The Great Gatsby: Top Ten Plot Quotes (plus analysis...)

The Great Gatsby: Top Ten Plot Quotes (plus analysis…)

Character-Defining Quotes

  • “I hope she’ll be a fool—that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Daisy’s wish for her daughter expresses her own knowledge of the gender expectations within her society. It showcases her awareness of the limited and often superficial role of women in the 1920s.

  • “They’re a rotten crowd. You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.” Nick’s opinion of Tom and his circle is clear in this quote. It allows us to explore the theme of moral decay among the established American upper class.

  • “I’m thirty. I’m five years too old to lie to myself and call it honour.” This quote from Nick indicates his growing disillusionment with the East Coast elite. It’s an explicit illustration of the moral costs of their lifestyle.

  • “Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.” Meyer Wolfsheim’s statement, referencing Gatsby after his death, emphasizes the theme of superficial relationships and the hollowness of the American Dream.

Significant Plot-Advancing Quotes

  • “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” The book’s closing lines suggest the impossibility of escaping the past, a significant concept in Gatsby’s character and life.

  • “Her voice is full of money.” When Gatsby says this about Daisy, it highlights how he is attracted by her wealth and status—characteristics he associates with the elusive American Dream.

  • “There must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams—not through her own fault, but because of the colossal vitality of his illusion.” This is a reflection on the failure of Gatsby’s dream to match reality, again speaking to the hollowness of his pursuit.

Evidencing Themes Through Quotes

  • “And I like large parties. They’re so intimate. At small parties there isn’t any privacy.” Daisy’s paradoxical statement underscores the theme of societal decay and moral hollowness.

  • “Can’t repeat the past?…Why of course you can!” Gatsby’s assertion, in direct contradiction to the reality of life, highlights the futility of his dream and underscores the novel’s exploration of time, memory, and regret.

  • “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and…then retreated back into their money…leaving others to clean up the mess they had made.” Nick’s summary of Tom and Daisy is a damning indictment of their irresponsibility and selfishness. This thematically ties into the critique of the American Dream, exposing its cost on those less privileged.