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Daisys Love in The Great Gatsby

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Daisy's Relationship with Jay Gatsby

Daisy's marriage to tom buchanan.

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The Great Gatsby

F. scott fitzgerald, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions, daisy buchanan quotes in the great gatsby.

• The Great Gatsby

F. Scott Fitzgerald

• Literature Notes
• Daisy Buchanan
• The Great Gatsby at a Glance
• Book Summary
• About The Great Gatsby
• Character List
• Summary and Analysis
• Character Analysis
• Nick Carraway
• Character Map
• F. Scott Fitzgerald Biography
• Critical Essays
• Social Stratification: The Great Gatsby as Social Commentary
• In Praise of Comfort: Displaced Spirituality in The Great Gatsby
• Famous Quotes from The Great Gatsby
• Film Versions of The Great Gatsby
• Full Glossary for The Great Gatsby
• Essay Questions
• Practice Projects
• Cite this Literature Note

Character Analysis Daisy Buchanan

Daisy is The Great Gatsby 's most enigmatic, and perhaps most disappointing, character. Although Fitzgerald does much to make her a character worthy of Gatsby's unlimited devotion, in the end she reveals herself for what she really is. Despite her beauty and charm, Daisy is merely a selfish, shallow, and in fact, hurtful, woman. Gatsby loves her (or at least the idea of her) with such vitality and determination that readers would like, in many senses, to see her be worthy of his devotion. Although Fitzgerald carefully builds Daisy's character with associations of light, purity, and innocence, when all is said and done, she is the opposite from what she presents herself to be.

From Nick's first visit, Daisy is associated with otherworldliness. Nick calls on her at her house and initially finds her (and Jordan Baker, who is in many ways an unmarried version of Daisy) dressed all in white, sitting on an "enormous couch . . . buoyed up as though upon an anchored balloon . . . [her dress] rippling and fluttering as if [she] had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house." From this moment, Daisy becomes like an angel on earth. She is routinely linked with the color white (a white dress, white flowers, white car, and so on), always at the height of fashion and addressing people with only the most endearing terms. She appears pure in a world of cheats and liars. Given Gatsby's obsession with Daisy and the lengths to which he has gone to win her, she seems a worthy paramour.

As the story continues, however, more of Daisy is revealed, and bit-by-bit she becomes less of an ideal. Given that she is fully aware of her husband's infidelities, why doesn't she do anything about it? Because he has money and power and she enjoys the benefits she receives from these things, she is willing to deal with the affairs. In addition, when she attends one of Gatsby's parties, aside from the half-hour she spends with Gatsby, she has an unpleasant time. She finds the West Egg nouveaux riches to be tedious and vulgar, an affront to her "old money" mentality. Another incident that calls Daisy's character into question is the way she speaks of her daughter, Pammy. "I hope she'll be a fool," she says, "that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool." Clearly, she has some experience in this area and implies that the world is no place for a woman; the best she can do is hope to survive and the best way to do that is through beauty rather than brains. Later, in Chapter 7 when Pammy makes her only appearance, Daisy treats her like an object, showing her off for guests, suggesting Daisy's lack of concern for her child. Daisy's life revolves around Daisy, allowing Pammy in only when it's convenient. Clearly, in real life Daisy isn't all the way Gatsby remembers — but blinded by his dream, he cannot see the truth.

Although Daisy seems to have found love in her reunion with Gatsby, closer examination reveals that is not at all the case. Although she loves the attention, she has considerations other than love on her mind. First, she knows full well Tom has had affairs for years. Might this not motivate her to get back at him by having an affair of her own? Next, consider Daisy's response to Gatsby's wealth, especially the shirts — does someone in love break into tears upon being shown an assortment of shirts? For Daisy (and Gatsby too, for that matter) the shirts represent wealth and means. When Daisy bows her head and sobs into the shirts, she is displaying her interest in materialism. She doesn't cry because she has been reunited with Gatsby, she cries because of the pure satisfaction all his material wealth brings her. He has become a fitting way in which to get back at Tom. When Tom and Gatsby have their altercation at the hotel in Chapter 7, Daisy's motivations are called into question: Her inability to deny having loved Tom speaks well for her, but at the same time, it suggests that her attachment to Gatsby has been purely business. Tom also knows that after Daisy realizes Gatsby is not of their same social circles, she will return to Tom for the comfort and protection that his money and power bring.

Although Daisy's true self comes out more and more each time Nick encounters her, her final actions help show what she has been really made of. When she hits and kills Myrtle Wilson, and then leaves the scene, readers know (as poor Gatsby still does not) that she is void of a conscience. Perhaps all that white that has surrounded her isn't so much purity (although Gatsby, of course, would see it as such), but perhaps the white represents a void, a lack (as in a lack of intellectualism and a lack of conscience). To Daisy, Myrtle is expendable. She is not of the social elite, so what difference does her death make? To add insult to injury, as if she hadn't betrayed Gatsby enough already, she abandons Gatsby in his death. After killing Myrtle, Daisy returns home. She and Tom resolve their differences and leave soon thereafter, moving presumably to another city where they will remain utterly unchanged and life will continue as it always does. Daisy, although ethereal in some qualities, is decidedly devilish in others.

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Sat / act prep online guides and tips, how to write a compare/contrast essay for the great gatsby.

Book Guides

These compare/contrast essays are an opportunity for you to tie the character similarities and differences to larger observations about society and class, the American Dream , or identity in the novel. They also allow you to practice standard English class skills: close reading, using lines from the text as evidence, and taking a stance and presenting a supporting argument in an essay.

We’ll go over some basic dos and don’ts for writing compare/contrast essays before diving into some analysis of the most asked-about character pairings. Keep reading if you have a Compare/Contrast assignment on the horizon!

Article Roadmap

• The do's of a compare and contrast essay
• The don'ts of a compare contrast essay
• Why some characters are paired for comparison more often than others
• Nick and Gatsby
• Tom and George
• Tom and Gatsby
• Daisy and Jordan
• Daisy and Myrtle

What to Do in a Compare/Contrast Essay

Like anything you write for English class, your essay should be clearly organized, with a thesis statement (a one-sentence summary of your argument), and topic sentences for each body paragraph.

And you should definitely have an overall argument! The point of the compare/contrast essay isn’t for you to just list the differences and similarities between two characters, you need to take those observations and make a larger argument about the novel as a whole . That larger argument allows you to practice writing an essay that contains an argument, which is a skill that nearly all English teachers are focused on building.

To take a quick example, don’t just list the differences between Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby. Instead, make an argument like, “Fitzgerald’s portrayal of wealthy New York society through Jay Gatsby and Tom Buchanan allows him to critique both old money and the newly rich, while reserving his most pointed critiques for the old money crowd.” (Obviously, that’s just one example, and there are dozens of potential arguments you could make while comparing and contrasting characters in Gatsby!)

Make sure to address your larger argument in each body paragraph as you draw out the similarities and differences between the two characters. Don’t get caught in the weeds as you tease out the many differences and similarities in each character pair. Always link back to the bigger picture.

Finally, analyze each quote you use – in other words, don’t stick a quote in your essay and do nothing with it. Make sure to explain how and why the quote demonstrates a key similarity or difference, and what that means for your bigger argument.

What to Avoid in a Compare/Contrast Essay

Don’t just list differences and similarities without an overarching argument . Although you can definitely start brainstorming by making a list of similarities and differences, just presenting that list in essay form won’t get you a good grade, since you need to go deeper and explain what the similarities/differences suggest about the novel as a whole.

And, on the other side, don’t make big claims without some evidence from the text to back them up . For example, don’t say “Tom is selfish while Gatsby cares about others.” Prove those two separate claims (Tom is selfish” and “Gatsby cares about others”) with relevant lines from the book. (And if you’re having a hard time locating good quotes, find a digital version of Gatsby you can search using the CTRL-F function. It’s a lifesaver when gathering relevant quotes for an essay!)

Why Are These Characters Paired Most Often?

We will tackle these major pairings in the next sections of this article:

Nick Carraway and Jay Gatsby

Tom buchanan and jay gatsby, tom buchanan and george wilson, daisy buchanan and jordan baker, daisy buchanan and myrtle wilson.

Before we dig into the analysis, you might be wondering: “why are we only comparing characters of the same gender?” or maybe “why not other pairings? Why not Jordan and Myrtle, or Nick and Tom?” We are focusing on these specific pairings because they are by far the most commonly asked about pairs in essay prompts and discussion topics for The Great Gatsby . And we want this guide, first and foremost, to be helpful to students as you work on assignments involving Gatsby!

Furthermore, these pairings help teachers get you to explore some of the novel’s larger themes . For example, comparing Daisy/ Myrtle or Tom/George can help you explore the differences between the wealthy and the working class . Comparing Daisy/Myrtle or Daisy/Jordan can help you explore the changing status of women during the 1920s. Comparing Tom and Gatsby can get at the old money/new money divide. Finally, differences between Nick and Gatsby raise some of the novel’s larger questions about the American Dream , repeating the past, and identity. In short, these pairings have become common because they each allow fairly easy access to one of the novel’s larger issues.

That’s not to say you couldn’t also explore some of those themes by comparing, say, Jordan and George, or Daisy and Gatsby, but cross-gender compare/contrast essays can be challenging because the status of women and men is so different in the novel. If you are interested in seeing how a particular male and female character are paired, you may be better off studying them through the lens of love, desire, and relationships in the novel, or through the way they relate to one of the novel's symbols or motifs.

With those thoughts in mind, let's jump into the top 5 pairings! For each pairing, we will suggest a few possible larger arguments you can either build from or disagree with, but these are far from comprehensive! You should add to our analysis of the characters and come up with an argument you’re excited about.

Quick Note on Our Citations

Our citation format in this guide is (chapter.paragraph). We're using this system since there are many editions of Gatsby, so using page numbers would only work for students with our copy of the book. To find a quotation we cite via chapter and paragraph in your book, you can either eyeball it (Paragraph 1-50: beginning of chapter; 50-100: middle of chapter; 100-on: end of chapter), or use the search function if you're using an online or eReader version of the text.

Although Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway vary both in outlook and temperament, they are also alike in interesting ways. Despite somewhat similar desires, attitudes, and social positions, Nick and Gatsby make very different choices during the novel.

Love and Romance . Nick and Gatsby both want women that are out of their reach, although in different degrees. Daisy is miles above Gatsby in terms of social class. Jordan and Nick are of the same social status, but Jordan doesn't seem free to make her own decisions since an aunt controls her financial life. There is a significant passion gap between Gatsby and Nick as well. Gatsby obsesses over Daisy - he has thought of nothing else for five years, going as far as to buy a house across the bay from her just in case she notices. Nick, meanwhile, is attracted to Jordan's cool and self-sufficient demeanor, but he is clearly not in love with her, as he himself notes ("I wasn't actually in love, but I felt a sort of tender curiosity" (3.159)). 

Approach to Women.  Both men are not particularly interested in the inner lives of the women they want to be with. Gatsby is devastated when Daisy doesn't want to renounce her relationship with Tom completely. Similarly, Nick cavalierly discounts Jordan's penchant to lie, cheat, and generally be cynically uninterested in other people, and then is deeply disappointed when she acts this way after Myrtle's death.

Class and Social Standing.  Although both Gatsby and Nick are outsiders to the wealthy communities of East and West Egg, Nick is a much more in-between character socially than Gatsby. Nick is familiar with the ways of the old money crowd because of his own family's privilege and the fact that he is related to Daisy. Gatsby is not only self-made, but is a criminal who is desperate to pass as part of the old money elite without knowing its customs or rules of behavior. What isolates Nick from East Egg life is his Midwestern values and the importance he places on morality and decency. Gatsby is isolated from everyone by the fact that he can never actually be himself - he is always playing a role and putting on his "Oxford man" persona. It may be this sense of feeling out of place that connects them.

Outlook and Temperament.  Gatsby is an optimist (almost to a delusional degree) while Nick is a realist who finds Gatsby's idealism inspiring and admirable. Gatsby believes in his ability to shape his own life and future, which makes sense since he has managed to transform himself from a farmer to a successful gangster, to impersonate an "Oxford man," and to accumulate a fantastic amount of wealth in a very short time. This belief in his power translates to Gatsby being sure that he and Daisy can go back to their month of idyllic love ("'Can't repeat the past?', he cried incredulously. 'Why of course you can!'" (6.129). Nick tries his best to be an objective realist and to reign in his tendency to judge others. He is deeply in awe of self-directed men like Gatsby, and even Wolfshiem (Nick is amazed to think that one man could be behind a huge event like the rigged World Series). 

Ambition.  Gatsby dreams of greatness. As a young man his mind “romped like the mind of God,” and so as an adult, he seems to have made good on this promise by buying the most ridiculous mansion and throwing the most extravagant parties (6.134). Nick is much less ambitious in comparison. While he comes to New York seeking excitement, he doesn't want to be the wealthiest bond salesman on Wall Street or to have the biggest house. He is happy to be an observer at the edge of the drama rather than being in its midst.

Nick and Gatsby Essay Ideas

Here are potential arguments to build on or disagree with based our observations. These are certainly not the only possible arguments, so be creative! Make sure your essay considers what the similarities and differences between Nick and Gatsby reveal about the novel as a whole.

• Nick is a passive person and Gatsby is active, which is why Gatsby is the hero and Nick simply the observer.
• Nick has much more in common with Gatsby than he thinks he does, which explains why he becomes so enamored of him.
• Nick serves as a foil (someone who serves as a contrast) to Gatsby, which makes Nick the best possible observer of Gatsby.
• At the end of the novel, Tom says that Gatsby “threw dirt in [Nick’s] eyes, just like Daisy’s,” meaning that both Nick and Daisy were taken in and could never see the true Gatsby: a narcissist and a criminal. Tom is right - the whole novel is Nick trying to spin a negative character into a positive one.

As they battle over Daisy’s love, Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby sometimes seem surprisingly similar - particular in their self-centeredness, wealth, and concern with appearances. At the same time, these surface parallels point to major conflicts in their social class, and say a lot about the world of the novel.

Appearance.  Gatsby is driven by his materialism to be very invested having fashionable clothes, a beautiful mansion, and visually overwhelming parties - for him, the outfit is the thing that makes the Oxford man . Meanwhile because Tom doesn't have to dress the part of the moneyed elite to be one, he is instead very attuned to the behavior of others. This is why he immediately sees how fake Gatsby's persona is, both because of Gatsby's overly ostentatious clothes, and because of how much Gatsby misreads the fake invitation from the Sloanes. Tom is never fooled into thinking that Gatsby is anything other than an upstart, and mostly likely a criminal one.

Self-Centeredness.  Tom and Gatsby are both completely selfish, and fully convinced that their desires have to be acquiesced to by those around them. Tom, for example, starts his affair with Myrtle by pressing himself against her on a train platform - basically, his version of flirting is bodily assault. Gatsby, meanwhile, also thinks nothing of starting an affair with a married woman, assuming that his obsessive feelings are enough to justify any behavior.

Wealth.  Despite the fact that both are unimaginably rich, these men come from totally different sides of the big money divide. Tom comes from old money and is forever worried about the encroachment of the nouveau riche, minorities, and others onto what he thinks is his. At the same time, Gatsby is the most successful of the novel's many ambitious social climbers, using his lack of ethical scruples to parlay his criminal activity into a higher social status.

Power.  Tom loves being powerful and wields his power directly. He is physically aggressive and uses his body to threaten and intimidate (Nick, for one, is clearly very cowed by Tom's bulk). He is also quick to violence, whether it's socially sanctioned - like his football accomplishments - or not - like when he breaks Myrtle's nose without a second thought. Gatsby also holds significant power, but his methods are much more indirect. Still, whether he is offering Nick some illegal bond trading action, or showing off his get-out-of-a-ticket-free card to a cop on the highway, Gatsby is clearly happy to be in control of a situation.

Love. Tom and Gatsby both seem to be in love with Daisy. But what does that really mean to each of them? For Tom, Daisy is clearly partly appealing because she completes his horse-riding, East Egg, 350-thousand-dollar pearl necklace lifestyle. He cheats on her because he clearly has never denied himself anything, but he also understands Daisy as a person. He knows that she is too weak to leave him, but he also loves her enough to tolerate her affair with Gatsby and to stay with her after Myrtle's murder. Gatsby's love, on the other hand, is in some ways purer because he so idealizes Daisy and connects her to all of his other hopes and dreams. But this love is overly pure - he doesn't really seem to know Daisy as anything other than an idealized object, and is incapable of accepting that she has led a life apart from him for five years.

Tom and Gatsby Essay Ideas

In a compare/contrast essay, you can’t just present a list of similarities and differences. You also need to have an underlying argument you’re supporting. Feel free to take these at face value or as jumping-off points for your own thoughts.

• Tom loves Daisy as a person, Gatsby loves her as an idea.
• Both Tom and Gatsby’s tendency to control women and see them as prizes reveals the misogyny of the 1920s.
• Although Tom sees Gatsby as someone from an entirely different class than him, what they have in common (selfishness, affairs, obsession with appearances) makes a larger argument for an overall moral hollowness of the rich of any class.
• We see both Gatsby and Tom through the eyes of Nick, who worships one of them and hates the other. In reality, they are both much more similar than different, and their different treatment reveals Nick's insecurities and biases.

At first, most readers see Tom Buchanan and George Wilson  as opposites. But, these markedly different characters face very similar circumstances and offer two takes on masculinity and power in the novel.

Appearance and Presence.  Where Tom is strong and cowering, George is meek and shrinking. Tom exudes power and confidence while George tends to just fade into the background. These differences are borne out in the way these two men interact with the world. Tom is violent towards others, while George’s instinct is to be passive or to try and escape situations, the notable exceptions being his locking up of Myrtle and murder of Gatsby. Tom is confident, privileged, and assured while George is timid; George is “ruled by his wife” where Tom is selfish and acts on his own desires.

Reaction to Adversity. There is a dramatic difference in the way the two men react to the fact that their wives are cheating on them. Tom notices Daisy’s love for Gatsby and immediately starts making power plays. On the other hand, George discovers Myrtle’s affair and is undone by it. Nick compares the two men in a memorable description:

“the shock had made him physically sick. I stared at him and then at Tom, who had made a parallel discovery less than an hour before--and it occurred to me that there was no difference between men, in intelligence or race, so profound as the difference between the sick and the well. Wilson was so sick that he looked guilty, unforgivably guilty--as if he had just got some poor girl with child" (7.160).

In this description, Tom is “well” and George is “sick.” These are certainly arresting ways to describe Tom's more traditional masculinity and George's less overtly masculine character. Tom is self-assured in the face of adversity and immediately takes action to win Daisy back, insisting on driving Gatsby's car, bullying those around him into driving to Manhattan, and using his romance skills to remind Daisy of the pluses of their relationship. Meanwhile, George's weakness makes him look sick and guilty as he contemplates Myrtle's betrayal and is driven to violence to reassert his power over her.

Approach to Women.  Both Tom and George assume they know what’s best for their wives: Tom dismisses Daisy’s professed love for Gatsby despite their obvious closeness, while George is determined to take Myrtle out west once he learns about the affair. But, while it seems that Tom does fundamentally understand Daisy and is right about her unwillingness to leave their marriage, George is unable to hold on to Myrtle either emotionally or physically. She is killed trying to run away from him.

Tom and George Essay Ideas

Differences in attitude and outcome, despite a relatively similar situation, reveal some unexpected truths about the world of the novel. Argue the reverse of any of these topics for a really provocative essay!

• The fact that Tom manipulates George into killing Gatsby and then himself (which allows Tom and Daisy to walk away from the entire affair without consequence) shows the huge privileges of having money in the novel.
• Nick's approach to Tom and George shows his admiration of a physical, brutish, domineering kind of masculinity. 
• The fact that the relatively good guy turns into a murderer while the bad guy lives to cheat another day is a very cynical take on what happens in a world without a moral compass.

Despite Daisy Buchanan and Jordan Baker 's similar “white girlhoods” (1.140) in Louisville, their attitude and motivations are quite distinct, making them really interesting to compare and contrast.

Attitude and Outlook.  Both Daisy and Jordan display an entitled, bored attitude that’s typical of Fitzgerald’s depiction of the old money segment of wealthy New York society. The fact that they are introduced in tandem, both lying on the couches in their white dresses, speaks to their initially similar attitudes. But soon we see how different their takes on this kind of life are. Daisy is increasingly despondent, even nihilistic, asking in Chapter 7 , “what shall we do today, and tomorrow, and for the next thirty years?” (7.74).  Jordan meanwhile is a pragmatic opportunist, who sees possibilities everywhere, arguing that “life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall” (7.75). In other words, Daisy’s pessimistic attitude from Chapter 1 comes through again, while Jordan, despite coming across as cynical and sharp, actually still seems excited about the possibilities life has to offer.

Appearance and Personality.  Both Daisy and Jordan very alluring in their own way, though Daisy’s allure comes through her enchanting voice and feminine charms, while Jordan is masculine, “jaunty,” witty, sharp, and physical. Daisy maintains a squeaky-clean reputation despite moving with a fast crowd, while there are plenty of rumors about Jordan’s cheating in golf, and Nick comments on her dishonest attitude. More significantly, Daisy is incredibly self-absorbed while Jordan is very observant.

Role in Society.  Daisy seems caught between what society expects of her and some deeper, more powerful desires she can’t name, resulting in restlessness, depression, and her affair. Daisy is sticking to her prescribed societal role by marrying and having a child, while Jordan plays golf, “runs around town” and doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to marry, at least in the beginning of the novel. Perhaps Jordan is still somewhat optimistic about the possibilities of life since she hasn’t settled down yet, while Daisy realizes that nothing major in her life will change at this point. Jordan, meanwhile, is content to chase after fun and intrigue via other people’s bad behavior. And she doesn’t get dragged down by the tragedy in the book – on the contrary, she is callous in how little Myrtle’s death seems to shake her, coolly calling Nick the next day and asking him to meet like nothing has happened (8.50-61). Perhaps her motivations are a bit less accessible to the reader since her role was significantly downsized between some of Fitzgerald’s earlier drafts. But in any case, as we watch Daisy struggle in her marriage, what we see of Jordan is cool, calm, collected, and rather uncaring.

Daisy and Jordan Essay Ideas

So what are some possible conclusions we can draw from Daisy and Jordan’s characters? One of the most common strategies is to tie the differences between these women onto one of the book’s larger themes, like the role of society and class or the American Dream . Another is to think about an important feature of the novel, like Nick’s narration, and see what these two characters can reveal about it. With those strategies in mind, here are some potential arguments you could argue for or against!

• Jordan and Daisy, because they are generally disempowered, both use their sexuality in different ways to gain power, with different results.
• Despite Jordan’s overt cheating and lying, Daisy is, in fact, the more morally compromised person.
• The way Nick treats Jordan versus the way he describes Daisy reveals the novel’s preoccupation with Gatsby above all, to the detriment of the female characters.

While Daisy Buchanan and Myrtle Wilson obviously come from very different backgrounds and have conflicting motivations, they also have some surprising similarities.

Physical Appearance.  Daisy and Myrtle both derive power from their looks. Myrtle's comfort with her voluptuous body is clearly appealing to Tom, while Daisy's magnetic voice and ethereal presence obsess Gatsby. Throughout the novel, Myrtle is frequently reduced to being just a body - one to be used or violated by those around her. Tom sees little in Myrtle besides someone to either rub up against, have sex with, or punch at will; George resorts to imprisoning Myrtle while she eggs him on to "beat" her (7.314) the way Tom does; and finally, Daisy gruesomely rips Myrtle's body apart with a car. Meanwhile, Daisy's voice also serves to make her less of a person in her own right and more of an idealized, mythic figure from fairy tales. For Gatsby, Daisy's voice is appealing because it is "full of money" (7.105) - he is attracted to her not because of who she is, but because he sees her as a prize.

Social Standing.  Myrtle puts on the airs that Daisy has been born and raised with. This allows Myrtle to wield considerable social power within her group, as seen by how her guests fawn on her at the Manhattan party she throws. Daisy, in contrast, never exerts such overt power over a group – rather, she seems to move with crowds, doing what it expected of her (for instance marrying Tom despite still loving Gatsby). 

Love and Relationships.  Daisy and Myrtle’s marriages are strikingly quite different. Daisy and Tom are able to stay together even through serial affairs and murder. They end up loyal co-conspirators, protected by their wealth. Meanwhile, Myrtle has nothing but disdain for George despite his evident love for her. Still, both women use affairs with other men as a way to escape. Daisy wants to get away from an increasingly unhappy marriage and try to recapture the spontaneity and possibility of her youth, while Myrtle loves the status that her affair with Tom grants her. However, both learn that they can’t escape forever through their affairs. Obviously, their biggest difference is that Daisy gets to walk away from the novel unscathed, while Myrtle gets killed. 

Daisy and Myrtle Essay Ideas

Here are ways to write about these different women who face similar choices with dramatically opposite conclusions.

• Despite their similarities in action and motivation, Daisy is protected from any lasting harm by her wealth and old money status, while Myrtle is punished for the same behavior, revealing how the class system in America protects the wealthy.
• The novel refuses to give any inner life to women, and instead reduces them to their physical qualities no matter what social class they come from. Daisy and Myrtle's similar treatment by the narrator and by the men around them shows that gender trumps class when determining status. 
• Daisy and Myrtle’s similarities reveal how hollow the progress of the women’s movement really was at that point in time. Despite the big gains the movement made in the early twentieth century, including winning the right to vote and pushing for more freedom in how they could dress and act, both of these women’s lives aren’t vastly improved. They’re both trapped in unhappy marriages, they both rely on their looks/charms/sexuality to get what they want, and neither of them has even a chance of pursuing a fulfilling life through a career.

What’s Next?

Now that you’ve gone over the novel’s most popular compare/contrast pairings, check out our analysis of the novel’s romantic pairings in our guide to love, desire, and relationships in The Great Gatsby .

Have an essay about a symbol or motif? Get started with our symbols overview  and motifs overview.

Still a little hazy on some of the plot elements in Gatsby? Not to worry, we have you covered with our complete book summary !

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88 Perfect Essay Topics on The Great Gatsby

Welcome to The Great Gatsby Essay Topics page prepared by our editorial team! Here you’ll find a large collection of essay ideas on the novel! Literary analysis, themes, characters, & more. Get inspired to write your own paper!

• 🔬 Literary Analysis
• 🎭 Characters
• 📊 Compare & Contrast
• 🗺️ Navigation

🎓 References

🔬 literary analysis of the great gatsby: essay topics.

• What are the literary devices used to create the image of Jay Gatsby?
• Analyze how Fitzgerald uses imagery in The Great Gatsby.
• The Great Gatsby: analysis and feminist critique
• What do colors symbolize in The Great Gatsby?
• How does Fitzgerald use geographical setting to show the contrast between social classes in the novel?
• How does Fitzgerald convey a notion of the American Dream through metaphors and symbols?
• What does the green light in Daisy’s window represent in The Great Gatsby?
• What does the Valley of Ashes symbolize in The Great Gatsby?
• What role does Nick Carraway’s narration play in the story? If we got it through an omniscient third-person narrator, what would we gain or lose?
• Could the story have been set in other places, like Chicago or Los Angeles, or were New York City and Long Island absolutely necessary?
• Look at the novel’s opening lines. If we accept Nick’s advice when we read the story, will our views of it change? Or, in other words, does refraining from criticism promote compassion?
• Is there a hidden meaning of the title of The Great Gatsby? What is it?
• How is the color white used within the novel? When does it make a false representation of innocence? When does it truly represent innocence?
• Color symbolism in The Great Gatsby
• What is the role of a New York setting in the novel’s storyline?
• What is the real meaning of ‘great’ in the title of The Great Gatsby?
• What significance do colors have in the party’s descriptions in chapter 3?
• Why is Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby a satire?
• Elaborate on the green light as the symbol of the American dream.
• What is the meaning of the phrase “Can’t repeat the past?.. Why of course you can!” What does Gatsby really want from Daisy?
• What role do the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg play in The Great Gatsby?
• How is The Great Gatsby a satirical representation of the society?
• Are the rich in the novel really so careless as everyone believes them to be?
• Create an alternative ending for The Great Gatsby. Justify your choice.
• What is the relationship between those born rich and those who became rich in the novel?
• Fairy tale traits in The Great Gatsby

🎭 Essay Topics on The Great Gatsby’s Characters

• Discuss female characters and their significance in The Great Gatsby.
• Compare Gatsby and Wilson. In what ways are they similar?
• Gatsby & Nick in The Great Gatsby
• Who is the most responsible for Gatsby’s death? Why is it so?
• Why do Tom and Daisy stay together at the end of the novel?
• Does Gatsby’s money bring him real happiness?
• Can Jay’s feelings for Daisy in The Great Gatsby be considered love?
• How do secondary characters affect the story?
• Daisy Buchanan: quotes analysis
• Who is the real hero in The Great Gatsby?
• Can we call Jay Gatsby a romantic hero or a villain?
• What does Jay Gatsby really live for in the novel: the present or the past?
• Compare Myrtle and Daisy.
• Jay Gatsby & Tom Buchanan: compare & contrast
• What does Tom’s quarrel with Myrtle in chapter 2 tell us about his personality?
• Elaborate on how both Tom and Gatsby want to change not only the future, but the past in chapter 7.
• What was Gatsby’s power of dreaming like? Was Daisy a worth object?
• Is anyone to blame for Gatsby’s death?
• Nick as the narrator in The Great Gatsby
• Are there any moral characters in the novel?
• Can Jordan and Daisy be considered perfect role models for the upper class in America? Why or why not?
• Is Gatsby really great? In what way? How does his greatness evolve as the plot unfolds?
• How does Nick’s character change over the course of The Great Gatsby?
• Does Gatsby deserve the definition of a self-made man? Why or why not?
• What role does Daisy play in the conflict between Gatsby & Tom?

🌻 Essay Topics on The Great Gatsby’s Themes

• What are the central themes in The Great Gatsby?
• What roles do fidelity and infidelity play in Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby?
• What importance does sex have in the story?
• What role does alcohol play in The Great Gatsby by Fitzgerald?
• Did Fitzgerald really criticize the idea of the American Dream in The Great Gatsby?
• Does love play have any importance in The Great Gatsby?
• What role does the relationship between geography and social values play in the novel?
• Francis Scott Fitzgerald & his American Dream
• What is the meaning of time in The Great Gatsby?
• How do the aristocratic East Eggers, Tom and the Sloanes, regard Gatsby in chapter 6? How is their contempt connected to the theme of social class in the novel?
• Analyze The Great Gatsby through the prism of feminist theory.
• How are the themes of kindness and compassion presented in The Great Gatsby?
• Describe how the theme of ambition is presented in the novel.
• Elaborate on how Fitzgerald contrasts education and experience in The Great Gatsby.

⌛ Essay Topics on the Context of The Great Gatsby

• Describe how F.S. Fitzgerald’s life experiences influenced The Great Gatsby.
• What are the examples of modernism in The Great Gatsby?
• How does Fitzgerald represent the society of his time in the novel? Would you like to live in the Jazz era? Why or why not?
• How is America shown in The Great Gatsby? What values do the East and the West represent?
• How does Fitzgerald provide a critical social history of Prohibition-era America in his novel?
• How is the economic boom of postwar America shown in The Great Gatsby?
• Why did The Great Gatsby was neither a critical nor commercial success just after its publication? Why did its popularity grow exponentially several decades after?
• How are racial anxieties of the time shown in the novel?

📊 The Great Gatsby: Compare & Contrast Essay Topics

• Make a critical comparison of the novel with the 2013 movie.
• Make a comparison of the novel with the 1949 movie.
• Compare The Great Gatsby movies of 1949 and 2013.
• Compare and contrast two classic American novels: The Great Gatsbyand The Grapes of Wrath.
• Female characters in The Streetcar Named Desire & The Great Gatsby .
• How are Donald Trump and The Great Gatsby’s Tom Buchanan alike?
• Compare Miller’s Death of a Salesman and The Great Gatsby.
• What other fictional or non-fictional character from a book or movie can Nick Carraway be compared to?
• Jay Gatsby & Eponine from Les Miserables .
• Make a critical comparison of The Sun Also Rises and The Great Gatsby.
• Compare The Great Gatsby with A Farewell to Arms.
• Make a comparison of Daisy from The Great Gatsby with Henrietta Bingham from Irresistible.
• Love in The Great Gatsby & The Catcher in The Rye .
• What pop stars of nowadays Daisy can be compared to?
• Macbeth vs. Jay Gatsby: make a character comparison.
• CS Topic Generator – Purdue Computer Science
• Past Essay Topics – University of Warwick
• Literature Topics and Research // Purdue Writing Lab
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Study Guide Menu

• Short Summary
• Summary (Chapter 1)
• Summary (Chapter 2)
• Summary (Chapter 3)
• Summary (Chapter 4)
• Summary (Chapter 5)
• Summary (Chapter 6)
• Summary (Chapter 7)
• Summary (Chapter 8)
• Summary (Chapter 9)
• Symbolism & Style
• Quotes Explained
• Essay Topics
• Essay Samples
• Questions & Answers
• F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Biography
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2023, August 13). 88 Perfect Essay Topics on The Great Gatsby. https://ivypanda.com/lit/the-great-gatsby-study-guide/perfect-essay-topics/

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Get Cracking

Looking for an intricate diversion? Pick this puzzle by Michael Schlossberg — what’s inside pays off.

By Caitlin Lovinger

Jump to: Tricky Clues | Today’s Theme

SUNDAY PUZZLE — Joel Fagliano, in his print introduction to this grid, writes: “Michael Schlossberg, of Bend, Ore., is a doctor specializing in internal medicine. This is his 11th crossword for the paper, and his fifth Sunday.”

Mr. Schlossberg makes a mean Sunday puzzle, and the concept of this one is over-the-top fun to work through. It’s a great example of a visual element that took intense skill to execute, but the payoff is worth it.

Today’s Theme

The mechanisms in this grid look intimidating, don’t they? Seven round structures, each three squares in diameter, and each with a keyhole at its center, beneath a box containing a circle. Those keyholes indicate locks, and the title of the puzzle, “Get Cracking,” is a hint to the solver’s task. Fortunately, this imposing theme isn’t too hard to “break into,” but prepare yourself for some suspense!

Each of the seven mechanisms is the cylinder of a lock, formed by four squares that connect to other entries in the puzzle at 90-degree increments. None of the connecting entries are hard to figure out, thank goodness. The complexity here is primarily in the construction, which is quite a tour de force.

Take the “lock” in the northwest corner of the puzzle, which is formed by the last letters of 28-Across and 19-Down and the first letters of 29-Across and 33-Down. At 28-Across, “Unimpressed” solves to BLAS E , and at 19-Down, “Channel with on-air fund-raising” solves to PB S . At 29-Across, “Sheet under a tent” is T ARP, and at 33-Down, “Taunt” is J EER. The circled square that I mentioned, which sits right above the center “keyhole,” is the final square in 19-Down. For now, that square contains the S in PB S . Those four letters — E , S , T and J — are the critical elements in this puzzle’s revealer.

As the grid fills in, so will each lock and its set of four letters. The clues involved are not terribly difficult, but they are vague enough that they might solve rather slowly. For example, I thought that 30-Across, “Sharp pain,” was “pang” instead of STAB, and I needed hints from two crossing letters to understand that 107-Across, “Letters that sound out a sentence,” was IOU (which is clever and simple, in retrospect). Once your locks have all their letters, the magic begins.

As the note on this puzzle (and at the top of this column) indicates, each of those seven cylinders must rotate, or tumble, in order for the lock to open. When it is turned correctly — with a crank of 90, 180, or 270 degrees — four new words are created in the entries around the lock. In the northwest corner example, the key is turned 180 degrees, which puts the bottom letter at the top, the left-hand letter at the right and so on. This turns T ARP into E ARP, J EER into S EER, BLAS E into BLAS T and, at the top of the cylinder, PB S into PB J . Remember the circled square? J is its correct occupant.

Gradually, new letters land in all the circled squares. When all the tumblers are in the correct positions, those circled squares in the grid spell an appropriate prize for cracking this safe wide open: Everybody hits the JACKPOT.

Tricky Clues

51A. Did anyone else misread this entry the way I did? For “Small Southwestern birds of prey,” I eventually deduced EL FOWLS, como “ el pollo loco ,” and nearly missed learning of the enchanting ELF OWLS that live in dry thorn forests and sound like they’re giggling . Back to remedial Spanish for me!

111A. This is a puzzle debut that’s new to me, too. The “Speculative fiction subgenre that envisions a sustainable-energy future” is SOLARPUNK, a term that apparently originated in 2008 as an adaptation of steampunk with real-life plausibility .

77D. “Distracted Boyfriend, e.g.” falls into the “if you know, you know” category. It’s a photographed moment that became a MEME template for all manner of temptations .

85D. Old English major here, confessing that this clue sneaked up on me. “What Tom and Daisy embody in ‘The Great Gatsby’” solves to OLD MONEY. This entry and a couple of others are probably winks to today’s theme.

Constructor Notes

Happy Sunday, everybody! Let’s rob a casino! I started the construction by placing the circles. Seven was the most I could fit. All had to be placed at least three squares from any border, and none of the theme answers could connect with another. I settled on JACKPOT as the 12 o’clock word. Then I started on one of the dial’s four theme words and branched out from there. To make solving easier, I constructed the grid so that no matter how each dial was turned, there was only one possible alternate answer for each theme word. So for ARK, I made sure that ARC was the only option, and not “are,” “arm,” “art,” etc., when turning the dial. This had a knock-on effect that made the other dials and the surrounding grid progressively more difficult to fill — the entire process took days. I did the best I could to avoid clunky entries (NEGATRON) and tricky crossings. Thanks for doing my puzzle!

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