About The Author!

F. Scott Fitzgerald
Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1896. He was
a student of St. Paul Acadamy, the Newman School, and
had attended Princeton for a short while. In 1917 he joined
the army and was posted in Montgomery, Alabama. This is
where he would meet his future wife Zelda Sayre but first
he had to make some money to impress her. Having his first
novel, This Side of Paradise published and a bestseller
accomplished this. He was published at the age of only
twenty-three and was regarded as the speaker for the Jazz
Age. Pretty soon though things started to take a turn for the
worse. Zelda's schizophrenia and Fitzgerald's drinking
problem led Fitzgerald to rely mostly on his short story's for
income. Slowly they started to lose their appeal as well.
Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald ended up dying in Hollywood
on December 21, 1940.

About the 1920's

Just so you understand what it was like when Fitzgerald

wrote this novel I'm going to give a brief description of
what it was like in the 1920's. They were known as the
Roaring Twenty's because the economy at the time was
through the roof and people were partying all over the
place. At the time there was a legal ban on the manufacture
and sale of intoxicating drink called prohibition. Since a lot
of people didn't feel like drinking the gin they made in their
bathtubs all the time there was a huge market for organized
crime. Organized criminals catered to the needs of the
drinking public by illegaly supplying them with liquor and
 made a fortune doing it. Even with all the crime in the Jazz
Age though, it will still be remembered for its glittering
lights and unbridled romance.

Character Descriptions:

Nick Carraway:
Nick Carraway is the narrator of this story. As you can see
on the first page Nick holds himself in higher esteem than
the other characters in the novel. Even though Nick is the
narrator he should not be completely trusted. On the first
page he boasts about how he doesn't judge people yet
throughout the story he's judging people. The only person
who he envies though is Gatsby. On [page 2] Nick says
about Gatsby, He has an extraordinary gift for hope, a
romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other
person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again.
Also, for someone with such high moral values he doesn't
handle commitment very well. That's probably a main
reason why he left the Mid West and it's part of why he
ended up going back. Nick left the Mid West to be a stock
broker in New York but didn't get rich, yet everywhere he
looks these amoral people are rolling in the wealth. That's a
clue to one of the main themes....
Jay Gatsby:
Gatsby is the rich, majestic, protagonist of the novel. While
it isn't clear how he made all his money it is obvious that it
was through illegal dealings in organized crime. There was
a reference to the 1919 World Series, (That's the one where
the players on the Chicago White Sox helped out organized
crime by not trying their hardest when it counted). It is also
clear that the driving motivation for getting all this cash is
so that it will appeal to Daisy. Daisy was the rich girl that
 he fell in love with before he joined the service.
Unfortunately he just didn't have enough money to keep her
while he was overseas. When Gatsby got back she was
married to someone else but that didn't disuade him in the
least. Gatsby's whole efforts in this book are focused on
trying to bring him and Daisy back to the point of time
before he joined the army except this time he has enough
money for her. Gatsby says it himself on [page 111], Can't
repeat the past? Why of course you can!.
Daisy Buchanan:
Daisy is the woman Gatsby is trying to win back and
coincidentally she is also Nick's second cousin. Daisy
doesn't have a strong will and she cracks under pressure as
will be shown late in the book in the hotel scene. She is the
original material girl and focuses on the outward instead of
the inward. Tom bought her love with a three hundred
thousand dollar necklace, and now Gatsby is doing it with a
huge mansion and a lot of nice shirts.(You'll understand the
shirts thing when you read the part of the novel when Daisy
first visits Gatsby's house).
Tom Buchanan:
Tom is the antagonist in this novel. While Gatsby was
fighting in World War I Tom was using his wealth to sweep
Daisy off her feet. Tom is a yuppy and clearly in the way of
Gatsby's love for Daisy. He is having an affair, which he
makes no attempt to keep secret, with Myrtle Wilson while
stringing along Myrtle's husband on a business deal. He
treats Myrtle even worse than Daisy because in his eyes
Daisy is worth a three hundred thousand dollar pearl
necklace while Myrtle is worth a dog leash. With that fact
in mind it is reasonable to assume Fitzgerald is telling us
that Tom considers Myrtle to be his pet dog. Tom is just the
bad guy in this story and you could not possibly like him.
Jordan Baker:
Jordan is the woman in this story who connects Gatsby to
Nick and consequently Gatsby to Daisy. Jordan is also a
 friend of Daisy's while she has something going with Nick
during the story. She has short hair and plays golf which
back in the twenty's was uncommon for women. Therefore
you can assume she acts like a guy. She is very into the
Roaring Twenty's party scene and is carelessly going
through life. The carelessness comes out when she's driving
with Nick on [page 59]:
Nick: You're a rotten driver, either
you ought to be more careful
or you oughtn't to drive at all.
Jordan: I am careful.
Nick: No you're not.
Jordan: Well, other people are.
Nick: What's that got to do with it
Jordan: They'll keep out of my way, It
takes two to make an
accident
Nick: Suppose you met somebody just as
careless as yourself?
Jordan: I hope I never will, I hate
careless people. That's why
I like you.
This also tags her as a hypocrite when she says "I hate
careless people" being a careless person herself.
Myrtle Wilson:
She's the woman Tom is having an affair with. She let's
Tom push her around and treat her however he wants and
she likes it. Tom has all the money and leads the life she
wants to be a part of. She always thought she should have
done better than her current husband and having an affair
with Tom reinforces this belief of hers. Her current
husband, George Wilson, is just a poor gas station owner in
the Valley of Ashes who had to borrow a tuxedo for his
wedding. Myrtle would rather be treated like a dog by
someone who has money instead of being cared for by
someone who has no money.
George Wilson:
 George is married to a woman who resents him and is
having an affair right under his nose without him knowing
it. He runs a gas station which he lives above in the Valley
of Ashes which is the dirtyest area of New York. The valley
of Ashes has now become Queens if you were wondering
where it was. That's not even the worst of it but I don't want
to give up to much of the story so you'll just have to believe
me. George Wilson is just the hard luck guy in this novel
and he ends up taking it out on someone else in the end.
Meyer Wolfsheim:
While he may not be a major part of this novel he serves a
purpose. He is Gatsby's connection to organized crime. He
is the link that connects Gatsby to how he gained all his
money. He supposedly in this novel is the one that fixed the
World Series of