Imagine that George Clooney was your next door neighbor, threw extravagant parties every weekend, yet kept quietly to himself during the day; this describes the life of Jay Gatsby. While he appears to be the nation’s most mysterious, wealthy bachelor, his wealth is built on the illegal business of bootlegging. However, despite all the rumors against him, the allure of Gatsby’s character is based off of the slanted view of the narrator and the improbable way that he obtained his massive amount of wealth. The allure of Gatsby’s life becomes clear early in to F. Scotts Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. In chapter three, Nick mentions the amount of food Gatsby uses at just one of his parties,
“Every Friday five crates of oranges and lemons …show more content…
Most members of wealthy society in Gatsby’s time were well established members who possessed the wealth of their ancestors. Wealth which had been made over decades, if not centuries in the past. These wealthy families intermingled and probably became well acquainted with one another. In fact, most of the ‘Old Money’ types lived together in the same neighborhood, known as the East Egg. Across a small body of water, lies the West Egg, home to Gatsby and other new money types, most of which earned their money through the rigged bond and stock business. It’s Gatsby’s differences that drive wedges between him and Tom Buchanan, the suitor of Gatsby’s old flame Daisy. Tom doesn’t believe Gatsby is at all what he seems, which in a way, Tom is correct, ““I found out what your ‘drug stores’ were…He and this Wolfshiem bought up a lot of side-street drug stores here and in Chicago and sold grain alcohol over the counter”” (Fitzgerald 141). The new money people represented the fears of the old money. That everyone could achieve wealth no matter where they came from. This makes Gatsby become the face of new money and how it contrasts with the old. New money holds extravagant parties with no privacy, while old money stays in private meetings. Gatsby’s challenges against old money are what lead Tom to have him
“Every Friday five crates of oranges and lemons …show more content…
Most members of wealthy society in Gatsby’s time were well established members who possessed the wealth of their ancestors. Wealth which had been made over decades, if not centuries in the past. These wealthy families intermingled and probably became well acquainted with one another. In fact, most of the ‘Old Money’ types lived together in the same neighborhood, known as the East Egg. Across a small body of water, lies the West Egg, home to Gatsby and other new money types, most of which earned their money through the rigged bond and stock business. It’s Gatsby’s differences that drive wedges between him and Tom Buchanan, the suitor of Gatsby’s old flame Daisy. Tom doesn’t believe Gatsby is at all what he seems, which in a way, Tom is correct, ““I found out what your ‘drug stores’ were…He and this Wolfshiem bought up a lot of side-street drug stores here and in Chicago and sold grain alcohol over the counter”” (Fitzgerald 141). The new money people represented the fears of the old money. That everyone could achieve wealth no matter where they came from. This makes Gatsby become the face of new money and how it contrasts with the old. New money holds extravagant parties with no privacy, while old money stays in private meetings. Gatsby’s challenges against old money are what lead Tom to have him