Alcoholism In The Great Gatsby

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In Babylon Revisited by F. Scott Fitzgerald Charlie, the protagonist, is a man who rode a wave of good fortune financially until going bankrupt in the Stock Market Crash of 1929. Here was a man who struggled with alcoholism, the loss of his wife in death and guardianship of his daughter. He was pulling himself out of the abyss and wanted desperately to make a home for his child before he lost her to adulthood. Charlie has three primary attributes that define the man he has become; his confidence in dealing with alcoholism when he says to Alix the bartending “I’ll stick to it all right,” “I’ve stuck to it for over a year and a half now” (Fitzgerald, 1931, p. 2171). Later he tells his sister-in-law Marion “As I told you, I haven’t had more than a drink a day for over a year, and I take that drink deliberately, so that the idea of alcohol won’t get too big in my…show more content…
He has a conscious in the way he respects his brother and sister-in-law when he says “I don’t blame Marion” (Fitzgerald, 1931, p. 2172) and “I wish you and I could be on better terms” (Fitzgerald, 1931, p. 2175). Throughout the story he is not argumentative with her and he recognizes her fear and addresses it according to her needs. As Charlie goes through the ensuing drama with the always evident hostility in his sister-in-law he revisits the death of his wife opening up old wounds. As the author writes“but suddenly he grew sad, remembering all the plans he and Helen had made” (Fitzgerald, 1931, p. 2174) and “Again the memory of those days swept over him like a nightmare” (Fitzgerald, 1931, p. 2178) you can feel the pain of a man with a conscious who realizes his past mistakes. His conscious is his third most important characteristic. Charlie is sympathetic to his situation and the damage he has done but believes he is better when he says “but I think she can have entire confidence in
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