"Who is this Gatsby anyhow?" demanded Tom suddenly. "Some big bootlegger?"
Chapter 6 · Tom Buchanan
Context
As Tom and Daisy wait for their car after the party, Tom suddenly demands to know Gatsby's identity and source of wealth. His immediate assumption—bootlegging—reflects both his suspicion of new money and his instinctive need to delegitimize a potential rival.
Analysis
Tom's blunt question strips away all social niceties to assert his class authority: by reducing Gatsby to 'this Gatsby' and immediately supplying 'bootlegger' as the answer, he performs the old-money prerogative of defining others' social worth. The question functions less as genuine inquiry than as a declaration of intent to investigate and destroy, foreshadowing Tom's eventual exposure of Gatsby's criminal connections in Chapter 7.
How to Use in Essay
Useful for essays on Tom as the enforcer of class boundaries, or for tracing how Tom's suspicion builds across chapters toward the confrontation that destroys Gatsby's fantasy.