Immoral Daisy Buchanan

The novel, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is told by Nick Carraway who lived on Long Island next to a man named Jay Gatsby who lived in a huge mansion. Nick became very curious about Gatsby after being the only person to receive an invitation to one of his huge parties. He later finds out he is in love with his cousin Daisy Buchanan, who is married to Tom Buchanan. The two meet again and start seeing each other, while Tom is also having an affair with a woman from the Valley of Ashes, named Myrtle. Daisy is in love with two men and needs to decide who she wants to be with. Daisy Buchanan represents the perfect image to Gatsby, she is everything he thinks he needs to complete his life, though she is selfish and manipulative. In the beginning she is portrayed as the victim but we see her true personality unfold throughout the novel.

Daisy Buchanan is a beautiful woman who is the love interest of Gatsby in this novel. Daisy grew up in Lexington, Kentucky and could have had any man that she wanted. Many of the military officers that were stationed near her home were attracted to her. One of these officers was Jay Gatsby who lied about his background to her in order for her to like him. She eventually fell in love with Gatsby but he soon had to leave to go fight in the war. Daisy wasn't willing to wait for him to return as she met Tom Buchanan (her husband in the book) and knew that he came from a wealthy background and that her parents had approved of him. Although Daisy comes across as sophisticated and charming she also turns out to be very fickle and selfish and fake. An example of this is when Nick first arrives to her home for the first time and describes her laugh as an absurd, charming little laugh (8). This shows the audience that she might be kind of fake and probably not the most genuine person.

Daisy wants to come across as very sophisticated but also comes across as having to be the center of attention. She is flirtatious towards men and when she speaks she sometimes acts so excited it's as if she was acting. It is obvious that the is annoyed with her husband by the way they interact with one another. 'You did it, Tom' (Daisy) said accusingly. 'I know you didn't mean to, but you did do it. That's what I get for marrying a brute of a man, a great, big, hulking physical specimen of a--,' (12). She doesn't appear to be afraid of him at all and they both seem to be miserable around one another. When she is around her friends, she tries to act funny and when she is around Gatsby she puts on her charm. She acts overly excited about everything he says and shows to her. In the beginning of the book, Daisy was almost looked upon as the victim and you felt a little bad for her when you found out that Tom was cheating on her. By the end of the book you do not feel sorry for her anymore as you see the true Daisy.

Daisy's existence is all about social status and money. Everything she does in life has to do with these two things. The way she acts around people and the way she treats people. She almost seems to be a little insecure in that she is very dependent on men but yet she also seems to be angry at them a lot as well. She doesn't want to have to be responsible for anything nor does she want to have to make any decisions. She just wants to keep her life the way it is and be taken care of. This is the reason why she won't leave Tom even though she knows that he is cheating on her. She can't leave Tom for Gatsby as it would be too hard and Gatsby doesn't have the social status that Tom does. They also were too much alike and probably deserved each other. They were careless people. Tom and Daisy-they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made, (179).

The story ends with Gatsby dying as a result of taking the blame for killing someone when in actuality, it was Daisy. This is where we get the full picture of how the character we were introduced to in the beginning of the novel seemed to have changed drastically compared to the character we see at the end of the novel. However in reality it is the same person but we just don't know the true Daisy yet. Daisy was portrayed as the poor wife of Tom who was having an affair. We initially don't know if Daisy knows about the affair or not. Then as the story unfolds we see glimpses that maybe Daisy does know about Tom but just doesn't really care as their marriage does not appear to be that great. You see how Daisy doesn't really seem to have a lot of love for her daughter as not much is mentioned about her and she never really seemed to spend much time with her. It isn't until she meets up with Gatsby that we start to get a true picture of what Daisy is really like. She has no problem starting a relationship with Gatsby and then is perfectly fine when Gatsby takes the blame for her killing Tom's mistress.

Finally when we are told that Daisy does not attend Gatsby's funeral but instead takes off with Tom and doesn't leave a forwarding address. We see that she is capable of a lot of bad and has very little morals in life.

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