Essay about Character Analysis of Tom Buchanan in the Great Gatsby

Gatsby is a “poor boy trying to remake himself” (McClurg). Gatsby comes from an impoverished family, so he leaves his family and starts looking for success. His first chance at being rich is when Dan Cody leaves him some wealth. Unfortunately, Cody’s wife refuses to give it him, so Gatsby makes it his goal to get rich without Cody’s help. Gatsby serves in the Great War then he joins the bootlegging business. The bootlegging business turns Gatsby to a really wealthy man. He becomes “mister nobody… who rise up out of the crowd” (McClurg). Gatsby tries to fit in with rich people by throwing extravagant parties, buying a personalized car, and lying about his background. Despite of all his generosity at his parties, people usually “came and went without having met Gatsby” (Fitzgerald 41). Additionally, his desire to be an upper class comes from his love for Daisy. For instance, Jordan Baker tells Nick that “Gatsby bought [his] house so that Daisy would be just across the bay” (Fitzgerald 78). Gatsby wants to show his wealth to Daisy and prove to her that “he has been cured of poverty” (Pidgeon 180). Nevertheless, Daisy leaves Gatsby “standing… in the moonlight – watching over nothing” (Fitzgerald 145). Gatsby’s hard work is all for nothing. Readers can infer that Daisy picks Tom over Gatsby due the fact that he does “not belong to the right club [class]” (Pidgeon 178).

“The smaller the mind, the greater the conceit,” (Aesop). Society admires people who have morals but sometimes this morality is clouded by a person’s wealth or popularity. Morality is a sense of wellbeing and knowing the differences between what is right and what is wrong. People attain their morality through being confident, being concerned about others, and caring about the world and everything in it. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Tom Buchanan is perceived as the least moral by being conceited and having a passion to pursue this vulgar trait.

Nick Carraway's perceptions and attitudes regarding the events and characters of the novel are the most crucial. You see the different personalities and characteristics of a character. He really sees most of the characters as shallow and views himself to be highly moral.

Being wealthy is one of the things that Tom and Gatsby have in common. For both of them, maintaining a high social status is a priority. They strive to be financially successful. Tom went to a wealthy school and he flaunts his money with expensive sports cars. Gatsby, on the other hand, shows his need for wealth when he quits

Tom Buchanan is a villain, there's too much he’s done to deny the name. He has a mistress, and Daisy knows it: she barely conceals her knowledge of it. Completely being hypocritical, he suspects that Daisy may have a novel that angers him. He is a supremacist, and a pompous “thug” who has more money than values. And Tom sends Wilson after Gatsby, accusing Jay of Myrtle’s death (when Gatsby was innocent), and Wright kills Gatsby.

Through the means of characterization, Fitzgerald expresses Tom Buchanan as another immoral character. Tom is portrayed as an egotistical, hypocrite who advocates white supremacy. His hypocrisy is shown when he speaks to Gatsby, he conduct himself as a “high” class citizen but dwells as a “low” class citizen. “I picked him for a bootlegger the first time I saw him, and I wasn’t far wrong.” “What about it?” said Gatsby politely. “I guess your friend Walter Chase

Tom Buchanan is not only in The Great Gatsby to provide an obstacle for Daisy and Gatsby’s relationship. He is crucial to The Great Gatsby because he is a key character at the turning point of the book, or the afternoon at the plaza. The afternoon at the plaza is also a scene that is essential to Tom’s character because it is one of the only times that Tom is heavily featured in the novel. Although he is very present in the dinner with Jordan and Daisy, and in the party at Myrtle’s apartment, he isn’t given much of an opportunity to display the traits that are crucial to his character. A large part of Tom’s character is his intense masculinity, which in his case is defined as physical strength, the

Both Jay Gatsby and Tom Buchanan are similar in their amount of wealth, but are viewed differently by their community. Tom believes himself to belong to a superior class because he was born into money and in contrast, Gatsby, took part in illegal business dealings to achieve his wealth. Their differences are evident in the location of where they live. East Egg is where people that have been born into money live like Tom, while Jay Gatsby lives in West Egg where people of entrepreneurial success live. “I lived at West Egg, the-well, the less fashionable of the two, though this is a most superficial tag to express the bizarre and not a little sinister contrast between them…Across the courtesy bay the white palaces of fashionable East Egg glittered along the water, and the history of the summer really begins on the evening I drove over there to have dinner with the Tom Buchanans.” (Fitzgerald, 5) Tom cheats on Daisy with Myrtle, yet he can’t accept why Daisy would cheat on him with Gatsby since he is of a higher social class than Gatsby, and it would be degrading for Daisy. “‘She’s not leaving me!’ Tom’s words suddenly leaned down over Gatsby. ‘Certainly not for a common swindler who’d have to steal the ring he put on her finger.’” (Fitzgerald, 133) Another difference between

He had been full of the idea so long, dreamed it right through to the end, waited with his teeth set, so to speak, at an inconceivable pitch of intensity” (92). Gatsby was overwhelmed at seeing his love again; while he planned it, reality was much different. Tom also loves Daisy, yet his love is clouded by his affair with Myrtle Wilson. However, all in all, Tom does live Daisy and fights Gatsby, verbally, for her love. During this lingual altercation, he lucidly states, “...I love Daisy too. Once in a while I go off on a spree and make a fool of myself, but I always come back, and in my heart I love her all the time” (131). While Tom does flaunt his unfaithfulness, he has an unfeigned love for Daisy despite his mistresses.

The imperfect characters that exist within The Great Gatsby highlight Fitzgerald’s already fantastic writing the most since it displays his characters from a jaded perspective. This is exemplified in the development of Tom Buchanan and Daisy’s relationship is toxic in the sense that both parties seem to be missing fundamental emotional components. One of these missing components can be broken down into the observation that Daisy must only love money and herself which is why she is an egoist. On the other hand, Tom can also be considered an egoist due to his arrogant attitude in assuming everything belongs to him. In fact, Tom doesn’t care about Daisy at all, he only cares about possessing his trophy wife, which is an extremely sinister trait in any relationship. Hence, the most unhealthy relationship within the book is Tom and Daisy’s because they possess several malicious character traits that debilitate them as couple which are: Tom’s belief that everything belongs to him, Daisy’s inherently materialistic nature, and both of their total unconcern toward each other’s extramarital antics.

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby Tom Buchanan is portrayed as a bully who is snobbish, physically and mentally abusive, and ridiculously wealthy. He is good at covering his lack of self-esteem by talking bigger and better about himself than how he truly feels. Tom is a large powerful man therefore he is always ready for a fight if somebody dare to disagree with him. Nick observes, “I felt that Tom would drift on forever seeking, a little wistfully, for the dramatic turbulence of some irrevocable football game.” (Fitzgerald 17) Nick’s speculation about Buchanan and the irrevocable football game presents Tom as someone whose needs can never fully be met. Buchanan through his many outburst of aggression. Fitzgerald assures that readers

The purpose of this chapter is to show what Tom Buchanan is like, and how he acts towards other people and his money. Also, the reader is prepared to meet Gatsby as the party scene continues to build an aura of mystery and excitement around Gatsby, who has yet to make a full appearance in the novel. Here, Gatsby emerges as a mysterious subject of gossip. He is extremely well known, but no one seems to have any

Differences that set Buchanan and Gatsby apart is, Tom comes from old money, in other words his wealth originally runs in his family, it goes back generations. Because of Tom’s age, the way in which he spends his money his at sometimes insane. Spending it on unnecessary items such as “a string of polo ponies from a lake forest”. ( Fitzgerald, 6 ) The way in which Tom treated Daisy was much different from how Gatsby would treat her. Tom treated Daisy with no respect. He was an unfaithful individual who would hook up with another woman just to feel powerful. He was also very abusive and unable to contain his anger. In this. He ends up breaking Myrtle’s nose because refuses to stop mentioning Daisy’s name. “Making a short deft movement, Tom Buchanan broke her nose with his open hand”. ( Fitzgerald, 37) Since Tom had been brought up with so much wealth, he never took into thought of other races. He gives off the impression that he is a racist

One thing they both have in common is a strong passion for Daisy. Gatsby’s obsession for Daisy might seem obvious but Tom also is in love with Daisy. In chapter 7 after being confronted by Gatsby, Tom states that, "And what's more, I love Daisy too. Once in awhile I go off on a spree and make a fool of myself, but I always come back, and in my heart I love her all the time”. This shows that Tom is very passionate about Daisy and willing to fight for her.

Tom Buchanan is hypocritical and racist for his class excellence. He is generally skeptical of “new money” millionaires like Gatsby, and frequently makes negative remarks about bootleggers, claiming that Gatsby most likely is one by “A lot of these newly rich are just big bootlegger 's you know” (Fitzgerald 86). He “suddenly spout of off about polarization of the world between super-ethnic groups, the superior white race and the inferior colored races” (Slater 54). He tries to use invidious ethnicity as a weapon to demean his rival. He attacks Gatsby based social class. He says, “Mr. Nobody from Nowhere make love to your wife”. He then quickly moves his turn to racial one by associating Gatsby with miscegenation. “Nowadays people begin by