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Jay Gatsby
Nick's wealthy neighbor in West Egg. Gatsby owns a gigantic mansion and has become well known for hosting large parties every Saturday night. Gatsby's lust for wealth stems from his desire to win back the…
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Nick Carraway
A young man from Minnesota who has come to New York after graduating Yale and fighting in World War I, Nick is the neighbor of Jay Gatsby and the cousin of Daisy Buchanan. The…
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Daisy Buchanan
The love of Jay Gatsby's life, the cousin of Nick Carraway, and the wife of Tom Buchanan. She grew up in Louisville, Kentucky, where she met and fell in love with Gatsby. She…
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Jordan Baker
A friend of Daisy's who becomes Nick's girlfriend. A successful amateur golfer, Jordan is beautiful and pleasant, but does not inspire Nick to feel much more than a "tender curiosity" for her. Perhaps this is…
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Minor Characters
Tom Buchanan
A former football player and Yale graduate who marries Daisy Buchanan. The oldest son of an extremely wealthy and successful "old money" family, Tom has a veneer of gentlemanly manners that barely veils a self-centered, sexist, racist, violent ogre of a man beneath.
Myrtle Wilson
The wife of George Wilson and the mistress of Tom Buchanan. Myrtle disdains her beaten down husband and desperately wants to improve her lot in life. She chooses Tom as the means to this end, but he sees her as little more than an object.
George Wilson
The husband of Myrtle Wilson and the owner of an auto garage in the Valley of Ashes. Wilson is a beaten-down man, who nevertheless loves and adores his wife. Her affair with Tom drives Wilson to the edge, and her death pushes him over.
Meyer Wolfsheim
Gatsby's business partner and friend. A small, fifty-year-old Jewish man with hairy nostrils and beady eyes, Wolfsheim is a gambler who made his name in organized crime by fixing the 1919 World Series.
Owl Eyes
A drunken man Nick encounters looking through Gatsby's vast library, amazed at the "realism" of all the unread novels.
Ewing Klipspringer
A man who is such a frequent guest at Gatsby's mansion that he almost seems to live there. Yet he turns out to be nothing more than a leech, and after Gatsby's death cares only about retrieving a pair of sneakers he left at Gatsby's mansion.
Dan Cody
Jay Gatsby's first mentor and best friend. Cody left Gatsby twenty-five thousand dollars when he died, but Gatsby never received it due to a legal complication.
Henry Gatz
Jay Gatsby's father. A dignified but poor man, Henry Gatz loves his son deeply and believes he was destined for great things.
Pammy Buchanan
Daisy and Tom Buchanan's young daughter.
Michaelis
A young Greek man who runs a coffee shop near Wilson's garage.
Catherine
Myrtle Wilson's sister.
