Great Gatsby Reading Blog #2

F. Scott Fitzgerald included the character of Meyer Wolfsheim to add mystery to the character of Jay Gatsby. Wolfsheim and Gatsby had known each other for a very long time and are good friends, even with the things Wolfsheim has done in the past. Gatsby obviously knows about those, like when Wolfsheim fixed the World Series, and he is not afraid to talk openly about it to Nick. It seems as though Gatsby is fascinated with the fact that Wolfsheim was able to do what he did and the fact that he was never caught. He has lived his life knowing that Wolfsheim did such a thing and has never turned him in, which shows that he could be a very good and trustworthy friend, or that he condones those kinds of activities. At this point in the book, we think of Gatsby as a good man that is welcoming of people into his home and very generous, but this reveals that we still might not know very much about the character of Jay Gatsby. Just like the character of Wolfsheim, the past relationship between Jay and Daisy helps develop Gatsby's character while also making him even more mysterious in some ways. Gatsby and Daisy's relationship ended with him going overseas to the military, so there was a great possibility that they both still had feelings for each other that never went away. On Daisy's wedding day, she almost didn't marry Tom because of a letter she received, which we can assume came from Gatsby. There was obviously still some lost connection between Jay and Daisy that never went away, so that could be the reason why Gatsby moved so close to where Daisy lived. This possibly reveals one of Gatsby's motives, which is to fix things with Daisy and get their relationship back. The rest of Gatsby's past shows that he had to support himself as he grew up and reached adulthood and had to experience the world firsthand. To me, he becomes a much more interesting character because more and more mystery builds around him has we find out what he is really like.