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The Great Gatsby Society and Class Quotes Page 9
Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
| Quote #25 This says a lot about Daisy. We’re still unclear on what exactly a voice "full of money" actually sounds like, but we take it to mean that Daisy simply exudes wealth in everything she does. Even the simple act of speaking somehow reminds people that her wealth and lifestyle are ingrained into every aspect of her identity. For more on Daisy's voice, check out her "Character Analysis." |
Through this twilight universe Daisy began to move again with the season; suddenly she was again keeping half a dozen dates a day with half a dozen men, and drowsing asleep at dawn with the beads and chiffon of an evening dress tangled among dying orchids on the floor beside her bed. And all the time something within her was crying for a decision. She wanted her life shaped now, immediately – and the decision must be made by some force – of love, of money, of unquestionable practicality – that was close at hand. (8.19)
| Quote #26 After Gatsby has been absent from her life for a while, Daisy gets restless and re-adopts the luxurious lifestyle that her family’s wealth affords her. Unwilling to wait for long, and probably somewhat fearful that Gatsby would never make enough money to earn her hand in marriage, she throws herself back into finding a husband. If Tom Buchanan hadn’t scooped Daisy up to be his wife, we get the impression that someone else of a similar background would have. |
Even when the East excited me most, even when I was most keenly aware of its superiority to the bored, sprawling, swollen towns beyond Ohio, with their interminable inquisitions which spared only the children and the very old – even then it had always for me a quality of distortion. West Egg, especially, still figures in my more fantastic dreams. (9.123)
| Quote #27 This is a complicated comment. We’re thinking that he's referring to the old money way of life, a way of life that is inherited. The West Egg lifestyle, or the world populated with the nouveau riche, seems more of a dream world to Nick. The dream of working your way up the social ladder and into a life of financial comfort? The American Dream? Nick seems to believe that one should have to earn one’s rewards rather than simply being born into them. |
They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made... (9.143)
