Jay and Tom in The Great Gatsby Essay

Every story, book, novel, epic poem has certain literary elements that are needed in order to keep a readers interest and to keep them reading throughout the story. Needed to keep the reader on the edge of their seat. Some of these elements are plot, theme, setting, conflict, climax, antagonist and protagonist. The antagonist in the story is the character that creates the problems in the story for the protagonist and all but symbolizes what is wrong with society. The protagonist is the one in the story that has to deal with what the protagonist sets forth and the obstacles that consume them. In the Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald there are a few of these conflicts but the two that I wish to talk about are Tom Buchannan and Jay Gatsby. Tom Buchannan in The Great Gatsby is the antagonist and Jay Gatsby must be the protagonist.

Jay Gatsby and Tom Buchannan both grew up from different backgrounds in their lives. Their parents each taught them different morals, ideals, and completely different beliefs. Each having their own life experiences and walking away from each a different person than the other and going about their business completely differently. They both however began to not care about life. Jay decided to become a big money spender while Tom decided to be moe conservative with his money and find his pleasures else where.

Tom Buchannan was born into money. He was born into a rich family. Growing up with a family that has an old set of values. He went to school in New England , graduating from New Haven University of Connecticut. Tom is a thirty year old man. He h ad a very hoarse and robust type of a voice. He eventually settled in the wealthy end of Long Island. Tom lives in a very fancy old type of a house in East Egg Long Island. He lives where all the high class rich home owners live that have the old set of values and have always had wealth. This is the exact opposite of East Egg Long Island where they were just coming into wealth and wanted to flaunt it around as much as they could. Trying to make themselves happy. They believed that throwing their money around could make them happy people from which Jay Gatsby was no different.

Tom had a normal life for a wealthy man with the old set of values. He has a wife named Daisy and a daughter that they named Pammy. Daisy was no different from Tom in that she too was born into money. So she was used to the highlife. Its also the reason that she pretended to be happy with their life so as not to spill what was actually going on. Daisy only married Tom because she needed to and it wa s expected of her. Their marriage is falling apart.

Tom has a mistress in the story. His mistress name is Myrtle Wilson who also happens to be cheating on her husband. These characters love of money is the root of their problems in the story. They value money much too highly. Because Tom Buchannan was born into a wealthy family he was impelled to be a spoiled little brat. And it didnt matter to him if he hirt other people or not. You can see in the story that Tom is a racist pig from the quote Have you read The Rise of the Coloured Empires? whenever he asked Nick about the book and whether he had read it or not.

Tom Buchannan also used to insult and sell Jay Gatsby short whenever he used to say the words Circus Wagon . There isnt too much to see when youre looking for Toms racism. The evidence is few and far between. But his selfishness is quite easy to see in the story. Its a main part of Toms personality. While he is seeing Myrtle Wilson presently, he lost his temper when he found out that Daisy had once had a previous relationship with Jay Gatsby. Tom seems like a bored soul. He seems like a drifter. He goes from place to place without seeming to have a purpose in life for himself. Which isnt too different from what most rich folks do when theyre in the same situation that he is. When they feel lonely and empty and lack of a purpose.

Jay Gatsby the protagonist is one of the most famous characters from the story, especially since part of the title has his namesake in it. To fully and actually understand Jay a person would have to look not at the life that he had made for himself, but at the life that he actually lead. His real life.

Jay is about the same age as Tom is being thirty. He had a very different life than Tom did. He was raised with a poor family in the mid west and ended up creating his own wealth and trying to create his own happiness. He unlike his stuck up counterpart fought in World War One. Jay lives in an extravagant home with a huge garden, a marble swimming pool and constantly has parties to show off his wealth. He lives in the East Egg part of Long Island.

Jay is deeply in love with Daisy Buchannan and would do just about anything to win her from Tom. Jay spent his entire life yearning for money and success, as well as Daisy the one for his heart. However even when hes richer than he has ever been and his status in society is as high as it has ever been he still can win Daisys heart. One of the most important symbols in the story that represents Daisy and everything that Gatsby needs is the green light.

Jay Gatsby is well known and so are his parties that he throws inviting celebrities and important people to them. Gatsbys personality is so odd that theres plenty of rumors about him to go around. Jays original name was James Gatz and he wasnt fond of it so to reinvent himself he started calling himself Jay Gatsby. But whatever he does and no matter how hard he tries he wont be able to win the love of his life back. Which is why he throws such huge parties just to take his mind off of things and try to atleast be a little happy and make people think that he is.

The only similarity between Tom and Gatsby besides their enormous wealth is that both of their lives are based on having or hurting Daisy. Their actions are careless and theyre child like people because of how easy they have it in life. Money seems to have ruined Gatsby. Theyre both irresponsible and have disgusting personalities and both having empty pointless lives.