The relationship at the very heart of The Great Gatsby is, of course, Gatsby and Daisy, or more specifically, Gatsby's tragic love of (or obsession with) Daisy, a love that drives the novel's plot.
The analyzes of the novel shows that it is through Daisy Buchanan's influence that Gatsby is transformed into the man we meet in the novel. It is Gatsby's longing for the American dream that will lead him into the arms of Daisy Buchanan, who symbolizes both wealth and social standing, a woman beyond Gatsby's reach.
Gatsby is only in love with Daisy because of her identity and what she represents. He is unable to forget the past where Daisy once saw him as a perfect man in her eyes and can't accept his new reality. Gatsby's want of wealth and power only proves that he only loves the idea of her and not actually her.
Despite Gatsby's “romantic readiness” (2), as narrator Nick Carraway puts it, he subtly shows that his love for Daisy is never genuine. Gatsby, in fact, is never capable of loving her at all; he was born with a life and status too drastically different from hers to ever really connect with her in a true, romantic way.
Gatsby's obsession with Daisy resulted in him buying a mansion across the lake from her, throwing huge parties, and spending years of his life trying to become rich. Gatsby bought mansion intentionally across the lake from Daisy just to be closer to her.
Gatsby obsessively gazes at the green light in hopes and dreams of being with Daisy again. His undoubted obsessive love with her makes him carry out all his unusual and mysterious actions. His arms stretching out towards the green light symbolizes his dream of reuniting with Daisy even though she is with Tom.
Gatsby's obsession for money, “the instrument which will enable him to fulfil his dream”, is closely related to his dream of regaining “the peace Daisy once gave him”, and with this desire goes the obsession to repeat the past.
This is at the very end of the novel. Of the late Gatsby, Tom says, “That fellow had it coming to him. He threw dust in your eyes just like he did in Daisy's….” And that's why it matters that Nick is gay and in love with Gatsby: because Tom's assessment is spot-on, but Nick will never admit it.
Gatsby reveals details of his and Daisy's long ago courtship. He was enthralled by her wealth, her big house, and the idea of men loving her. To be with Daisy, he pretended to be of the same social standing as her. One night, they slept together, and he felt like they were married.
The first thing that attracted Gatsby was Daisy's wealth – her house in particular ('there was a ripe mystery about it'). This removes the idea that he was attracted to Daisy in herself. He was – and still is – attracted to the 'money' in her.
Not only is he a total stalker, but he also develops her into an unattainable ideal that Daisy herself couldn't live up to, and is then disappointed when she isn't this impossible ideal.
Daisy, like her husband, has an affair but, she cheats on Tom with Gatsby. She slowly starts to lose faith in humanity and starts to see the world as a very bad place. She wishes for her daughter to not see the world for what it is.
While Gatsby desires Daisy, his pursuit of her is a lot like his pursuit of money and prosperity. Gatsby thinks he wants love, and maybe he does, but Daisy also represents the American Dream, and he wants the money and lifestyle that come with being with a woman like Daisy.
The implication here is that Daisy was romantically experienced and certainly no virgin, an implication further supported in the fact that there was no mention of loss of virginity when Gatsby "took her."
Gatsby was surprised by the fact that Daisy has a child as he saw her as a daydream rather than a woman. The main character was deeply in love with a dream girl who barely had flesh. So, she could not possibly be associated with such earthly aspects as childbearing.
Daisy does not want to be seen attending Gatsby's funeral because she does care about her reputation, despite the fact that she has never loved Tom. As a result, she makes the decision to abstain out of concern that she will damage both her connection with Tom and her standing in the eyes of the general public.
Nick admires Gatsby due to his optimism, how he shapes his own life, and how doggedly he believes in his dream, despite the cruel realities of 1920s America.
He sees both the extraordinary quality of hope that Gatsby possesses and his idealistic dream of loving Daisy in a perfect world. Though Nick recognizes Gatsby's flaws the first time he meets him, he cannot help but admire Gatsby's brilliant smile, his romantic idealization of Daisy, and his yearning for the future.
First, Luhrmann made the curious decision to begin the story with Nick Carraway (our first-person narrator played by Tobey Maguire) writing in a patient's journal after ending up in a mental hospital due to “morbid alcoholism, fits of anger, insomnia.” According to Mike Hogan's (Executive Arts and Entertainment Editor ...
Compulsive Behavior
Gatsby is obsessed with Daisy and feels compelled to throw party after party after party to get her attention. He lies compulsively about how he became rich, and is compulsive in his desire to spend time with Daisy, even though he knows the dangers of becoming intimate with a married woman.
(Which, of course, is part of the point of the novel.) And perhaps Daisy realizes that Gatsby's love is as fake as his name. At the end, she's left with a man who thinks too much of her and a man who thinks too little of her. She chooses the latter, since she can't measure up to the former.
Daisy isn't really talking about—or weeping over—the shirts from England. Her strong emotional reaction comes from the excitement of Gatsby having the proper wealth, and perhaps remorse over the complexity of the situation; he is finally a man she could marry, but she is already wed to Tom.
Gatsby tells Nicks about the magical past that he wants to recreate. It was encapsulated in the moment of Gatsby and Daisy's first kiss. As soon as Gatsby kissed Daisy, all of his fantasies about himself and his future fixated solely on her.
Daisy is a beautiful fool, she knows about Tom's affair, but doesn't say anything just so to keep that image of an ideal happy family. Daisy thought she had love when she married Tom, but in reality it was for his money.
It is control, not affection. But Daisy is no better, as she uses Gatsby as an escape from her life she feeds into his toxic fantasies. Yet, eventually she leaves without even phoning the man she 'loves' good-bye.