Wealth, or Self

“In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. ‘Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,’ he told me, ‘just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had” (Fitzgerald). In his novel, The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald examines how wealth creates greed and corruption in the morals of mankind and eventually results in catastrophe. This is demonstrated through the characters Tom Buchannan and Jay Gatsby.
Tom Buchanan is a man who is born into a privileged family and lives a life where money certainly is not an issue. Tom and Nick Carraway, the narrator of the story, travel to visit Tom’s mistress. Nick recalls the event of going to the “valley of ashes”, “It was because of this that I first met Tom Buchanan’s mistress. The fact that he had one insisted upon wherever he was known. His acquaintances resented the fact that he turned up in popular restaurants with her and, leaving her at a table, sauntered about, chatting with whomever he knew” . Onion. Tom believes that because he is of high social status that it exempts him from the normal constraints on the average person. He is flaunting to the world that he has this second world that he can live in and not fear the consequences of his actions. This is because he knows that his money can be used to overlook immoral actions. Close to the end of the novel it is revealed that Daisy very much knows about Tom’s extramarital activities and they speak to one another, “’And what’s more I love Daisy too. Once in a while I go off on a spree and make a fool of myself, but I always come back and in my heart I love her all the time’…She turned to me, and her voice, dropping an octave lower, filled the room with thrilling scorn: ‘Do you know why we left Chicago? I’m surprised that they didn’t treat you to the story of that little spree’” . From this quote the reader can assume that Tom’s has been involved