Surrounded
by,
“The only respectable thing about us is money”
The
Great Gatsby is a novel about a young man with nothing in the beginning and
then rising to become a self–made billionaire and he did all this for his love,
Daisy. But she married Tom Buchanan. Gatsby started to host parties in hope
that Daisy would attend one of them someday.
In the story just like all the other guests in Gatsby’s sumptuous and
extravagant parties who spoke of diverse rumors about the dark past of Gatsby’s
rags to riches, Tom Buchanan accuses him of being a low class who did nothing
but cheat to have the status he had. He claims that he and Gatsby are
dichotomized and are no means to be compared for no good reason but that Tom
was born in the riches while Gatsby’s was a product of greed who wanted money
and molded his morals to gain it.
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The
fact that Tom mocked Gatsby of his low birth while him being born into fortune,
a born noble. Even the blood was differentiated by the amount of money one had
before even coming to the world. The family background of a person would define
his status in society and his pace of belonging. It was an ironic claim made by
a man who was not only cheating on his wife but still kept her as a wife which
he can show off to the world of nobility. His character is the embodiment of
how our society worships the born rich and accuses the one who wants to become
rich. Although Gatsby tried to get his love back unfortunately he faced a
tragic end.
Money
has always been a source of measuring a man’s status as well as his background.
In this novel, Buchanan had family money which can also be observed in his
attributes. Gatsby, on the other hand, had new money which also made him
insecure and suffocating in the new rich environment. People tend to run after
money despite that how it is made. As long as they are served with a wealthy
amount, they are willing to sell their soul for it.
It
does not matter how much morality you have left in yourself what matters is the
amount of money in your wallet, you may kill a human being and still be walking
away why? Because you have money. In the story at the end although Gatsby had
mended the laws to have money still he had his morals and his love for Daisy
for which he took the blame for the death of Tom’s mistress. But the noble
blood that was Daisy did not have the time to send a flower to his grave. In
the end, all he got was Nick by his side. And Tom for whom his mistress was
always there for what did he do? He ran away from her dead body saying he
didn’t do it instead of being brave enough to look for her murderer.
What
are these examples if not describing the dreams we have to in order have a
respectable life? And the biggest irony is that we are trying to do these
things to please ourselves but the ones who have everything but still can’t
tolerate other people being happy. As Gatsby says to Tom the real issue and the
scale of honor is the money just money, the more you have the more you prosper
in this world where newborn parents have to first think about how much money
they need to celebrate the birth of their child so when he grows up people
would know that he comes from a powerful background.
In
short, human beings claim to have power over everything in the world but a
piece of paper makes them distinguish in their kind. No matter how much we
neglect the fact, it's money that decides how to look upon a person at the end
of the day. Therefore, we can consider that our lives revolve around money
rather than the concept of humanity.
The theme is extracted by Hafsah Afridi, one of the team members at the School of Literature.
