Essay on "The Great Gatsby" : the Question of Nick Carraway's IntegrityIn pursuing relationships, we come to know people only step by step.Unfortunately, as our knowledge of others' deep
Trang 1Essay on "The Great Gatsby" : the Question of Nick Carraway's Integrity
In pursuing relationships, we come to know people only step by step.Unfortunately, as our knowledge of others' deepens, we often move from enchantment todisenchantment Initially we overlook flaws or wish them away; only later do we realizeperil of this course In the novel "The Great Gatsby" by F Scott Fitzgerald, the journeyfrom delight to
disappointment may be seen in the narrator, Nick Carraway Moving frominitial interest to romantic allure to moral repugnance, Nick's
relationship with JordanBaker traces a painfully familiar, all-to-human arc
Nick's initial interest in Jordan is mainly for her looks and charm Upon first sightof her at the Buchanan's mansion, he is at once drawn to her appearance He Notes herbody "extended full length" on the divan, her fluttering lips, and her quaintly tipped chin.He observes the lamp light that "glinted along the paper as she turned a page with aflutter
of slender muscles in her arms." He is willing to overlook her gossipy chatterabout Tom's extra-marital affair, and is instead beguiled by her dry witticisms and herapparent simple sunniness: "Time for this good girl to
go to bed," she says When Daisybegins her matchmaking of Nick and Jordan, we sense that she is only leading whereNick's interest is already taking him It is Jordan, then, who makes Nick feel comfortable at
Gatsby's party, as we sensewhat Nick senses: they're becoming a
romantic couple As they drive home a summerhouse-party, Nick notes her dishonesty but forgives it, attributing it to her understandableneed to get by in a man's world She praises his lack of carelessness, tells him directly "Ilike you" and he is smitten, After Jordan tells him the tale of Gatsby and Daisy's past,Nick feels a "heady excitement" because she has taken him into her confidence Attractedby her "universal skepticism" and under the influence of his own loneliness, Nick overlooking this time her "wan, scornful mouth" seals their romance by planted a kiss
onJordan's lips But the attraction can't last and is, by summer's end, replaced by repugnance Thesmallest of details, at first, heralds this falling-apart: "Jordan's fingers, powdered withwhite over their tan, rested for a moment in mine." Here Fitzgerald has dropped a subtlehint that their liaison is to be the matter of only a moment, and that Jordan's
"integrity"may be a matter of mere cosmetics But it is Jordan's failure to feel the gravity of the realfalling-apart among Tom, Daisy, and
Gatsby that most rankles Nick, and he reacts withdisgust when she invites him in for a nightcap amid all the emotional wreckage,
thencomplains the next day of his refusal But Jordan's worst action, in Nick's eyes, is herfailure to stay on at Daisy and Tom's when Daisy needs her The betrayal is far worsethan moving a golf ball, because it is deeply personal In the end, with a rueful acceptance of what seemed "meant
to be" but was not,Nick sees that, while Jordan may excite his interest and passion, the excitement pales inthe light of her lack of "the
fundamental decencies." Though it has been Nick's firstimpulse to
reserve judgments about her, in the end he cannot: the limit of his
tolerancedefines him In letting go of Jordan because of her lack of
integrity, Nick has held fast tohis