As the chapters progress in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, I can see a bond building between Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway. This became very prominent to me when Gatsby began telling Nick the truth about his life. This was important because it seemed everyone in the city knew stories of Gatsby but at the end announced it was just a rumor they heard. No one really knew where he was from or how he came upon his money. To me, this seems as though that's the way Gatsby wants it; so it was out of his comfort to tell Nick his real story.
"He hurried through the phrase "educated at Oxford" or swallowed it, or choked on it, as though it had bothered him before. And with this doubt, his whole statement fell to pieces, and I wondered if there wasn't something a little sinister about him after all," (Fitzgerald, pg65). I wonder what bothered Gatsby about this? Why wouldn't he confide fully with Nick if he began to at all? Maybe Gatsby was hiding something terrible from the world. Although, I do have confidence that he is telling the truth. I believe Gatsby to be just a retired veteran and a young, educated man who found great wealth.
Another quote that I felt was extremely important at this point in the novel was on page 66, "Then the war came, old sport. It was a great relief, and I tried very hard to die, but I seemed to bear an enchanted life." This quote really tells the reader alot about Gatsby's character. He must have been bearing a burden in his life to where a war was a relief to him, something to get away to. He even says he was just hoping he would die in the war and went out of his way to TRY to die. He did find that when in the end he couldn't succeed in dying, he must have a deeper meaning for the world. I believe this to be the wake up call Jay Gatsby needed.
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