Chapter 2 Pages 27-42

Summary: Nick goes to the valley of ashes which is a poor neighborhood in between New York and West Egg. There Nick meets Myrtle, Tom’s mistress, and finds out that she is also married. They go into New York and Tom buys a dog for her. They go back to Myrtle’s house and invite over the McKees and her sister Catherine. They all talk, gossip, and even argue which leads to Tom slapping Myrtle across the face and breaking her nose.

Character: Myrtle Wilson

            “The thickish figure of a woman blocked out the light from the office door. She was in the middle thirties, and faintly stout, but she carried her surplus flesh sensuously as some women can. Her face, above a spotted dress of dark blue crepe-de-chine, contained no facet or gleam of beauty but there was an immediately perceptible vitality about her as is the nerves of her body were continually smouldering” (Fitzgerald 29,30).

            Myrtle loves material things. As long as she is getting gifts and buying surplus amounts of unneeded things she will be happy. The only thing she wants in life is to be rich. Myrtle does not care for anything other than money. She loves money and is trying to marry into it. She also buys outrageous things just to prove that she is being taken care of. She also pretends that she is rich and everyone is waiting on her, and wants to be her.

            Myrtle Wilson is married to George Wilson. She lives in a small neighborhood that is not known for it beauty or wealth. She is an average woman that seeks to be higher. She wants to be rich and live a privileged life. She loved her husband until she married him, and realized that the suit he wore was not his and he borrowed it because he could not afford to buy one. Once she meets Tom, a well dressed man that takes taxis, she falls in love because he is rich. Myrtle is envious of Daisy and wishes that she could be Tom’s wife living in a gorgeous mansion in East Egg.

Quote: “Yet high over the city our line of yellow windows must have contributed their share of human secrecy to the casual watcher in the darkening streets, and I was him too, looking up and wondering. I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life” (Fitzgerald 40). I found this quote very interesting because Nick compares himself to Mr. Gatsby. The last time he saw him Gatsby was looking out towards the East Egg wanting something more in life. Now Nick looks out over the city, and finds himself wanting more too. No matter what goes on in life Nick finds it desirable; he will never be bored of life. Nick just like Gatsby has hope.