatsby's desire to recover the past is
impossible. For her part, Daisy does not seem to care too much about the girl, whom she leaves with her nanny and
with whom she does not seem involved.
In the suite at the Plaza Hotel, Tom seems to realize Gatsby's “fictitious” persona when he asks him: “All
that 'camarda' stuff. Where did you get it from?” (20111:167). Somehow, he understands that there is a character
construction or staging in Gatsby. He knows that his wife would not leave her aristocrat husband for a more humble
man, regardless of the love she feels, and that is why he discredits Gatsby. And after Daisy discovers Gatsby's illegal
background and humble origins, there is indeed a certain disenchantment in her that breaks Gatsby's romantic dream.
Daisy's idea of Gatsby is fundamental to the construction of the protagonist, and when this image is no longer
perfect, as Gatsby wishes, the character breaks; his own idea of himself is affected.
Nick uses metaphors to describe this break in Gatsby's dream and in his personality: “only the dead dream
continued the fight, as the afternoon slipped away, trying to touch what was no longer tangible” (2011:175). The
idea of the immaterial or incorporeal alludes to the fantasy construction of Gatsby's identity, which is put in check
after Daisy stops trusting him. Regarding the importance of Daisy's gaze, at the beginning of the chapter Nick
comments on the relevance that Gatsby begins to give to the gossip about him. He wants, for the first time, to take
care of public opinion of himself to preserve Daisy's image of him. For this reason, he stops celebrating parties and
changes the staff at his mansion.
 The theme of class is fundamental in the duel between Tom and Gatsby. Beyond the shame that his wife's
infidelity causes Tom, the biggest problem is that he does it with a man from a lower social class. This fact
represents a disgrace for a rich white man like Tom. However, and making use of his gender privileges, his affair
with a woman from a lower social class (Myrtle) is not read by Tom with the same seriousness as that of his wife.
Regarding Myrtle's accident, it is considerable how the event is told. Nick stops narrating like a reporter
based on his experience and begins a more expository narration. It tells the event from a greater distance and
generates intrigue in readers, since it mentions an investigation and an accident, without explaining what accident it
is talking about. Then it includes the version of Michaelis, the witness, who tells a story of gender violence between
George Wilson and Myrtle. The description of the event is compressed: “A moment later she ran out into the
evening, waving her hands and screaming; before he could move from his door, the matter was over” (2011:178).
The chapter ends with Tom and Daisy strengthening their loyalty to each other. Once again, class prevails
over love. Simultaneously, Gatsby waits outside the Buchanan mansion ready to sacrifice himself for love. The
counterpoint between Gatsby and Daisy is very clear: Gatsby prioritizes love and Daisy prioritizes social status. She
takes no responsibility for the crime she commits and Gatsby is willing to take responsibility for the murder of his
beloved. Regarding this, Nick comments that Gatsby “spoke as if Daisy's reaction was the only one that mattered”
(2011:185).
Chapter 8
Summary
That night Nick can't sleep. At dawn he hears a taxi arriving at Gatsby's house, so he leaves his bungalow.
He crosses the lawn and finds a despondent Gatsby. He tells her that nothing has happened: Daisy has not gone out
to look for him.
They go to Gatsby's mansion. Nick feels that, that night, he is bigger than ever. They go through the rooms
looking for cigarettes. There is dust everywhere and it smells musty. Nick suggests that Gatsby leave West Egg,
because they are going to locate his car and blame him for Myrtle's murder. Gatsby can't leave: he doesn't want to
leave Daisy. Then she tells him her story with Dan Cody and Nick clarifies that that night at the hotel, “Jay Gatsby
had broken like glass against Tom's harsh malice and the long secret fantasy performance was over” (2011:189).
Gatsby also tells him about the first time he saw Daisy, in 1917. He was seduced by her beauty, her wealth
and her youth. Gatsby was a “penniless young man without a past” (2011:190) who made Daisy believe that he was
a man from a social class similar to hers, thinking that she would leave him if she knew of his humble origins.
Before he left for war, Daisy promised him that she would wait for him. Gatsby survived, but later traveled to
Oxford. Daisy wrote to him with “nervous desperation” (2011:192) because she needed to make a decision regarding
her future. The following year she met Tom Buchanan and married.
Gatsby defiantly tells Nick that he doesn't believe Daisy ever loved Tom. Tom, she says, scared her that day
at the Plaza and that's why Daisy went back to him. Gatsby tells her that when he arrived from Europe after the war,
he visited Daisy's house, which “was permeated with melancholy beauty” (2011:194).
The gardener tells them that he is going to empty the pool but Gatsby tells him not yet. Summer is ending.
Nick has to go to work but he doesn't want to leave Gatsby alone. When he goes to take the train to New York, he
shouts at him: “they are rotten people (...) you are worth more than all of them combined” (2011:196). Gatsby
responds with a bright smile.
The narrator then goes back to the valley of ashes and what happens on the night of Myrtle's death. After
Nick, Jordan, and Tom left the garage, Wilson told Michaelis that he had argued with Myrtle about their affair.
Michaelis was left alone with Wilson until early morning, and Wilson told him that he had told Myrtle that she
couldn't fool God by pointing to Dr. Eckleburg's eyes. Then she said she knew how to find out whose yellow car had
hit her. Wilson thought Myrtle's lover had killed her: “it was the man in that car. She ran out to talk to him and he
didn't stop” (2011:202).
 Wilson goes to Gatsby's mansion and finds him floating in the pool, staring at the sky. Gatsby feels empty
and lost. Wilson shoots him and then commits suicide. Gatsby's driver hears the shots. Nick returns to the mansion
and finds her body floating in the pool. The gardener then discovers, in the garden, Wilson's body.
Analysis
The last words that Nick says to Gatsby show the affection he has for him: “they are rotten people (...) you
are worth more than all of them combined” (2011:196). Although there is some ambivalence in his feelings towards
Gatsby due to his criminal past, Nick values his friend's way of transforming his dreams into reality, that is, his
romantic quality, which leads him to not abandon his dreams. Gatsby is exceptional in an age characterized by
decadence and cynicism: his love for Daisy and his willingness to risk his life for her seem to be the only pure
impulse in a corrupt and materialistic world.
At the same time, that quote reflects what Nick learned during that summer. After getting to know the
Buchanan couple in depth, he refutes a common idea, shared by Gatsby, that the rich, just because they are rich, are
good people. Gatsby longs for a type of life that comes with great wealth and that for him means a fabulous
existence full of goodness. Nick contradicts this idea by getting to know Tom and Daisy in depth.
Furthermore, Gatsby's fantasized character breaks when Tom takes him away from Daisy, that is, when she
learns of her lover's humble origins and chooses to continue her loveless aristocratic marriage. Attuned to the
shattering of this illusion, Nick enters Gatsby's mansion and finds it dark and dusty. A space that used to shine,
reflect sunlight and house hundreds of guests is now empty, dirty and decaying: “there was an inexplicable amount
of dust everywhere, and the rooms smelled musty” (2011:188).
That morning, Gatsby tells Nick his true past; his connection with Dan Cody and the fabrication of the
character of Jay Gatsby. This story has already been told, halfway, in chapter VII. Dan Cody's life works as a rags-
to-riches story. This is a best-selling genre at the time of publication of The Great Gatsby, and appears after the
North American Civil War in the 19th century, when the riches of great monopolistic magnates such as Rockfeller,
Morgan, etc. emerge. The greatest exponent of this genre is the writer Hora Alger. According to Lehan, The Great
Gatsby can be considered the end point of this tradition of rags-to-riches novels (1970). According to this
perspective, Fitzgerald's novel constitutes the tragic, absurd and corrupt end of the mythical history of the genre. In
some ways, this novel is an inverted version of the genre, since Gatsby fights from his humble origins to make a lot
of money and buy a mansion, but this is in West Egg and not East Egg, and his money comes from smuggling,
illegal alcohol and gambling. Lehan considers the novel to be the final product of the American dream: the grotesque
image of what the United States could offer an ambitious young man (1970).
Significantly, Gatsby does not give up his dream: he remains in his mansion waiting for Daisy. Even when
she has chosen Tom, he insists on the possibility of her seeking him out. In some ways, his death seems inevitable,
as a dreamer cannot live without his dreams, and his own has begun to crack. Furthermore, it is significant that
Gatsby does not die for reasons linked to his illegal businesses but to his romantic relationship with Daisy. When his
romantic dream with Daisy is shattered, Gatsby has no reason to live.
Gatsby is murdered on the first day of autumn. That day he tells Nick that he hasn't used the pool all summer
and that's why he decides to get in, in a gesture expected of a character who rebels against the passage of time.
Summer meant his chance to get Daisy back and the end of this season, the end of their love story.
Finally, a parallel can be drawn between Wilson and Gatsby. Both characters share some kind of visionary
daydream: Gatsby with the green light and Wilson with the eyes of Dr. Eckleburg. Both men somehow "enchant"
these objects with deep meanings. Wilson looks into the billboard's eyes and feels controlled; Gatsby looks at the
green light and finds, in the future, his ideal identity and his path to Daisy. At the same time, they are harmed by the
women they love - Daisy and Myrtle - and both are involved with Tom Buchanan. However, Gatsby is presented as a
slightly more successful dreamer - at least financially - while Wilson exemplifies the defeated dreamer.

Chapter 9
Summary
 Two years later, Nick remembers the hours after Gatsby's body was found. Reporters, police and
photographers enter and leave the mansion. They write grotesque, exaggerated and false stories about Gatsby. The
journalists listen to the testimony of Michaelis, who reports on Myrtle's infidelity with Gatsby, but Catherine,
Myrtle's sister, does not confirm the affair. Wilson is classified as a man “disturbed by pain” (2011:208).
Nick feels guilty about Gatsby's death and begins to organize the funeral. He calls Daisy's house and is told
that she and Tom have left town. He tries to contact Meyer Wolfsheim but is unsuccessful. She waits for him and
Daisy to call, but they don't.
On the third day a telegram arrives from Minnesota signed by Henry C. Gatz, warning that he is traveling to
West Egg and asking that the funeral be delayed until his arrival. He is Gatsby's father: a solemn and dismayed man.
He dresses in a cheap overcoat. He tells Nick that he found out about his son's death from the Chicago newspaper.
Nick takes him to see the body. The man leaves crying, but then begins to look at the mansion with amazement and
pride. Kilpspringer calls and tells Nick that he won't be going to the funeral.
The morning of the funeral, Nick goes to New York to find Meyer Wolfsheim. The businessman tries to
avoid him, but finally ends up receiving him in his office. When Nick asks him to go to the funeral, Wolfsheim
replies that he can't: “I can't get caught up in that” (2011:217).
Back in West Egg, Mr. Gatz shows Nick a photo of the West Egg mansion that his son sent him. He tells him
that Gatsby, two years ago, came to see him and bought him a house. Then, he shows him a book in which Gatsby,
as a child, has written down a schedule with the day's activities: exercises, studies, “practicing diction, ease and how
to achieve it” (20111:219).
No one else arrives at the funeral, so Nick leaves for the cemetery with Gatsby's father and five employees.
The man with owl glasses that Nick met at his first party at Gatsby's appears unexpectedly. After the ceremony, Nick
meets up with Jordan Baker. She tells him that she is engaged to someone else and tells him that she thought he was
an honest person. Nick leaves, in love with her and distraught.
One October afternoon, Nick meets Tom Buchanan walking down Fifth Avenue. Nick doesn't want to shake
her hand but quickly asks her what she said to Wilson the night of Myrtle's death. Tom confesses that he ratted out
Gatsby. He says that he deserved it and then adds: “he threw dust in your eyes just like Daisy” (2011:225). Nick
thinks Tom doesn't know it was Daisy driving that car.
The narrator reflects that the East has a distorting nature of experiences. He finds it vain and brutal.
Determines to return to the West. After Gatsby's death, the East is grotesque and the West, in contrast, seems idyllic.
On his last night in West Egg, he looks at the moon and Gatsby's mansion. Imagine a country made by dreamers like
him. He compares the green light on Daisy's dock with the discovery of the great American continent, with the
arrival of Dutch sailors to the “green new world” (2011:227). Imagine the fascination of these explorers at their
discovery and Gatsby's amazement at discovering the light that guides him to his beloved.
Analysis
In the last chapter, Nick seems to be Gatsby's only friend. He looks for people to attend the funeral, but
Meyer Wolfsheim and Klipspringer refuse. When he searches Gatsby's desk for more contacts to invite to the
ceremony, he finds only a photo of Dan Cody. For her part, Daisy not only does not try to help her lover, knowing
that he will be blamed for Myrtle's death, but she does not call or attend his funeral. Nick faces the consequences of
something he already knows: Gatsby is a man without a past.
The one who does arrive is Gatsby's father. In reality, it is James Gatz's father. The information he adds
about Gatsby is evidence that, as a child, he already had the desire to improve, to rise from his situation and be the
hero of a Horatio Alger novel. Thus the germ of the American dream is exhibited in the protagonist. Gatsby's father
shows Nick a schedule with activities and some “general resolutions” (2011:219) that Gatsby writes as a child:
“Don't waste time at Shafters” (2011:219), “read an instructive book or magazine for week, save $5 (crossed out) $3
per week” (2011:219). From this we can see the rigor and meticulousness with which the protagonist undertakes the
construction of a character that responds to the archetype of the "man who builds himself."
 On Nick's last night in West Egg, before returning to live in the West, he walks through Gatsby's “that
immense and incoherent failure of a house” (2011:227). He imagines his friend standing there, staring at the green
light: “He had come a long way to that blue grass, and his dream must have seemed so close that it was hard not to
catch it. I didn't know I was already behind him” (2011:227). Nick reflects on how close Gatsby has come to getting
Daisy, to getting the wealth and glamor of his beloved, but he also recognizes that his dream was impossible. He
thinks Gatsby fails to recognize that the American dream was already dead before he began pursuing it. Their goals,
the search for abundance and status, have been emptied of meaning in the American society of the time. There is an
awareness in the narrator about the decadence of the American dream that, in his time, degrades to a cruel
materialism. The final disillusionment is with contemporary American culture and, in a sense, with modern Western
civilization. Nick is disappointed by everything Gatsby pursues but, at the same time, he values the imaginative
idealism with which he firmly supports his desire.
Nick compares Gatsby's romantic dream to the “last and greatest of all human dreams” (2011:227): the
arrival of European settlers on an unknown continent. According to Dalton, this parallel raises a universal question
among men about whether real human experience can ever measure up to desires and dreams (1998). The novel
seems to answer that no, disappointment is inevitable.
In harmony, the final sentence of the narrative can function as the epitaph of Gatsby and the novel: “Thus we
beat on, ships against the current, carried back ceaselessly to the past” (2011:228). Nick confirms that Gatsby's
desire to repeat the past is as inevitable as it is futile. In comparison with the current of a river, this nostalgic force of
retreat is presented as inexorable and, in some way, as a tendency determined by nature. Following Dalton, the
impossibility of repeating the past is much more than a disappointment in love for Gatsby, because that love is the
essence of a dream of self-realization and greatness (1998). But the dream is frustrated and, following the critic, the
idea that reconstructing a specific moment in the past could solve his life reflects a search of modern man who
continues to pursue meaning in a culture that no longer has it.
In this sense, personal experience doubles cultural experience (1970). That is, Gatsby's character's experience
describes what the American dream became in Fitzgerald's time. In Nick's final reflection on Gatsby, it emerges that
the United States was founded for men like him: to make the dreams of ambitious people come true. However,
Nick's awareness implies the acceptance that people like Tom and Daisy Buchanan reproduce in the United States
the excesses of the European aristocracy. This implies that Gatsby, despite all his wealth and personal growth,
cannot be part of his world. The money Gatsby gets does not cover the gap between his class and that of the
Buchanans. His attempts to build his own destiny were sabotaged by the cruelty of members of the wealthy and
conservative class. The final conclusion of the novel is devastating: the United States is not that different from the
European aristocratic order, and Gatsby is proof of this, unable to overcome the humble conditions of his childhood.
That is, social mobility is an illusion.
Lehan considers the novel to be even apocalyptic; leaves no hope (1970). The green light that Gatsby looks
at, as well as the land of the American continent at the time of its colonization, functions as a symbol of hope. The
novel shows how that sign deteriorates in the desperate search for riches. In his love story with Daisy and in his
desire to become the man he wants to be, Gatsby ends up immersed in a materialistic and accumulating career.
Fitzgerald's novel thus denounces the materialism of American society in "the crazy years."