The Great Gatsby

The novel takes place in New York during the summer of 1922, specifically across three main locations: Long Island, Manhattan, and a bleak industrial area in between.

Most of the story unfolds on Long Island, which is split into two contrasting communities. West Egg, where Nick Carraway and Jay Gatsby live, is home to the “new rich”—people like Gatsby who have recently made their fortunes and display their wealth through extravagant parties and mansions. Across the bay is East Egg, where Daisy and Tom Buchanan live, representing “old money”—families with inherited wealth, social status, and long-established connections. These two places face each other across the water, and so the very geography is a visible symbol of class division.

The characters also travel frequently into Manhattan, where much of the novel’s tension plays out. Affairs, confrontations, and the climactic argument between Gatsby and Tom all happen there. The city represents excitement and excess, but also moral looseness and chaos.

Between Long Island and Manhattan lies the Valley of Ashes, an industrial wasteland covered in dust and decay. This area, where George and Myrtle Wilson live, stands in stark contrast to both Eggs. It represents those left behind by the era’s wealth, the people who live there having been crushed by the same economic system that enriches characters like Gatsby and Tom.

Together, these settings create a map of the novel’s central conflict: a glittering world of wealth and illusion built alongside—and often at the expense of—poverty, decay, and moral emptiness. The physical distances between these places mirror the social and emotional gaps the characters can’t overcome.