Examples Of Greed In The Great Gatsby

A truly motivated individual is the most powerful driving force known to history. Empires have been built and felled by the will of a single man. Yet the driving forces behind these individuals are just as important as their momentum; With the ability to carry man to legend or stop them in their tracks. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby explores a diverse set of characters, set apart not just by their race, sex, class, or creed, but by their motivation. Set in the roaring 20’s, with money, booze, and adulteration rampant, Fitzgerald romanticizes the settings and characters in glamorous fashion. The main character, Nick Carraway, inserts himself into a world where “Laughter is easier minute by minute,--” (41) and with “--a simplicity of heart that was its own ticket of admission.”(42). Yet the dainty world of Long Island sound that Fitzgerald paints possesses its own dark intentions, where the hopeless romantics perish and only the cutthroat survive.

One example of this could be the titular character Jay Gatsby, who dedicated nearly five years of his life to chasing only love: Daisy. The central problem with Gatsby dedicating five years to “the colossal vitality of his own illusion” was that “It had gone beyond her, beyond everything”(95). James Gatz had based so much of his Gatsby persona around Daisy that Gatsby had no other substance. All of Gatsby’s status symbols, the hydroplane, mansion, cars, were simply an attempt to fulfill the standards of Daisy. Gatsby himself does not hold any of the objects he possesses as valuable; He doesn’t drink, doesn’t read the books in his library, and only has his house filled with partygoers- not family or true friends. Gatsby planned nearly five years of his life to accumulate symbols of power for Daisy. Yet through all his meticulous planning