The Great Gatsby
Chapter 1
By: Rebecca, Shayne & Kesley
Summary
The narrator of The Great Gatsby is Nick Carraway whom he is also casted
as the book’s author.
The chapter begins with Nick commenting on himself, saying that he had
learned to reserve judgement about other people from his father because if
he holds them to his own moral standards, he would misunderstand them.
In the summer of 1922, Nick had just arrived in New York to join in the bond
business and he had also rented a house on West Egg.
He also introduces West Egg as home to the “new rich” and the East Egg as
home to the “old rich”.
Nick graduated from Yale and has many connections on East Egg.
Summary
One night, he drives out to East Egg to have dinner with his cousin, Daisy
Buchanan, and her husband, Tom Buchanan.
Upon arriving, Tom greets Nick on the porch. Inside, Daisy lies on a couch
with her friend, Jordan who is a competitive golf player.
Tom tries to interest the others in a book called The Rise Of The Colored
Empires which expresses racism.
Tom was interrupted with an incoming phone call from his lover from New
York. Daisy hurriedly follows him.
After an awkward dinner, Jordan goes to sleep and Tom and Daisy hint that
they would like for Nick to take a romantic interest in Jordan.
When Nick arrives at his home in West Egg, he sees Gatsby, whom he did
not know who he was yet, stretching his arms towards the green light at the
end of a dock.
Characters in Chapter 1
Nick
Gatsby
Tom
Jordan
Daisy
Nick Carraway
He is the narrator of the book. Nick
is a young man from Minnesota who,
after being educated at Yale and
fighting in World War I, goes to New
York City to learn the bond business.
Honest, tolerant, and inclined to
reserve judgment, Nick often serves
as a confidant for those with
troubling secrets.
After moving to West Egg, a fictional
area of Long Island that is home to
the newly rich, Nick quickly befriends
his next-door neighbor, the
mysterious Jay Gatsby. The Great
Gatsby is told entirely through Nick’s
eyes; his thoughts and perceptions
shape and color the story.
Jay Gatsby
The title character and protagonist of the novel,
Gatsby is a fabulously wealthy young man living
in a Gothic mansion in West Egg.
He is famous for the lavish parties he throws
every Saturday night, but no one knows where he
comes from, what he does, or how he made his
fortune.
As the novel progresses, Nick learns that Gatsby
was born James Gatz on a farm in North Dakota;
working for a millionaire made him dedicate his
life to the achievement of wealth. When he met
Daisy while training to be an officer in Louisville,
he fell in love with her.
Nick also learns that Gatsby made his fortune
through criminal activity, as he was willing to do
anything to gain the social position he thought
necessary to win Daisy.
Tom Buchanan
Daisy’s immensely wealthy husband, once
a member of Nick’s social club at Yale.
Powerfully built and hailing from a socially
solid old family, Tom is an arrogant,
hypocritical bully. His social attitudes are
laced with racism and sexism, and he
never even considers trying to live up to
the moral standard he demands from
those around him.
He also has no moral second thoughts
about his own extramarital affair with
Myrtle, but when he begins to suspect
Daisy and Gatsby of having an affair, he
becomes outraged and forces a
confrontation.
Jordan Baker
Daisy’s friend, a woman with
whom Nick becomes
romantically involved during
the course of the novel.
A competitive golfer, Jordan
represents one of the “new
women” of the 1920s—cynical,
boyish, and self-centered.
Jordan is beautiful, but also
dishonest: she cheated in
order to win her first golf
tournament and continually
bends the truth.
Daisy Faye
Daisy stands in stark contrast to her husband, Tom.
She is a very frail and diminutive person that labors
at being shallow and laughs at every opportunity.
Though she breezily remarks that everything is in
decline, she does so only in order to seem to agree
with her husband.
As a young woman in Louisville before the war,
Daisy was courted by a number of officers,
including Gatsby. She fell in love with Gatsby and
promised to wait for him.
However, Daisy harbors a deep need to be loved,
and when a wealthy, powerful young man named
Tom Buchanan asked her to marry him, Daisy
decided not to wait for Gatsby after all. Now a
beautiful socialite, Daisy lives with Tom across from
Gatsby in the fashionable East Egg district of Long
Island.
Themes
Violence
Violence is a key theme in The Great Gatsby
and is mostly embodied by the character of
Tom. As an ex-football player, he uses his
immense physical strength to intimidate those
around him. Tom Buchanan vulgarly exploits
his status: he is grotesque, completely lacking
redeeming features. Daisy describes him as a
“big, hulking physical specimen,” and it is seen
that he mainly uses his size to intimidate and
dominate others.
Themes
Class
The societies of East and West Egg are deeply
divided by the difference between the people who
have “new money” and the people who have “old
money”. Gatsby is “new money” which means he
only recently began to earn his large sums of
money. He tries desperately to fake status, even
buying British shirts and claiming to have attended
Oxford in an attempt to seem as if he is part of “old
money”. Ultimately, it is class that separates Gatsby
and Daisy, which cements Daisy’s relationship with
her husband, Tom who is from the same class as
she is.
3 Significant Quotes
“I hope she’ll be a fool - that’s the best thing a girl can be in
this world, a beautiful little fool.”
Daisy spoke these words as she describes to Nick and Jordan her
hopes for her daughter. This quote reveals a glimpse into Daisy’s
character. Daisy is not a fool herself but is the product of a social
environment that does not value intelligence in women. She
describes her own boredom with life and seems to imply that a girl
can have more fun if she is beautiful and simplistic. She herself
thinks that being a “beautiful fool” is what men expects of women
and this is her mindset on how to get past tough situations. This is
also an excuse for her to live a luxurious life as she expects Tom
to provide for her.
3 Significant Quotes
“It was the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as
if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be
played again.”
This shows that Daisy’s voice can be described as being full, not
just of money, but of promises. There’s something about the
description of the voice that tells the listener/reader that wonderful
things are on the horizon. Daisy’s voice is irresistibly seductive
and all the other characters are drawn to her because of it.
3 Significant Quotes
“A single green light, minute and far away, that might have
been the end of a dock.”
The green light is a complex piece of symbolism in the book. The
obvious reason is that the green light represents where Daisy is at
and his longing for her. However, the green light means so much
more, Daisy is just part of it. The green light represents all his
wants in life which include: wealth, success, acceptance and
Daisy. And no matter how much the wealth or materialistic
possessions he has, he still never feels complete. Even with a
large house full of people partying and seeking his attention, he
still longs for Daisy. So to possess the green light, that is the
ultimate combination he longs for.
Thoughts About The Chapter
The first chapter of The Great Gatsby gives
an introduction to the narrator which is Nick
and his personality in his point of view.
It also introduces the East and West Egg.
It makes the reader want to know more
about Gatsby because of Fitzgerald’s
mysterious portrayal of him towards the end
of the chapter.
THE END :)