“They were careless people, Tom and Daisy -- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made” (187-88). In those few words Fitzgerald summarizes the essence of Tom and Daisy’s entire being.Another character whose entire being revolves around money is Myrtle Wilson. Myrtle stands at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder and money seems to be her only desire in life. She makes it abundantly clear when she speaks of her wedding: “The only crazy I was when I married him. I knew right away I made a mistake. He borrowed somebody’s best suit to get married in and never even told me about it, and the man came after it one day when he was out” (39). Myrtle has hoped for money however, all that her husband gave her was eleven years of miserable life in poverty. Although Fitzgerald does not shed any light on Myrtle’s feelings for Tom, it is obvious that it is not love. It is only natural to suspect that her relationship with Tom is based on money. Tom might not love her, but he provides her with the kind of lifestyle that she longed for all her life. It might seem confusing at first, but in the end the reader understands that this novel is not about love. It is about that rotting effect that the money has on the society. Fitzgerald depicts the society as a faceless, drunk, and demoralized mass: I see it as a night scene by El Greco: a hundred houses, at once conventional, overhanging sky and lusterless moon. In the foreground four solemn men in dress suits are walking along the sidewalk with a stretcher on which lies a drunken woman in a white evening dress. Her hand, which dangles over the side, sparkles cold with jewels. Gravely the men turn in at a house --- the wrong house. But no one knows the woman’s name, and no one cares. (185)I...
