The Great Gatsby Group

Question:

animalluver2
animalluver2
Student
High School - 11th Grade

In The Great Gatsby, what is the major conflict?

Rate question:

Posted by animalluver2 on Thursday March 12, 2009 at 8:48 PM and tagged with agons, conflict, conflicts, fitzgerald, gatsby, major conflict, plot resolution, the great gatsby, theme, themes.

Answers:

  1. mshurn
    mshurn Teacher
    College - Freshman

    eNotes Editor

    The central conflict in the novel concerns Gatsby's dream of winning Daisy back and repeating their past as if they had never been separated. Gatsby wants to wipe out the previous five years, an impossible dream. Nick tries to explain to Gatsby that no one can ever repeat the past, but Gatsby refuses to believe it:

    "Can't repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can . . . I'm going to fix everything just the way it was before," he said, nodding determinedly. "She'll see."

    As Gatsby continues to talk, Nick begins to understand the importance to Gatsby of his dream:

    He talked a lot about the past and I gathered that he wanted to recover something, some idea of himself perhaps, that had gone into loving Daisy. His life had been confused and disordered since then, but if he could once return to a certain starting place and go over it all slowly, he could find out what that thing was . . . .

    The conflict is resolved when Daisy refuses to tell Tom Buchanan, her husband, that she never loved him, choosing instead to abandon Gatsby again and stay in her marriage. In the hours leading up to his death, Gatsby is still waiting for Daisy to call, refusing to recognize, acknowledge, or accept that his dream is not going to come true.

     

    Sources:
    http://www.enotes.com/great-gatsby/chapter-8-summary-anal...
    http://www.enotes.com/great-gatsby/character-analysis
    http://www.enotes.com/great-gatsby/themes

    Rate answer:

    Posted by mshurn on Thursday March 12, 2009 at 10:17 PM

  2. atropiano
    atropiano

    Gatsby has amassed a huge fortune in order to win the affections of the upper-class Daisy Buchanan, but his mysterious past stands in the way of his being accepted by her.

    Rate answer:

    Posted by atropiano on Friday March 20, 2009 at 8:56 PM