Plot Summary
Nick Carraway, a young man from Minnesota, moves to West Egg, Long Island, in the summer of 1922 to work in the bond business. His neighbor is Jay Gatsby, a mysterious millionaire who throws extravagant parties every weekend but never seems to participate in them. Across the bay in East Egg, Nick's cousin Daisy Buchanan lives with her husband Tom, a brutish old-money athlete.
Nick learns that Gatsby and Daisy had a love affair five years earlier, before Gatsby went to war and Daisy married Tom. Gatsby's entire life since — his fortune (built through bootlegging and connections to organized crime), his mansion, his parties — has been constructed for a single purpose: to win Daisy back. The green light at the end of Daisy's dock, visible from Gatsby's lawn, symbolizes everything he is reaching for.
Nick arranges a reunion between Gatsby and Daisy. They begin an affair. But when Tom discovers it, he confronts Gatsby and exposes his criminal background. Daisy, forced to choose, retreats to Tom. Driving home from the confrontation, Daisy — at the wheel of Gatsby's car — accidentally strikes and kills Myrtle Wilson, Tom's mistress, who had run into the road. Gatsby takes the blame to protect Daisy.
Tom tells Myrtle's husband George that Gatsby was driving. George shoots Gatsby in his swimming pool, then kills himself. Almost nobody comes to Gatsby's funeral. Daisy and Tom leave town without a word. Nick, disgusted by the carelessness of the wealthy, returns to the Midwest.
The novel closes with Nick's reflection: "So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."
Key Themes
- The American Dream: Gatsby achieves everything the Dream promises — wealth, self-invention, spectacle — and it gets him nothing he actually wants
- Old money vs. new money: Tom and Daisy's inherited wealth gives them a social power that Gatsby's earned fortune cannot buy — they set the rules and enforce them
- Self-invention: Gatsby is a performance — James Gatz from North Dakota transformed himself into Jay Gatsby, and the novel asks whether the performance was ever real
- Carelessness: Tom and Daisy are "careless people" who "smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money" — the novel's moral indictment
- The past: Gatsby believes he can repeat the past. Nick tells him he can't. The novel proves Nick right.
Key Characters
- Jay Gatsby: Born James Gatz, a self-made millionaire whose entire identity is built around winning Daisy back
- Nick Carraway: The narrator, drawn to Gatsby's dream but ultimately repelled by its cost
- Daisy Buchanan: Nick's cousin, Gatsby's lost love — charming, fragile, and ultimately unwilling to leave her world
- Tom Buchanan: Daisy's husband, old money, racist, brutal — the novel's embodiment of inherited power
- Myrtle Wilson: Tom's mistress, a working-class woman who dreams of escaping the Valley of Ashes
- George Wilson: Myrtle's husband, who kills Gatsby in a misdirected act of revenge
- Jordan Baker: Nick's love interest, a professional golfer and liar — another product of the careless world