Gatsby: F. Scott Fitzgerald and Nick Essay

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An Aimless Life In Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, Nick Carraway narrates the story of Jay Gatsby and their lives living in the West and East Egg. Jay Gatsby tries his best to live the “American Dream” while Nick lives a life where he is unsure what he wants. Fitzgerald’s depiction of the characters in this novel as being ignorant is portrayed through Nick’s narration, which in the end brings about a great tragedy. Through Caraway’s judgmental attitude, aimless life, and his obsession and jealousy of Gatsby, he is an ignorant person that brings about the tragic ending to Gatsby’s life.
In behalf of Nick’s judgmental attitude, he forms an opinion especially about Tom and Daisy, which reveals how ignorant and hypocritical he really is. Towards the end of the novel, Carraway called Tom and Daisy “careless people” because “they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made” (Fitzgerald 181). Nick is being judgmental towards Tom and Daisy because he is mad that Daisy left Gatsby and did not even have the decency to show up to his funeral. He also realizes that it was most likely Tom that had either murdered or hired someone to murder Gatsby. It is ironic that Nick thinks Daisy and Tom are the ones creating the mess, which in reality, it was because of Nick’s carelessness. Because Nick was so careless with Daisy and how through his ignorance was not able to understand the consequences of Daisy cheating on Tom, Gatsby was murdered in the end. Also, earlier in the novel as Nick was narrating the story, he claims that “there is not confusion like the confusion of a simple mind,” this was when he was talking about Tom and evidently telling the reader that Tom is stupid (Fitzgerald 107). This is just one of the many opinions that he forms about Tom, which makes him so ignorant because he is too busy forming other opinions of others instead of realizing the mistakes he has made.
Through Nick’s purposeless, aimless life, he portrays an ignorant character who contributes to the downfall and eventual death of Jay Gatsby. Right as Nick was going to leave with Daisy home from the city, he just remembers that “’today’s my birthday’” and goes on to add that “’I was thirty’” (Fitzgerald 135). It is clear that Nick realizes his life has had no purpose to it for he has no real job, has no real dream to follow, and does not even have one to live it with. When people turn thirty, most have their lives in place with a job or even a dream to chase while Nick has none of that. Remembering his birthday halfway into the day is a clear indicator that he does not see this age in a positive light, while most men would be excited to start a new decade full of new dreams. It also means that his dreams and hopes have all slipped away from his grasp and he does not have any interest in getting them back. Nick epitomizes how we as humans just go with the flow and do not take things into ones own hands. Any attempt Nick makes at moving forward are pointless so he believes that he should let the “current” take him, which is why he ends up having no true dream in the end. An aimless life Nick lead is the reason he has nothing worth fighting for. Nick’s ignorance in this novel as shown through his fight with the past and not being able to see a future, ultimately leads to the death of Gatsby in the end.
Jay Gatsby’s death at the end of the novel is brought about by Nick’s obsession and jealousy of him. Nick’s obsession with Gatsby is revealed when Nick is leaving breakfast with him and Gatsby and he randomly remembers something that had been on
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