The Great Gatsby Tom Buchanan Analysis

Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby The Great Gatsby is a story that revolves a great deal on the exercise of power held by people within society. Tom Buchanan, one of the main antagonists in the novel, is the man who marries Daisy, Nick Carraway’s cousin. Having inherited money from his family, or “old money” Tom Buchanan resides with Daisy in East Egg, where all the other people with inherited wealth live. The narrator already knew him from before as they’d attended Yale together, but his immediate description of him in the book, depicted him as being a “sturdy” man, with a “hard mouth”, “arrogant eyes” and a body of “enormous power,” which hints at the impression Tom gives off of a smug overbearing man(Pg.9). Later Daisy describes him right …show more content…
Tom is very narrow-minded, and believes he is much superior to everyone, and therefore,should have everything. This is clearly seen when he brings up his opinion over a book he claims he has been reading, as he says, “this fellow has worked out the whole thing. It’s up to us, who are the dominant race, to watch out or these other races will have control of things”(Pg.16). Tying in with the fact that Tom believes he deserves everything, it becomes clear he also loves to have total control over everything, even people. Thus, ultimately treating people like his property, and manipulating them along the way. This is seen by the fact that Daisy stays by Tom’s side, even though she and everybody clearly know about his mistress. He is able to not only have his wife, but his mistress on the side, who he parades around publicly, to his wife’s humiliation,” I was confused and a little disgusted as I drove away. It seemed to me that the thing for Daisy to do was to rush out of the house, child in arms — but apparently there were no such intentions in her head. As for Tom, the fact that he ‘had some woman in New York.’ was really less surprising than that he had been depressed by a book”(Pg.23). When a situation does not seem to go his way, Tom reacts aggressively, and violently, in an effort to manipulate the situation to benefit him. During one encounter with his mistress, Myrtle, she blatantly causes a scene and rebels against him, “some time toward midnight Tom Buchanan and Mrs. Wilson stood face to face, discussing in impassioned voices whether Mrs. Wilson had any right to mention Daisy's name. Making a short deft movement, Tom Buchanan broke her nose with his open hand”(Pg.41). He is definitely not the type of person to allow people to disobey him or humiliate him, or to even feel like control is slipping away from his