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Essay On Gender Roles In The Great Gatsby

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Throughout the text of The Great Gatsby, we see evidence of the time period in which it was written/set and the mindset of the author, F. Scott Fitzgerald. If we use this book as any indication of Fitzgerald’s thoughts we can see that he did not think very highly of women, especially within the upper class. All of the women in The Great Gatsby are either unpleasant, dishonest, or shallow. While this book makes the statement that men can be all these things as well, we are given at least one honest and morally decent male character, Nick.

There are three female characters in The Great Gatsby; Daisy Buchanan, the love interest of Gatsby and wife of Tom, Jordan Baker, friend of Daisy as well as nicks romantic interest, and Lastly Myrtle Wilson, …show more content…
These exception are Nick and George Wilson. Nick is introduced as a highly moral but very accepting person who, he implies that this is from his upbringing in the Midwest but that is obviously not true because Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby were also raised in the Midwest and did not have the same strength as Nick. Throughout the book Nick displays his helpfulness and kindness to those around him while everyone else bickers and fights, which is why he is a good narrator. This morally strong character shows us that there are still good people in the world. George Wilson is also the only other person who, at least at the beginning, was morally strong. George Wilson is used to represent the working class poor who are extorted and abused by the higher class such as Tom. George is a victim of abuse and trickery from Tom and is even lead to kill Gatsby by Tom, as well as Daisy’s unwillingness to turn herself in to the police for having killed Myrtle. The fact that George is a victim gives us another example of a male character that is morally justified, this time one from the lower working class. With this we can determine that it is not class that makes people good or bad but something different entirely, whether that is inherent personality or upbringing is arguable but the fact that there are no female characters with this sense of morals

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