Daisy Buchannan
Gender and the 1920s:
- The 19th amendment was passed in 1920 which gave women the right to
vote, which legally afforded more opportunities for women
+ However, their role remained relatively unchanged
+ Women were still expected to get married, have children and remain in
the domestic sphere
- 1920s America is referred to as the ‘Roaring Twenties’ – the age of jazz,
Prohibition (and liquor in great qualities, supplied by bootleggers) and the
flapper (a woman with a bob and painted lips, flaunting the rules of
respectable womanhood by smoking and drinking)
- The emancipated behaviours of the flapper were a direct reaction to
biologically deterministic ideas around femaleness and motherhood,
expectations of chastity and purity, and ideas about the private sphere
being the woman’s natural sphere
- According to historian Gordon A. Craig, the ‘first world war [had]
weakened old orthodoxies and authorities […] a change in manners and
morals [that] made a freer and less restrained society’
+ While WW1 enabled the flapper to emerge, conservative, gendered
ideas still persisted
- Jordan is the novel’s flapper representative and is portrayed as
androgynous
+ When describing her, Nick uses terms like ‘erect’ and ‘young cadet’
(ch1)
+ She also is pursuing a professional career in golfing, compounding to
her image of the ‘New Woman’; someone who resisted old gender
expectations
+ Her name is also gender-ambiguous
- Daisy is more traditionally feminine, indicated by her name
+ The colour white is used 49 times in relation to Daisy to signal her
outward purity, ethereality and wealth
+ She doesn’t outwardly subvert gender expectations
+ Linn Carson argues that Daisy reflects the New Woman in her thoughts,
signalled by her cynicism about her role and daughter’s future role
- Daisy hopes that her daughter will be ‘a beautiful little fool’ because
‘that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world’
+ This signals that she has realised she is ‘just a pawn in the game’; a
trophy to be desired
+ The gender contradictions inherent in American society during the
1920s have their counterpart in Daisy’s submissiveness versus her inner
cynicism
, Key characteristics:
Beautiful and charming
- Daisy’s name reflects how she is delicate and decorative, reinforced by
her attire when we first meet her: her white dress ‘rippl[es] and flutter[s]
as if [it] had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house’
(ch1)
- Daisy’s only role is to be a trophy for Tom since she’s wealthy enough to
have her child get taken care of by a nurse
- We have a clear sense of her charm, surroundings and dress and rarely
get a sense of her physical appearance
+ This contrasts Jordan, who’s immediately described as having an ‘erect
carriage’, ‘grey, sun-strained eyes’ and being ‘slender [and] small-
breasted’
+ Daisy’s charm lies more so in her mythology than in her physical
persona
- Daisy is surrounded by an aura of wealth and this manifests in her ‘low,
thrilling’, ‘glowing and singing’ voice (ch1)
- In ch7, Gatsby points out ‘Her voice is full of money’
+ This allows Nick to come to the realisation that, therein, lies her laugh’s
‘inexhaustible charm […] the jingle of it, the cymbals’ song of it’
- Fitzgerald employs pathetic fallacy to suggest Daisy’s external beauty
+ ‘The last of the sunshine fell upon her glowing face with romantic
affection’
- Daisy’s childhood came with purity and ease – ‘Our white girlhood was
passed together there. Our beautiful white…’ (ch1)
+ Her ‘world’ is ‘redolent of orchids and pleasant’
+ People are likely attracted to these associations rather than to Daisy’s
actual characteristics; passive, cynical, charming, superficial
Artificial
- She frequently stutters, appearing playful but also suggests her to be a
constant performer as she acts out of happiness
+ ‘I’m p-paralyzed with happiness’ (ch1)
+ ‘[…] followed by Daisy’s voice on a clear artificial note: ‘I certainly am
awfully glad to see you again.’’ (ch5)
+ Daisy seems to always be in performance mode when around others
+ Later, Nick repeats ‘Daisy was young and her artificial world was
redolent of orchids’
- Daisy’s prioritisation of beauty means she buries her head in the sand to
avoid the grim reality of life, made clear by the Valley of Ashes
+ This is what makes her artificial
- Daisy’s surname – Fay – evokes fairylike connotations, associating her
with romantic supernaturalism, rising above the realistic
+ Gatsby also idealises her, projecting onto her, ignoring her true nature
Gender and the 1920s:
- The 19th amendment was passed in 1920 which gave women the right to
vote, which legally afforded more opportunities for women
+ However, their role remained relatively unchanged
+ Women were still expected to get married, have children and remain in
the domestic sphere
- 1920s America is referred to as the ‘Roaring Twenties’ – the age of jazz,
Prohibition (and liquor in great qualities, supplied by bootleggers) and the
flapper (a woman with a bob and painted lips, flaunting the rules of
respectable womanhood by smoking and drinking)
- The emancipated behaviours of the flapper were a direct reaction to
biologically deterministic ideas around femaleness and motherhood,
expectations of chastity and purity, and ideas about the private sphere
being the woman’s natural sphere
- According to historian Gordon A. Craig, the ‘first world war [had]
weakened old orthodoxies and authorities […] a change in manners and
morals [that] made a freer and less restrained society’
+ While WW1 enabled the flapper to emerge, conservative, gendered
ideas still persisted
- Jordan is the novel’s flapper representative and is portrayed as
androgynous
+ When describing her, Nick uses terms like ‘erect’ and ‘young cadet’
(ch1)
+ She also is pursuing a professional career in golfing, compounding to
her image of the ‘New Woman’; someone who resisted old gender
expectations
+ Her name is also gender-ambiguous
- Daisy is more traditionally feminine, indicated by her name
+ The colour white is used 49 times in relation to Daisy to signal her
outward purity, ethereality and wealth
+ She doesn’t outwardly subvert gender expectations
+ Linn Carson argues that Daisy reflects the New Woman in her thoughts,
signalled by her cynicism about her role and daughter’s future role
- Daisy hopes that her daughter will be ‘a beautiful little fool’ because
‘that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world’
+ This signals that she has realised she is ‘just a pawn in the game’; a
trophy to be desired
+ The gender contradictions inherent in American society during the
1920s have their counterpart in Daisy’s submissiveness versus her inner
cynicism
, Key characteristics:
Beautiful and charming
- Daisy’s name reflects how she is delicate and decorative, reinforced by
her attire when we first meet her: her white dress ‘rippl[es] and flutter[s]
as if [it] had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house’
(ch1)
- Daisy’s only role is to be a trophy for Tom since she’s wealthy enough to
have her child get taken care of by a nurse
- We have a clear sense of her charm, surroundings and dress and rarely
get a sense of her physical appearance
+ This contrasts Jordan, who’s immediately described as having an ‘erect
carriage’, ‘grey, sun-strained eyes’ and being ‘slender [and] small-
breasted’
+ Daisy’s charm lies more so in her mythology than in her physical
persona
- Daisy is surrounded by an aura of wealth and this manifests in her ‘low,
thrilling’, ‘glowing and singing’ voice (ch1)
- In ch7, Gatsby points out ‘Her voice is full of money’
+ This allows Nick to come to the realisation that, therein, lies her laugh’s
‘inexhaustible charm […] the jingle of it, the cymbals’ song of it’
- Fitzgerald employs pathetic fallacy to suggest Daisy’s external beauty
+ ‘The last of the sunshine fell upon her glowing face with romantic
affection’
- Daisy’s childhood came with purity and ease – ‘Our white girlhood was
passed together there. Our beautiful white…’ (ch1)
+ Her ‘world’ is ‘redolent of orchids and pleasant’
+ People are likely attracted to these associations rather than to Daisy’s
actual characteristics; passive, cynical, charming, superficial
Artificial
- She frequently stutters, appearing playful but also suggests her to be a
constant performer as she acts out of happiness
+ ‘I’m p-paralyzed with happiness’ (ch1)
+ ‘[…] followed by Daisy’s voice on a clear artificial note: ‘I certainly am
awfully glad to see you again.’’ (ch5)
+ Daisy seems to always be in performance mode when around others
+ Later, Nick repeats ‘Daisy was young and her artificial world was
redolent of orchids’
- Daisy’s prioritisation of beauty means she buries her head in the sand to
avoid the grim reality of life, made clear by the Valley of Ashes
+ This is what makes her artificial
- Daisy’s surname – Fay – evokes fairylike connotations, associating her
with romantic supernaturalism, rising above the realistic
+ Gatsby also idealises her, projecting onto her, ignoring her true nature
