Fitzgerald's Portrayal Of Women In The Great Gatsby

700 Words3 Pages
In Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, set in the roaring 1920s in New York and its nearby areas, the role of women had under men was making a drastic change, and it is shown by some of the women that appear in the book, such as Myrtle, Daisy and Jordan. The Great Gatsby, can be consider a questionable reestablishment of a male ruled society. The novel analyzes the search for happiness and wealth through the Jazz Age and characterizes deteriorated relationships, excellence, materialism, and unethical principles during the Cultural Civil War. However, women are not portrayed in a positive way in this novel, as they are represented as being foolish and irrational. This social group is characterized as unflattering, unsympathetic and not very trustworthy. In Fitzgerald’s fiction, women are diminished…show more content…
This misunderstood approach of women is conceived through Fitzgerald’s judgement of a 1920s woman’s position in their society. The negative portrayal that women endure is shown through Daisy’s characterization and the male characters’ use of language and thoughts towards her. Daisy’s characterization is shown to be beautiful and charming, but at the same time shallow, fake and idiotic, as it can be seen when she talks about her daughter “I hope she’ll be a fool, that is the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.”(22)This quote explains that women are supposed to tolerate and ignore what is happening in the world around them . Daisy, as well as the other women in the book, reveal through her restricted social independence and the presentation that the new woman of the 1920s was not an acceptable image. This oppression is apparently revealed through Nick’s contradictory depiction of their behaviors. For example, because Daisy refuses her maternal responsibilities she is described as an imposer, self-centered gold-digger in her vicious chase for Gatsby’s

More about Fitzgerald's Portrayal Of Women In The Great Gatsby

Open Document