Preview

Compare And Contrast The Great Gatsby And Tom Buchanan

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1137 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Compare And Contrast The Great Gatsby And Tom Buchanan
Gatsby vs. Buchanan Imagine the 1920's have been re-enacted, a time of luxurious parties and when things, didn’t seem to matter or mean as much as they do now. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, gives you a picture of what the time period was like. It was a time known as the "Jazz Age", where the economy was at its peak, and money was easy to be held. Prohibition was in affect, and bootlegging was very gainful for those who took part in it. Jay Gatsby most likely took part in an illegal business scheme, such as bootlegging, to make his fortune. Tom Buchanan, on the other hand though, acquired his wealth through inheritance. The plot of The Great Gatsby seemingly also revolves around a girl, Daisy Buchanan, whom Tom and Gatsby both love in different ways. However, they are similar as they both want to be able to call Daisy “mine.” In The Great Gatsby, although Tom and Gatsby strive to be financially successful and maintain a high social class, and they both love Daisy in a way, they are two completely different people with different personalities and morals. …show more content…
Gatsby exemplified the “Jazz Age;” he was known for hosting very luxurious and lavish parties on a weekly basis. Gatsby’s view on spending money was that if he had the money, he should spend it. He hosted parties that weren’t just small gatherings though, they were more of a way for people to show off there social status, an excuse to get drunk, and a way to meet ne people. In fact, most of the people who went to Gatsby’s parties didn’t know Gatsby at all; they just went to prove their social status. Nick Carraway, the narrator of the story, explains to us; “I believe that on the first night I went to Gatsby’s house I was one of the few guests who had actually been invited. People were not invited- they went there”

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Gatsby a man Daisy is in love with but then there's her husband, Tom that she is scared to lose. Are Gatsby and Tom that much alike or is she just in it for the money? Daisy is all about money and she doesn’t care if it's old or new she just wants it. Daisy had a whim when Gatsby came back because she wanted Gatsby even though she was married to Tom. Daisy only married Tom for his money but she was in love with Gatsby.…

    • 743 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Tom and Gatsby are the same in the aspect of their values, but they differ in their life styles. Both Gatsby and Tom was adulteress because Gatsby wanted Daisy who was married and Tom was cheating on Daisy. But in contrast Tom was the big strong guy and Gatsby was smaller and not as well built. Tom and Gatsby were both rich and thought that money could buy anything and everything they wanted, both Gatsby and Tom used their money to impress people. Gatsby uses his for parties to get Daisy to come, and on other people for example when Lucille tore her gown on a chair, Gatsby paid for it to be replaced. Gatsby used his money to get what he wanted and Tom used his money and his strength to get what he wants. Gatsby wanted to be perceived as an intellectual person by telling them all that we went…

    • 490 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Contrastingly, Tom Buchanan would rather put his wealth on display in a much more understated way than Gatsby. His home is notably more modest than that of Gatsby and is intended to be a display of refined class, rather than a display of tasteless showiness and excessive amounts of extra money. Gatsby is too naive to realize that no matter how many gaudy parties he throws, Daisy is basically priceless and won’t leave the old money lifestyle she has become acclimated to through her time with Tom.…

    • 87 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Great Gatsby focuses around several characters, all of whom see reality in a different perspective. We are introduced to Daisy Buchanan, Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby. Daisy is characterized as a sort of air-headed woman who believes a woman’s looks are more important than their intelligence. She lives her life in a delusional fantasy in which there is no time frame for anything and nothing really has any substance. She is portrayed through the duration of the novel as being confused not really knowing what’s going on at all. Her reality seems to be nothing at all, shown by her spending days sitting on the couch with Jordan Baker, and not having any opinion as to where to go during the evening. Tom Buchanan, Daisy’s husband, is a character that readers are introduced to as a pompous, selfish, arrogant man who does whatever he likes. He even has a mistress in the city, and finds nothing wrong with his “dual life”. Tom’s take on reality is blurred by his self-centered agenda. He even goes as far as making George Wilson, his mistresses’ husband, beg him to sell his car to George, knowing all the while that he is sleeping with his wife. This twisted act further shows just how altered Tom’s reality is in his mind. On the other side of the spectrum, Jay Gatsby is living in a world where a big house, lavish parties, and material objects will win over the only person he cares…

    • 819 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    <br>The character of Jay Gatsby was a wealthy business man, who the author developed as arrogant and tasteless. Gatsby's love interest, Daisy Buchanan, was a subdued socialite who was married to the dim witted Tom Buchanan. She is the perfect example of how women of her level of society were supposed to act in her day. The circumstances surrounding Gatsby and Daisy's relationship kept them eternally apart. For Daisy to have been with Gatsby would have been forbidden, due to the fact that she was married. That very concept of their love being forbidden, also made it all the more intense, for the idea of having a prohibited love, like William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, made it all the more desirable. Gatsby was remembering back five years to when Daisy was not married and they were together:…

    • 1311 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Sometimes the competitive nature in people comes out and now the goal is only focused on winning, not for the prize, but for the victory over the opponent. Both Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby are in love with Daisy, so they say, but perhaps they care more about beating the other than having Daisy. Being so belligerent towards each other, you can see the hatred they have for the other. It’s surprising to find that the characters are alike in many of their thoughts and wants. By using confrontational dialogue and the contemptuous tone during the dialogue, Fitzgerald portrays that the characters of Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby are in fact very similar.…

    • 586 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    More Money More Problems

    • 594 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The Great Gatsby was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. In this story, there are a lot of twists and turns with several characters. Two characters that stand out the most are Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby. Even though they are alike in some ways, in others they were completely different. The main areas that showed their greatest differences were the way that they obtained their wealth, their relationships with Daisy, and the way they treated Nick. Even though Tom was married to Daisy, Jay Gatsby was not willing to give up on his true love Daisy.…

    • 594 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Is Gatsby Great

    • 856 Words
    • 4 Pages

    When considering Gatsby's Greatness, we must remember always that this is the 1920's the "Jazz Age". And Gatsby was a young successful man with lots of money. Not only is this the ideal of the American dream, but he also through gigantic parties every Saturday in his gothic mansion, where all the rich and famous would gather. He was a perfect representative of the "Jazz Age".…

    • 856 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    THE GREAT GATSBY

    • 697 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The 1920s change American society, people starts to wear less clothe and automobiles and radio came and made peoples life a lot more effective. During the 1920s their were riches and poor , there were New Money , Old Money , Some Money, and No Money. In the book the Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald did a very good job at describing just how much difference their were between the rich and the poor.There are many scenes in the book that are very comparable to the real time of the 1920s, all can be compared from the way the two different social work , setting , and living style. In the book Fitzgerald give the reader a clear view on Gatsby's wealthy,and Tom too. From my point of view those chracter have very little similarities, on their personalities, social class, and from all those you call reflect it to the real 1920s age where the rich was richer then ever and the poor to the tippy toe.…

    • 697 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    It was published in the 1930s and is all about the roaring twenties. It is well known for the time about the 1920’s The Jazz music era is a huge theme in the background of the novel. The entire novel is based on the different society classes and that in fact a love between different classes was impossible as demonstrated by the love between Gatsby and Daisy. Gatsby was born in another social class but did everything to achieve higher things and be someone from the higher class. But in the end it didn’t work out like this. The wild parties Gatsby is holding every weekend shows the party society culture at this time. People didn’t really care about anything except the social classes, having fun and sex and consumption. The parties Gatsby is holding in the novel are the hit in New York which shows that even though alcohol used to be forbidden, he was able to bootleg it and have the mafia on his side. This is demonstrating another characteristic of the roaring twenties, that due to the fact that alcohol was forbidden, it became an even bigger…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Tom and Gatsby

    • 472 Words
    • 2 Pages

    There are many similarities between the two characters. One is that both of the men loved Daisy. You could say that didn’t seem to love her having an affair, although towards the end of the book he showed deep love for her. Gatsby on the other hand was madly in love with Daisy from the moment he met her. Everyday he hoped for them to all in love and be together, however in the end he never got her. Another comparison could be the men’s lack to follow the “rules” so to say. Tom being a cheater who sneaks around with other women while he has a wife. Gatsby was just a plain out smuggler and ran speak easies during the prohibition era. Also tom and Gatsby are fabulously wealthy. They spend money like its nothing, how tom buys women basically whatever they want. Gatsby on the other hand jut throws expensive parties for everyone to come and drink, eat, dance and do what ever they wish, he does that just to impress Daisy.…

    • 472 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The 2013 version of The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald had portrayed chapter five to his intentions better than the 1974 movie version. The 2013 movie represented the emotions and imagery of Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan’s meeting better than the 1974 version. Some crucial aspects that was presented around the scene was how weird and strange the atmosphere was between Jay and Daisy, the scenery and rain, and the clock that Jay broke.…

    • 526 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    To start, as the film begins, Nick Carraway, is talking to a psychiatrist in some sort of “insane asylum.” This seems to be out of character for the narrator as Nick is seen as someone who is very thoughtful and careful. In the novel, there was no impression that his experience with Jay Gatsby led him to be mentally unsound. However, the film portrayed Carraway to be “on the edge of crazy” after Gatsby’s death, which was a bit of a stretch.…

    • 552 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    <br>The characters' search of their own identities and the struggle that ensues is the most suffusive theme throughout The Great Gatsby . The fact that we never really know the characters, and the corrupt immoral things they do, directly represent the 20's high society lifestyle. The characters continued to cheat on their spouses, let money become their obsession, and debated the American dream for the hopes of one day obtaining happiness. But the fact remains that they have no true morals or ideals of themselves as individuals. These are a group of people who --no matter how cocky and self- confident they seem-- have absolutely no idea of what they are doing (as many men and women of the 20's do not). Tom and Daisy are two examples.…

    • 1001 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gatsby’s parties were more like theatre productions, being boastful, wanting to be noticed and wanting Daisy. His world was corrupt, largely hidden by wealth, glamour and beauty. With his money he creates a new world for himself, looking like a celebrity. Celebrities are glamorous! He would put on a good show for everyone and walk away with another one to plan. He’s flaunting what he’s got.…

    • 362 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays