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Daisy's Responsibility In The Great Gatsby

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In all of our lives we all have certain responsibilities we are expected to uphold, regardless of how big or small they may be. When we do not handle these things, consequences are soon to follow. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, Daisy proves herself to be incapable of being fulfilled in her life; leeching off of the success and emotions of others to get what she wants. Daisy Buchanan is an incredible example of how wrong everything can go when we don’t respect the feelings of others, nor take our own into consideration. In The Great Gatsby, Daisy proves herself to be a manipulative and irresponsible person and fails to take responsibility for her actions on multiple occasions. Whether it’s taking care of her daughter, staying …show more content…
Gatsby decides to take the blame and suffers the terrible consequences for Daisy’s recklessness. Daisy doesn’t even attempt to take any responsibility for herself. When he is killed by Myrtle's husband, Wilson, she doesn’t bother to even make an appearance at her former lover’s funeral, something that she causes. Instead, she flees from the city with her family and deserts the event. This was her final act of deceit. She continues to preserve herself no matter what. As said in Robert Ornstein’s analysis, ““In Daisy’s case the answer is simple. We remember that Nick Carraway has described Gatsby’s personality as an “unbroken series of successful gestures.” Superficially, Daisy finds in Gatsby, or thinks she finds, that safety from human reality which the empty gesture implies.” (Scott Fitzgerald’s Fable of East and West.” 2016) Daisy was never truly in love with Gatsby. Similar to him, she was in love with the idea of a man who would grant her freedom and an escape from the rest of her life. She couldn’t love him forever, as much as she or Gatsby may have wanted her …show more content…
Yet, she receives no punishment from this occurrence. As stated before, she was recklessly driving when the woman ran out into the street and was hit by Daisy while driving Gatsby’s car. If the murder wasn’t bad enough, it continued to snowball into more disastrous problems. Tom’s hatred for Gatsby, fueled by Daisy, led him to tell Wilson that it must have been Gatsby driving. Even while this was unknown to Gatsby, he still felt inclined to take the hit for the girl that he loved. Daisy offered him no help and no escape. She didn’t even try to take some responsibility for herself. She had promised him a new life where they would run away together, but had no intent on keeping this promise. Gatsby, being the idealist that he was, believed her. Instead, he was met with death. This would make two lives taken, either directly or indirectly, by Daisy Buchanan. Carraway, who again captures the essence of her character perfectly, says, “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—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” (Fitzgerald,

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