Character Analysis: The Great Gatsby '

In the novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Nick is drawn back to the West once he realizes he has been pulled into the lifestyle of the East. Throughout the entire novel, Nick is a realist and sees everything literally without a “lens” obstructing his view of things, as Gatsby does. In the beginning, Nick is just a person who sits back and enjoys the ride of his life. He even leaves the West just to avoid marriage, “’We heard you were engaged.’ ‘It’s a libel. I’m too poor.’” (19). He avoids confrontation at all costs, even if it means leaving and not talking to that person for the rest of their lives. Nick is also the type of person that everyone talks to about their problems, “I’m inclined to reserve all judgments, a habit that has opened up many curious natures to me and also made me the victim of not a few veteran bones” (1). Nick does not wish to have these people talk to him, but still “reserves judgment” and keeps an open mind. He still considers himself one of the few “normal person[s]” (1) even when he discovers that everyone shares similar problems in their daily lives.
At the end of the novel, Nick wants “the world to be in uniform and at a sort of moral attention forever; I wanted no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human heart” (2).
As the novel progressed, Nick sees more into lives of others and realizes how “careless” people are: Daisy running into Myrtle with the car, Tom cheating on Daisy, Gatsby taking all reaches to get to his ideal life not caring what the consequences may be. Nick even confronts Jordan, “For just a minute I wondered if I wasn’t making a mistake, then I thought it all over again quickly and got up to say good-by” (177). He has taken giant leaps from the beginning of the novel and just running away, he decided to take control of his own life and make decisions for
himself.
Likewise, Nick realizes the Midwest “now seemed like the ragged edge of the universe” (3). However Nick does go back to the Middle West; “That’s my Middle West…I am part of that, a little solemn with the feel of those long winters, a little complacent from growing up in the Carraway house in a city where dwellings are still called through decades by a family’s name…perhaps we possessed some deficiency in common which made us subtly unadaptable to Eastern life” (176). Nick truly realizes the value of being home and family life, especially after he knows that Gatsby bought his parents a home when he was gaining his fortune. Gatsby had withdrawn himself from his past, and never even accepted his parents as his true parents and still he decided to help his family out. Nick finds great value in this sense that family values are most important because they made him who he is. He realizes that life is not just simplistic, people all have unique upbringings and stories, and becomes aware of what choices he must make to attain his personal character.