Tom Character Sketch

Throughout the first chapter of The Great Gatsby, there is not a ton of information released about the characters. The people at the dinner party, Tom, Daisy, Jordan, and Nick, all maintain an air of mystery about them. It almost seems as if Fitzgerald is trying to withold as much as possible from the reader at this point in order to pull him in little by little. Of all the characters in this scene, it seems like the author is willing to reveal the most about Tom. Because of his years playing football at Yale, he became a sort of national figure. But as he stopped playing, he has disappeared from the scene. But Tom continues in search for this past glory. Even Nick believes that "Tom will drift on forever seeking, a little wistfully, for the dramatic turbulence of some irrecoverable football game". But despite Fitzgerald's willingness to expose some of Tom Buchanan's personality, he keeps a lot of it mysterious. One of the most interesting things we find out about Tom is his strange fascination towards Nick. The two have strikingly different personalities, yet Nick is concinced that Tom "approved of me and wanted me to like him with some harsh, defiant wistfulness of his own". Adding to Tom's mystery is his "woman in New York". But we find out no more than that about this woman, because the author cleverly cuts off the conversation at that point to leave the reader hanging. The last thing we learn about Tom is his belief in white supremacy. Although this is something not uncommon for people to believe in this time peiod, it is worth noting because it seems to make Nick slightly uncomfortable.