American Lit.
Mr. David R. Lopez
14 May 2013
The Great Gatsby Paper
In the beginning of Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Nick doesn’t care too much for Gatsby, but later Nick begins to like Gatsby, and by the end, Nick and Gatsby become best friends. It is sort of weird how their relationship develops, and the reason it develops. Nick and Gatsby seem to be two totally different people, but I guess opposites attract.
In the beginning of Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Nick doesn’t care too much for Gatsby. Nick thinks that Gatsby is kind of odd, and mysterious. For example, on page 20, Nick says “he gave a sudden intimation that he was content to be alone”. That is kind of weird because if he wanted to be alone, why does he throw huge parties. Also Gatsby was just standing there with his arm extended looking at a light, if that isn’t weird than what is. This one encounter does not drive Nick away from getting to know Gatsby.
Later in Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Nick begins to like Gatsby. Later on when Nick meets Gatsby at a party he describes his smile. The way Nick described it was not normal he said “It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life.”(48) You don’t describe a smile that way unless you like that person, he could have just said he had a nice smile. After that Gatsby and Nick talked a lot more and hung out a lot more after that party, I guess you could say this was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
By the end of Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Nick and Gatsby became best friends. Towards the end Nick and Gatsby were always together. They went to lunch together, rode in Gatsby’s hydroplane together, and went to the city together. Nick liked Gatsby so much he said “They’re a rotten crowd,” I shouted across the lawn. “You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.”(154) Nick also tells Gatsby’s father that “We were close friends.” (168)