<P> Nick eventually receives an invitation to one of Gatsby's parties . Nick encounters Jordan Baker at the party and they meet Gatsby himself, an aloof and surprisingly young man who recognizes Nick from their same division in the Great War . Through Jordan, Nick later learns that Gatsby knew Daisy through a purely chance meeting in 1917 when Daisy and her friends were doing volunteer services' work with young Officers headed to Europe . From their brief meetings and casual encounters at that time, Gatsby became (and still is) deeply in love with Daisy . Gatsby had hoped that his wild parties would attract an unsuspecting Daisy, who lived across the bay, to appear at his doorstep and allow him to present himself as a man of wealth and position . </P> <P> Having developed a budding friendship with Nick, Gatsby uses him to arrange a reunion between himself and Daisy . Nick invites Daisy to have tea at his house without telling her that Gatsby will also be there . After an initially awkward reunion, Gatsby and Daisy begin an affair over the summer . At a luncheon at the Buchanans' house, Daisy speaks to Gatsby with such undisguised intimacy that Tom realizes she is in love with Gatsby . Though Tom is himself involved in an extramarital affair, he is outraged by his wife's infidelity . He forces the group to drive into New York City and confronts Gatsby in a suite at the Plaza Hotel, asserting that he and Daisy have a history that Gatsby could never understand . In addition to that, he announces to his wife that Gatsby is a criminal whose fortune comes from bootlegging alcohol and other illegal activities . Daisy realizes that her allegiance is to Tom, and Tom contemptuously sends her back to East Egg with Gatsby, attempting to prove that Gatsby cannot hurt her . </P> <P> On the way back, Gatsby's car strikes and kills Tom's mistress, Myrtle . Nick later learns from Gatsby that Daisy, not Gatsby himself, was driving the car at the time of the accident . Myrtle's husband, Wilson, falsely concludes that the driver of the yellow car is the secret lover he suspects she has . He learns that the yellow car is Gatsby's, fatally shoots him and then turns the gun on himself . Nick stages an unsettlingly small funeral for Gatsby which none of Gatsby's associates or partygoers attend . Later, Nick runs into Tom in New York and finds out that Tom had told George that the yellow car was Gatsby's and gave him Gatsby's address . Disillusioned with the East, Nick moves back to the Midwest . </P> <Ul> <Li> Nick Carraway--a Yale graduate originating from the Midwest, a World War I veteran, and, at the start of the plot, a newly arrived resident of West Egg, who is aged 29 (later 30). He also serves as the first - person narrator of the novel . He is Gatsby's next - door neighbor and a bond salesman . He is easy - going, occasionally sarcastic, and somewhat optimistic, although this latter quality fades as the novel progresses . He is a more grounded character than the others, and more practical, and is always in awe of other character's lifestyles and morals . </Li> <Li> Jay Gatsby (originally James "Jimmy" Gatz)--a young, mysterious millionaire with shady business connections (later revealed to be a bootlegger), originally from North Dakota . He is obsessed with Daisy Buchanan, a beautiful debutante from Louisville, Kentucky whom he had met when he was a young military officer stationed at the Army's Camp Taylor in Louisville during World War I . The character is based on the bootlegger and former World War I officer, Max Gerlach, according to Some Sort of Epic Grandeur, Matthew J. Bruccoli's biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald . Gatsby is said to have briefly studied at Trinity College, Oxford in England after the end of World War I . </Li> <Li> Daisy Fay Buchanan--an attractive though shallow and self - absorbed, young Louisville, Kentucky debutante and socialite, identified as a flapper . She is Nick's second cousin, once removed, and the wife of Tom Buchanan . Daisy once had a romantic relationship with Gatsby, before she married Tom . Her choice between Gatsby and Tom is one of the central conflicts in the novel . Daisy is believed to have been inspired by Fitzgerald's own youthful romances with Ginevra King . </Li> <Li> Thomas (or Tom) Buchanan--a millionaire who lives on East Egg, and Daisy's husband . Tom is an imposing man of muscular build with a "husky tenor" voice and arrogant demeanor . He is a former football star at Yale . Buchanan has parallels with William Mitchell, the Chicagoan who married Ginevra King . Buchanan and Mitchell were both Chicagoans with an interest in polo . Like Ginevra's father, whom Fitzgerald resented, Buchanan attended Yale and is a white supremacist . </Li> <Li> Jordan Baker--A professional golfer and Daisy Buchanan's long - time friend with a sarcastic streak and an aloof attitude . She is Nick Carraway's girlfriend for most of the novel, though they grow apart towards the end . She has a slightly shady reputation amongst the New York social elite, due to her habit of being evasive and untruthful with her friends and lovers . Fitzgerald told Maxwell Perkins that Jordan was based on the golfer Edith Cummings, a friend of Ginevra King . Her name is a play on the two popular automobile brands, the Jordan Motor Car Company and the Baker Motor Vehicle, alluding to Jordan's "fast" reputation and the freedom now presented to Americans, especially women, in the 1920s . </Li> <Li> George B. Wilson--a mechanic and owner of a garage . He is disliked by both his wife, Myrtle Wilson, and Tom Buchanan, who describes him as "so dumb he doesn't know he's alive". At the end of the novel, he kills Gatsby, wrongly believing he had been driving the car that killed Myrtle, and then kills himself . </Li> <Li> Myrtle Wilson--George's wife, and Tom Buchanan's mistress . Myrtle, who possesses a fierce vitality, is desperate to find refuge from her complacent marriage . She is accidentally killed by Gatsby's car (driven by Daisy, though Gatsby insists he would take the blame for the accident). </Li> <Li> Meyer Wolfshiem--a Jewish friend and mentor of Gatsby's, described as a gambler who fixed the World Series . Wolfshiem appears only twice in the novel, the second time refusing to attend Gatsby's funeral . He is a clear allusion to Arnold Rothstein, a New York crime kingpin who was notoriously blamed for the Black Sox Scandal which tainted the 1919 World Series . </Li> </Ul>

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