Deception in The Great Gatsby

In a time of economic crisis all parties submit to the power of the modern grail - the dollar. Daisy, for example, must choose between love and honesty, and class status. Gatsby’s relationship with Daisy mirrors Tom’s, both in his initial rejection, and subsequent pursuit of her. At the outset Gatsby is rejected by Daisy because of his class. He thus thinks that outbidding Tom will enable him to own Daisy. Protagonist and antagonist have the same economic and moral characteristics – they are hollow, greedy men pursuing women financially ‘at a cost’ to those women, others, and themselves. These capitalists have sacrificed their anima for money, and ironically, seek the idealised female ‘grail’ – the Other - financially.

Deception in The Great Gatsby

There are many American novels that yield insights into human nature, but few are as honest or intriguing as Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. The Great Gatsby is brilliantly composed, and involves many different personalities, but it is at the core of this novel that we find the dark secret of humanity: deception.

All of the inhabitants of East and West Egg use one another to get what they want, with little care as to how it will affect the people around them. Through the eyes of Nick Carraway, we see how the wealthy live: they live in a luxurious society surrounded by their own lies and deception. Looking in from the outside, their lives seem perfect; they have everything that money can buy, right? Wrong, the one thing that their money cannot buy them is happiness, and this is why each character deceives someone.

Our story unravels early on in The Great Gatsby, Nick's very wealthy cousin, Daisy, simply has it all: she is beautiful and graceful; her bank account is large; she's traveled and knows people no matter where she goes. Her husband, Tom Buchanan, is without a doubt very lucky to be with her; but there's a ripple in this perfect couple: he's cheating on her. Not only is Tom cheating on her, but he's cheating on her with someone of a far lesser class; which makes the reader question why he's with her in the first place. Daisy had a very good reputation among the elite; she had never done anything that would have embarrassed her. "They moved with a fast crowd, all of them young and rich and wild, but she came out with an absolutely perfect reputation" (82). This illustrates how well put together Daisy is, he has used her, and continues to use her not only for her wealth, but also for her firm social standing. She could, literally, make or break Tom depending merely on whether or not she stayed with him; of course he'd remain with her, she defined his social standing.

At the same time that Tom was using Daisy for her money, Daisy was using Tom, but for far different reasons. Nick reveals that Daisy doesn't need Tom in the same way that he needs her, she needs Tom to remain emotionally stable. As the story of Daisy and Gatsby's history unfolded, it became clear that they, at one point, loved each other very deeply, however, Gatsby had to leave Daisy to go to war. When he returned, Daisy was already married to Tom, and the soap opera continues. Daisy always hid her undying love for Gatsby from Tom, as well as all the others that were around her at the time of their marriage, so when Gatsby returned to confess his love for her, she was clueless as to how to deal with this situation. She began to see Gatsby on the side; however, she never seriously thought about actually leaving Tom for Gatsby. It was Jordan who told Nick that on the very night before Tom and Daisy's marriage, Daisy drunkenly wept in the tub for she knew that she would not marry Gatsby. And five years later, in the Plaza Hotel, Daisy confessed that she loved Gatsby, but that she had loved Tom at the time of their wedding. "Even alone I can't say that I never loved Tom" (140). She needed to express that she had loved Tom so that she had even the least bit of hope that he wouldn't leave her for someone else. Truth be known, Daisy was using Tom as a support barrier, so she'd never feel as alone and as abandoned as she did when Gatsby left her to fight in the war.

Tom Buchanan is not the only wealthy man in a position of power that's using the people around him to climb the social ladder. Mr. Jay Gatsby, Nick's next door neighbor, has done some using of his own to obtain something that he wanted. Gatsby and Nick became close friends as the summer progressed; over this time, Gatsby reveals that he is hopelessly in love with Daisy Buchanan, a woman that he knew and loved before the war. Nick, Daisy's cousin, conveniently lives right next door to Gatsby. Gatsby hadn't used anybody or anything before, so he pulls all of his favors to try to 'run into' Daisy. " 'He wants to know-' continued Jordan '-if you'll invite Daisy to your house some afternoon and then let him come over' .... 'He wants her to see his house.... and your house is right next door' " (83-84). Not only is Gatsby using Nick to get to Daisy, but he's also using Jordan to, in a matter of sorts, make it all happen for him. He had confronted Jordan at a party of his about how he had yearned for Daisy for the nearly five years that they hadn't seen each other. He uses Nick and Nick's social standing to further his own dreams; Gatsby wants Daisy to see how poor Nick is in comparison to the, excuse the pun, Great Gatsby. Nick was used merely as a tool for Gatsby to get to Daisy, only he never realized it.

Looking in at West and East Egg from Nick Carraway's perspective, we can see just how these people abused each other's trust and hope to obtain what they wanted. All the people that surrounded Nick were determined to achieve a sense of happiness, no matter who they hurt. They all saw something that they wanted, and they all used each other to obtain the glorified sensation of happiness, no matter how temporary. Nick exposes the extent to which the wealthy go to achieve what they want. Nick Carraway's honesty casts a shadow upon the lies and deception of the wealthy.