Analysis of Tom from the Great Gatsby
What does Fitzgerald make you feel about Tom Buchanan?
Tom is one of the more negative characters in the novel and has been described to be disliked from the start. Tom is described as having “arrogant eyes” at the beginning of the novel and as always leaning aggressively forwards. These two factors alone lea us to dislike Tom is then shown to be forceful and dishonest and it is an unsurprising that there are many people who “hated his guts”.
In the first chapter, Tom is shown to be uneducated and racist as he boasts about how he has read a book called “The Rise of The Coloured Empires”, about how non- white people are going to take over the world and that white people will be “utterly submerged”. This clearly shows the kind of distasteful, horrible, racist person that Tom is, believing a book like this and even worse, promoting it. He clearly feels no guilt or that there is anything wrong with what he says because he recommends the book to Nick.
We immediately get the impression of Tom being a rude type of person after this as he effortlessly interrupts Jordan as she tries to say something. When Jordan tries to elaborate on what Tom says, “Tom interrupted her by lifting heavily in his chair”. This kind of disrespect comes as second nature to Tom as he doesn’t need to even open his mouth to interrupt someone anymore as he takes advantage of his large physique. Daisy and Jordan show that they are used to this type of behaviour by not responding to or commenting on Tom’s obvious rudeness. Or they feel slightly threatened by his “body capable of enormous leverage- a cruel body”.
Tom is rather forceful and controlling using himself to physically move steer people into doing people as opposed to talking to people or asking what they want to do. Nick doesn’t want to really go and meet Myrtle in chapter 2 but Tom physically forces him to go with him. After travelling to New York, Tom takes hold of Nick and “literally forces me [him] from the car”. _ Tom also chose
Tom is one of the more negative characters in the novel and has been described to be disliked from the start. Tom is described as having “arrogant eyes” at the beginning of the novel and as always leaning aggressively forwards. These two factors alone lea us to dislike Tom is then shown to be forceful and dishonest and it is an unsurprising that there are many people who “hated his guts”.
In the first chapter, Tom is shown to be uneducated and racist as he boasts about how he has read a book called “The Rise of The Coloured Empires”, about how non- white people are going to take over the world and that white people will be “utterly submerged”. This clearly shows the kind of distasteful, horrible, racist person that Tom is, believing a book like this and even worse, promoting it. He clearly feels no guilt or that there is anything wrong with what he says because he recommends the book to Nick.
We immediately get the impression of Tom being a rude type of person after this as he effortlessly interrupts Jordan as she tries to say something. When Jordan tries to elaborate on what Tom says, “Tom interrupted her by lifting heavily in his chair”. This kind of disrespect comes as second nature to Tom as he doesn’t need to even open his mouth to interrupt someone anymore as he takes advantage of his large physique. Daisy and Jordan show that they are used to this type of behaviour by not responding to or commenting on Tom’s obvious rudeness. Or they feel slightly threatened by his “body capable of enormous leverage- a cruel body”.
Tom is rather forceful and controlling using himself to physically move steer people into doing people as opposed to talking to people or asking what they want to do. Nick doesn’t want to really go and meet Myrtle in chapter 2 but Tom physically forces him to go with him. After travelling to New York, Tom takes hold of Nick and “literally forces me [him] from the car”. _ Tom also chose