The Great Gatsby
Prompt #28 · The Great Gatsby
Prompt Type: Relationship/Contrast
Analyze the contrast between Gatsby's idealized love for Daisy and Tom's possessive relationship with her. How does Fitzgerald use this contrast to explore different forms of desire and their consequences? Explain how it contributes to the meaning of the work as a whole.
Quote 1
"Oh, you want too much!" she cried to Gatsby. "I love you now—isn't that enough? I can't help what's past." She began to sob helplessly. "I did love him once—but I loved you too."
Chapter 7
Argument
This quote represents Daisy's conflicted position between Gatsby's idealized love and Tom's possessive relationship, highlighting the tension between Gatsby's demand for an absolute rejection of the past and Tom's entrenched claim on her.
Quote 2
“He wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: "I never loved you." After she had obliterated four years with that sentence they could decide upon the more practical measures to be taken.”
Chapter 6
Argument
This quote exemplifies Gatsby's idealized love, where he seeks to erase Daisy's past with Tom entirely, contrasting with Tom's possessive stance that treats Daisy as an object to be controlled rather than a partner to be won.
Quote 3
“They weren't happy, and neither of them had touched the chicken or the ale—and yet they weren't unhappy either. There was an unmistakable air of natural intimacy about the picture, and anybody would have said that they were conspiring together.”
Chapter 7
Argument
This quote illustrates Tom's possessive relationship with Daisy, showing their unnatural yet stable intimacy, which contrasts sharply with Gatsby's romantic but ultimately unsustainable vision of love.
Quote 4
“He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning-fork that had been struck upon a star. Then he kissed her. At his lips' touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.”
Chapter 6
Argument
This quote captures Gatsby's idealized love for Daisy, portraying his romanticized vision of her as an almost divine figure, which starkly contrasts with Tom's possessive and materialistic view of their relationship.