Discussion Topic
Tom and Daisy's Departure in The Great Gatsby
Summary:
In The Great Gatsby, Tom and Daisy Buchanan leave East Egg after Gatsby's death, abandoning their responsibilities and the chaos they contributed to. They depart without leaving a forwarding address, signifying their desire to escape the situation and its consequences. This reflects their "careless" nature, as they retreat into their wealth and disregard the havoc they cause. Nick later encounters Tom in New York, underscoring their pattern of evading accountability and leaving others to handle their messes.
Why do Tom and Daisy leave in chapter 9 of The Great Gatsby?
Tom and Daisy leave in Chapter IX because they have no reason to stay. They left town shortly after Tom had revealed the source of Gatsby's fortune to Daisy during the big blow up in New York City. Nick had seen the couple, that same night, sharing a late meal and possessing "an unmistakable air of natural intimacy," despite the fact that Daisy had earlier referred to her husband as someone who "disgust[s] [her]." It seems that Daisy realizes that she can never have the same life, the same status, that she enjoys with Tom if she were with Gatsby instead, and so she simply leaves with her family as if to put the whole dream behind her.
Perhaps she and Tom decide that a trip far from home with be good for them all. They seem to have been happy on their honeymoon, and so maybe they think...
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another trip will help their relationship. He still believes, as far as we know, that Gatsby killed Myrtle, Tom's mistress, with his car, and Daisy seems content to let Gatsby continue to take the blame for that accident. There is nothing to keep them in East Egg, or even New York, for now, so why not take a trip and put the whole ugly business behind them?
After Nick runs into Tom some months later, he describes the couple as "careless people [...] -- 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 [...]." Tom and Daisy do not have to clean up their messes; they do not have to take responsibility. They can simply wash their hands of those individuals who are beneath them, and this is precisely what they do.
Where are Tom and Daisy at the end of The Great Gatsby?
In chapter 9 of the story, after Gatsby's death, it falls to Nick to "telephone news of the catastrophe" to all the villages in West Egg and all of Gatsby's acquaintances. Daisy is one of Nick's early calls; he feels sure that she, at least, will be interested in Gatsby's fate, but he finds that she and Tom "had gone away early that afternoon, and taken baggage with them." They have left no forwarding address or any idea of how Nick could reach them, which upsets Nick because he feels he owes it to Gatsby to bring someone to him who would genuinely care that he is dead.
Many months later, in late October, Nick sees Tom Buchanan in Fifth Avenue by chance. Nick, outraged at what Tom and Daisy did after Gatsby's death, refuses to shake hands with him, but Tom behaves as if this is "crazy." But when Tom explains himself—"he ran over Myrtle like you'd run over a dog"—Nick concedes to shake his hand, knowing that, although what Tom says is untrue, his behavior was justified in Tom's eyes. So Nick shakes hands with Tom, and Tom walks on into a jewelry shop, "rid of my provincial squeamishness forever."
This is the last we see of Tom and Daisy, and the reader is told nothing more of what becomes of them.
At the end of Chapter 7, Nick observes Daisy and Tom after the accident that killed Myrtle:
They weren’t happy, and neither of them had touched the chicken or the ale — and yet they weren’t unhappy either. There was an unmistakable air of natural intimacy about the picture, and anybody would have said that they were conspiring together.
Nick already knows that Gatsby has lost the fight for Daisy, and she and Tom will stay together. After Gatsby's death at the hand of Wilson, Nick calls to Tom and Daisy's house to tell them about Gatsby, but they have already left, taking baggage with them and leaving no forwarding address. Nick later runs into Tom on Fifth Avenue in New York City, presumably where Tom and Daisy ran the day of Gatsby death. Nick's comment about them sums it up:
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. . . .
It does not really matter where they ended up; they will always create messes where they live (think of Tom and all of his illicit affairs) and move on, leaving chaos in their wake.