Social Class In The Great Gatsby

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2) Think about the two worlds, the Midwest and the East, as Fitzgerald describes them, and what they represent for Nick and Gatsby. At the end of The Great Gatsby, Nick writes the East as “exciting” but uneasingly shallow behind the guise of wealth. Meanwhile, he also describes his hometown in the Midwest, nostalgically identifying with its homely small-town life and proximity to family. For Nick, there exists a moral distinction between the two regions, and finding himself utterly unable to adapt from one to the other. Back in the beginning, when Nick had just returned from the East, he writes, “When I came back… I wanted the world to be … at a sort of moral attention forever.” On the other hand, Gatsby views nothing but opportunity in the East, having made his wealth in illegal business with Meyer Wolfsheim–he says, “Start him! I made him!”, when Nick asks about it–and finally finding Daisy Buchanan. He found little opportunity in the Midwest in comparison, dropping out of the local college after being fed up by janitorial work. 3) Compare and contrast Gatsby’s social class with that of Tom and Daisy Buchanan. How does geography contribute to the definition of social class in The Great Gatsby? Gatsby may be as wealthy as Tom and…show more content…
To Nick, Gatsby symbolized every immoral quality he hated about the East, Nick writing that he “represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn,” yet he sported “an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such I have never found in any other person.” Gatsby exhibited in his pursuit of Daisy Buchanan the hope of Pandora’s box, and the fact that this quality stands out, perhaps even redeems, from all his issues is the reason why Nick calls Gatsby “great”. Meanwhile, Fitzgerald, placing us readers behind Nick’s eyes, seems to expect us to share this perspective. Therefore, he titled the book The Great
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