Preview

Examples Of Fixation In The Great Gatsby

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
985 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Examples Of Fixation In The Great Gatsby
In The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald, Jay Gatsby’s singular fixation is his pursuit of Daisy, a beautiful but unavailable married woman. Fitzgerald uses imagery and metaphors to convey to the reader the magnitude of Gatsby’s obsession and also its likely doom. The scene in which Gatsby gives Daisy a tour of his house and all the goods he’s acquired to woo her demonstrates the depth of his plan and its failure. Daisy is shown in the scene as being solely into Gatsby’s wealth and not him which sets him up for doom.
Gatsby believes the sole way to Daisy’s heart is through material goods. Earlier in his life he felt like he wasn’t adequate for Daisy when he was in the military and living in a tent. He wanted to make money so he could fit into her life and be more appealing to her. His driving goal was to become a material success. When Gatsby shows off his imported shirts to Daisy, flinging them in a chaotic pile on the bed, it becomes apparent that he was right about her loving material goods. “ ‘They’re such beautiful shirts,’ she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds. ‘It makes me sad because I’ve never seen such — such beautiful shirts before (93).’ ” Daisy is overwhelmed by the luxurious shirts are and cannot handle it. It’s the most emotion
…show more content…
Fitzgerald uses numerous visual descriptions of Gatsby’s opulence to show his over-the-top pursuit of Daisy. But Gatsby’s single-mindedness, described in language of machines, suggest discord. Gatsby believes that he is on the verge of achieving what he has worked so hard for, to have Daisy in his life. But truly Fitzgerald shows the great toll that his longing for Daisy has taken on him. She seems almost within his grasp, and he is on the brink of a collapse. Fitzgerald’s images and metaphors are essential for the narrative of the book and painting the picture in the reader’s mind of Gatsby’s

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby establishes characterization through an intimate relationship between Daisy and Gatsby without ever explicitly discussing about it. When the two became lovers, Gatsby was surprised to discover that "it didn't turn out as he had imagined.” However, he did feel as though they were married after this encounter. This conveys an aspect of how Gatsby fell in love with Daisy’s allure rather than her personality and was blindly obsessed with being with her. Shortly later, the two are split apart for a length of time and end up reuniting after five years. It is suggested that they resume their sexual relationship and their affair is purely physical with no substance behind it. Once again, Gatsby fails to…

    • 184 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    He tries seeing her through other people, hoping to make it seem like a coincidence when they meet up. That is why he denied the idea that Jordan Baker gave him about inviting Daisy to lunch. Instead, he incorporates Nick into his scheme. He asks Nick to invite Daisy to tea at his house. While she is there, Gatsby would go over to Nick’s house to see her, acting as if he had no idea of her whereabouts. He wanted Nick to have her over at his house so that he could show her his house. In Gatsby’s mind, he believes that he needs to show off in order to impress Daisy and to win her back. He shows off his car, his house, his butler, and every other detail inside and outside his house. It seems to work for Daisy. As she looks at his shirts, though, she begins to cry. “’They’re such beautiful shirts,’ she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds. ‘It makes me sad because I’ve never seen-such beautiful shirts before’” (Gatsby 92). Daisy isn’t crying because the shirts are beautiful, though. She is crying because she realizes everything that she could have had, she cannot have anymore. Gatsby, on the other hand, still has not come to realizations that he and Daisy being together is…

    • 962 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Jay Gatsby is passionately in love with a married woman named Daisy Buchanan, a woman he lost five years before the start of the book. In this novel, Gatsby orders his life around his one desire: to be reunited with Daisy. Gatsby’s mission in this story leads him from poverty to wealth, into Daisy’s arms, and eventually into his death. Gatsby sees Daisy as embodying the past that can be again in the future. He is completely obsessed with returning to the time when he and Daisy fell in love. "He wanted to recover something, some idea of himself perhaps, that had gone into loving Daisy. His life had been confused and disordered since then, but if he could once return to a certain starting place and go over it all slowly, he could find out what that thing was."(117; ch. 6) This clarifies why Gatsby is so desperate to reclaim Daisy and why he is stuck living in the past. In a way, Daisy represents a prize to Gatsby. Acquiring this prize is his dream, his salvation, and eventually it becomes his temperament. This love for Daisy is no longer a harmless attraction to Gatsby. It becomes an unhealthy obsession that completely takes over his life.…

    • 1553 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Fitzgerald portrays through Jay Gatsby’s illusion that building a life on a fantasy will only lead to an utter disappointment. Gatsby’s blind faith in his ability to “repeat the past” that he’s been dwelling on for “five years” that tribute to his romantic and idealistic nature and a clear indication that he just might be a completely delusional fantasist. So far in his life, everything that he's fantasizing about when he first imagining himself as Jay Gatsby has come true. But in that transformation, Gatsby now feels like he has lost a fundamental piece of himself, and “wanted to recover” from the past. Gatsby is telling Nick about his love for Daisy and how it all begins. For some time Gatsby has been in love with Daisy, and when this moment…

    • 275 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    He believes she is obligated to him and only him. Gatsby also believes there is no conflict between himself and Daisy that could arise. This however is very untrue. Gatsby doesn’t realize in a way that Daisy is married or at least thinks she married to save herself. She admits however that she loves both of the men she is deeply involved with, Gatsby and Tom. She states, “I did love him once- but I loved you too”(140). Gatsby has to prove himself to Daisy with material possessions because that is all he has now. He doesn’t really have a respectable position in society although it is upbeat all the time. Nick says, “While we admired he brought more and the soft rich heap mounted higher- shirts with stripes and scrolls and plaids in coral and apple green and lavender and faint orange with monograms of Indian blue” (98). Gatsby doesn’t realize none of these things will change the way she feels for her husband. Gatsby’s love doesn’t seem to be enough for her. Daisy wants more then what he can offer her. Gatsby might have the feeling of proving himself to her but this won’t change what has already happened. Daisy loves Tom now and no real material can change that sadly for…

    • 954 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The sole purpose of Gatsby’s residency in the extravagant mansion is to impress Daisy and show her that he has changed and increased his status from when she left him as a poor soldier going into the war. Once Daisy acknowledges Gatsby’s existence, he shows Daisy all the lavish, materialistic items that she missed out on by marrying Tom. Inside Gatsby’s inhabited house “he took out pile[s] of shirts and began throwing them, one by one, shirts of sheer linen and thick silk… [as] Daisy bent her head into the shirts and began to cry stormily” (Fitzgerald 93). When Daisy sees the materialistic wealth that Gatsby now posses she is overcome by the feeling and desire for her materialistic American…

    • 540 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gatsby’s love for Daisy could be considered an “obsession.” If Gatsby truly cared for Daisy, he would love her enough to let her live her new life with Tom in peace. Gatsby’s love for Daisy is undeniable, but is it really for the right reasons? Gatsby goes out of his way to become the person that Daisy would actually want to be with. Love and obsession are two different things. Love is having an intense feeling where obsession is filling your mind with someone or something in a troubling way. It seems as though Gatsby continues to be obsessed with Daisy and he just can’t let her go. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald suggests that Daisy Buchanan and Jay Gatsby are in love, when in reality Gatsby has a crazy, obsessive love for her. Fitzgerald…

    • 1009 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gatsby begins to reevaluate all of his belongings on the basis of how they could further his relationship with Daisy. When she comes over to his house, Gatsby “revalue[s] everything in his house according to the measure of response it [draws] from her well-loved eyes” (91). Objects that he had previously neglected suddenly had value and others became worthless simply because of Daisy’s response. Further, he spends excessive amounts of time pining after Daisy, instead of focusing on his own well-being. Prior to their reunion, Gatsby “read[s] a Chicago paper for years just on the chance of catching a glimpse of Daisy’s name” (79). Even though Daisy is married and has her own family, the vitality of Gatsby’s vision makes it impossible for him to accept the inevitability of their separation. When they are apart, he obsesses over her, looking for any sign that she may still love him. His so-called love blinds him, preventing him from realizing that their relationship is failing simply because it is based on false hopes and unrealistic expectations. Nick puts it best when he laments, “There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired” (79). Gatsby is pursuing Daisy endlessly, even though she will never belong to him. He believes that Daisy will be the one thing that finally makes his life complete, an…

    • 771 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Secondly, though some people may argue that Gatsby’s dreams weren’t foolish but merely romantic, he is still ultimately undone because of his love for Daisy. When Gatsby met Daisy “his heart was in a constant turbulent riot” and from there his need for wealth and success intensified, this combined with the growing materialism and prohibition of alcohol in America, it was inevitable that Gatsby would soon make his fortune and the only thing left would be to win Daisy. As Gatsby was deeply in love with the “exhilarating” Daisy and desperately wanted to impress her. However due to Daisy’s extremely shallow nature, she married wealthy, aristocratic Tom and as Gatsby returned, his dream of acquiring Daisy to match his new found wealth though foolish, was intense. Gatsby’s tunnel-vision for Daisy evolves through the book, at the first the reader is led to believe it was true love between the…

    • 615 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    456789

    • 909 Words
    • 4 Pages

    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.…

    • 909 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Even with immense wealth, Gatsby’s life is haunted by a lack of meaningful relationships along with a distorted view of Daisy and the rest of the world; these weaknesses make him a fragmented character, acting as an example of the disillusionment of many people aiming for the American Dream…

    • 1045 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In the great Gatsby, Fitzgerald explores how characters are fixated on the past, no character epitomises this greater than Gatsby himself, his entire empire of extravagant decadence and showmanship was created as a means to attract and impress Daisy, the shallow “trophy (i)” wife of Tom Buchanan, whom he had a relationship with 5 years previous. Gatsby is not the only character to hold on to the past, when Jordan Baker relates the tale of Daisy and Gatsby’s courtship to Nick, she romanticises their affair, describing the minute details like her “shoes from England (ii)” and the “red white and blue banners (iii)”, from this we can infer that Jordan too lusts after the nostalgia of the wartime past. Fitzgerald poses Gatsby as all consumed by his dream of Daisy, he revaluates his possessions “according to the measure of response it drew from her well-loved eyes” when he shows her around his mansion. However, the reality of her character is much more superficial than Gatsby realises, she is only drawn to him due to his apparent wealth and…

    • 1715 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    An Idealized Reality

    • 1468 Words
    • 6 Pages

    In the novel, Daisy symbolizes everything Gatsby aspired to gain--wealth, status, and luxury; she is Gatsby’s idealization of affluence. When discussing Daisy as “the first ‘nice’ girl [Gatsby] had ever known,” (148) he ironically does not focus on Daisy as a person, but the riches that come with the idea of her. The paragraph begins with “She was the first ‘nice’ girl he had ever known,” but as the paragraph progresses, her home (and not her) is described with scintillating diction like “breathless intensity,” “beautiful,” and “gay and radiant” (148). In a paragraph that would be expected to discuss Daisy as a “nice” girl, Gatsby ironically speaks primarily of her home. The lively diction describing the house emphasizes its luxury and excessiveness--its superficial materialism. These judgments on Daisy’s home reflect not only the superficiality of the house but also of Gatsby and his shallow perspective. The syntax of the sentences describing her home are also excessive in length, therefore mimicking the flow of the house’s luxury. Furthermore, the closest thing to describing Daisy as a person would be when “It excited…

    • 1468 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    To elaborate, when Gatsby meets Daisy, he loses sight of his true ambition. Gatsby ends up transforming himself in order to please Daisy, the love of his life. His actions could be seen as admirable if it were not for the fact that Daisy was a ridiculously shallow and ignorant woman. Originally, Gatsby was a man with high standards for himself and his future. Unfortunately, being a person who was most familiar with the lifestyle of the working class, he was easily lost in the glamour of Daisy’s rich, extraordinary life. When they develop a relationship, he finds an opportunity to take part in the exclusive high society of America and takes advantage of it: “eventually he took Daisy one still October night, took her because he had no real right to touch her hand” (Fitzgerald 156). Daisy was in love with Gatsby partially because he allowed her to believe that, financially, he was her equal. Under false pretenses, Gatsby takes Daisy’s virginity simply because he can. In an examination of The Great Gatsby, Tony McAdams pushes the novel as an attempt by its author, F. Scott Fitzgerald, to suggest “that the American Dream lies in the limitless possibilities in being human while warning of the risks in losing sight of those possibilities in the glare of wealth and its accoutrements” (McAdams 117). Gatsby is the prime example of a person disregarding whatever morals he might have had, in order to pursue Daisy, his own personal American Dream. Consequently, his actions were reprehensible, not great.…

    • 486 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Blinded by Love

    • 336 Words
    • 2 Pages

    F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1920’s novel The Great Gatsby shows that clouded judgments can lead to disappointments and heartbreak. Jay Gatsby, a rich man with a positive outlook, seeks to rekindle the past relationship he once shared with Daisy Buchannan. Refusing to accept that Daisy has already moved on, Gatsby is continuously blinded by the memories they used to share. On the first occasion in 5 years that Gatsby and Daisy have seen each other, Gatsby is extremely disappointed because, “he had been full of the idea so long, dreamed it right through to the end..at an inconceivable pitch of intensity. Now, in the reaction, he was running down like an over-wound clock” (92). Over the past 5 years, Gatsby has created a fantasy involving Daisy. After finally being reconnected, Gatsby is saddened by the fact that she does not live up to the image he has created of her. Gatsby gives Daisy a tour of his house in order to impress her. As the day goes on, it becomes evident that, “There must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams- not through her own fault, but because of the colossal vitality of is illusion” (95). Although it is not Daisy’s fault, she has fallen short of the expectations Gatsby had for her. His illusions built up over time have begun to fog his apprehension of the differences between reality and appearance. Following the death of Myrtle Wilson, Nick warns Gatsby that he should leave town, but, “He couldn’t possibly leave Daisy until he knew what she was going to do. He was clutching at some last hope” (148). The last bit of hope Gatsby had was the slightest chance that Daisy would leave Tom. Again, his inability to recognize his harsh realities ends up being his downfall. Jay Gatsby, although an optimistic person, also is a very naïve man. Without the ability to accept how things truly are, he becomes very susceptible to heart break and…

    • 336 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays