TheGGatsby: Selfish People

The Great Gatsby is composed mainly of selfish characters. Most of the characters only think about themselves and only care about what is good and best for them. In life, many people desire things such as money, love, wealth, and all the riches in the world. They don't know that these things are all meaningless, yet they crave more and more of everything they want and become a selfish person. In the Great Gatsby, the characters desire for many things they can not even have or even get close to, yet they force themselves to have it just to please themselves. Most of their goal and desire in life is to have a happy life that they like with all the things and wealth they can get.

Characters in the Great Gatsby that represent and portray selfishness would be Jay Gatsby, Daisy Buchanan, Tom Buchanan, and Myrtle Wilson.

Gatsby represents selfishness in many different ways. His unfailing love and desire for Daisy, his reputation in town, his mansion and riches, and his overall as a person makes him one of the most selfish people in they story. His love for Daisy Buchanan is what keeps him going and living. Gatsby thinks that he can still bring back Daisy after five years that they've been separated and make her love him like she did before. Selfishness takes place in this in a way that he only thinks of himself and how this will affect Daisy and especially Tom, Daisy's husband. He wants her back in his life but he can not accept the fact that Daisy is married to Tom and that she loves her husband very much. In the story, Gatsby even tells Daisy to admit to her husband that she doesn't love Tom anymore. Also, he brags about his wealth and riches through his gigantic mansion and luxurious parties he throws. Gatsby lies about how he got all his money by saying he was involved in business with drug stores and such, when he really was into the illegal bootlegging of alcohol. This is selfish in a way that he doesn't acknowledge the fact that Dan Cody was the one that really brought him to the wealth he has, and not himself who brought himself to where he is now.

Other examples of selfishness would be Tom and Daisy Buchanan. They both are wealthy and living the good life, but they are also both hiding a serious affair from each other. Their affairs show that they are not true to each other and just lying to each other. Both of them are selfish in a way that pleasing themselves with another woman and man is what makes them happy. Tom and Daisy should be happy together and to be content with one another and not looking for happiness some place else such as having affairs.

Myrtle Wilson should be ashamed of what she is doing to her husband, George Wilson. Not only is she selfish with the affair she's having, she is also unfaithful. George has been kind, caring, and faithful to Myrtle yet she chooses to have an affair with Tom Buchanan. Maybe the reason for this is she wants to become wealthy by being with Tom and have him to buy her anything and everything she wants. She is selfish in a way that her husband has been faithful to her but she treats him unfairly by cheating on him.