Chapter 7's Chaos |
"Mrs. Jones," you say, "what just happened and why did it keep talking about cars and Daisy and people being worried and something about Myrtle and her death and it was a lot." Let's break it down.
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"She had told him that she loved him, and Tom Buchanan saw. He was astounded."
Gatsby owns this awesome yellow car. He brings it over to Daisy's before they all decide to go into town together. Tom is feeling particularly heated having just come to the conclusion that Daisy is having an affair.
P.S. Gatsby is shocked by Daisy's daughter because the daughter is a clear reminder that Daisy has had a life (and still has a life) without Gatsby. Surprise, Gatsby! |
"[Wilson] had discovered that Myrtle had some sort of life apart from him in another world, and the shock had made him physically sick. I stared at him and then at Tom, who had made a parallel discovery less than an hour before—and it occurred to me that there was no difference between men, in intelligence or race, so profound as the difference between the sick and the well."
Through a bizarre series of events, Tom ends up driving Gatsby's car into town. He is riding with Jordan and Nick. That's right, somehow his wife and the man she's having an affair with are driving together. He's reasonably ticked. When they drive through the Valley of Ashes, he stops to get gas from Wilson. Wilson tells Tom that he just found out Myrtle is having an affair (uh oh), but he doesn't know who the "other man" is. It's Tom. Tom sees Myrtle through the window. MYRTLE SEES TOM IN THE YELLOW CAR.
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Daisy and Gatsby end up in Tom's blue car. They zip through town and ditch the others behind. Why is each person in a different car than the one they own? It's kind of bizarre, but we go with it. There's not necessarily a clear answer.
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"She never loved you, do you hear? She only married you because I was poor and she was tired of waiting for me. It was a terrible mistake but in her heat she never loved anyone except me."
In the hotel room, Gatsby urges Daisy to deny she loves Tom - fair enough. But this isn't enough for Gatsby. Gatsby wants Daisy to deny that she has ever loved Tom. He wants Daisy to pretend that five years of memories and a child never happened. And he wants her to turn away from her old money life and run away with Gatsby. Suddenly, reality has hit her and her fairytale life with Gatsby, and she must pick one of these two worlds: Tom or Gatsby. Under Gatsby's pressure and Tom's urgings (and her own desires - that's a whole topic there), she asks Tom to take her home. She picks Tom essentially. Now, Gatsby takes her own home in his yellow car. (Awkward drive home, if you ask me.)
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"So we drove toward death through the cooling twilight."
Gatsby and Daisy are back in Gatsby's yellow car. When everyone first drove through the Valley of Ashes, who was in the yellow car? Tom. And who saw Tom in the yellow car? Myrtle. So when a yellow car came driving down the road, who would Myrtle assume is driving the yellow car? ..............Tom - bing! bing! bing!
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Tom has returned home in the blue car. This is the car he stops in when they arrive in the Valley of Ashes.
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"The 'Death Car' as the newspaper called it, didn't stop; it came out of the gathering darkness, wavered tragically for a moment and then disappeared around the next bend."
Gatsby and Daisy have left ahead of Tom, Jordan, and Nick. When the threesome in the blue car arrive in the Valley of Ashes, they notice a huge crowd. And why is there commotion? BECAUSE MYRTLE WAS RUN OVER AND KILLED!!! Freaking heck! They learn that she saw a car, ran out into the road, and the car didn't even stop. It hit her -- did it veer? Who can say.
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"'Well, I tried to swing the wheel---" [Gatsby] broke off, and suddenly I guessed the truth."
Everyone assumes Gatsby was driving. It's his car, right? Tom certainly tells Wilson that his wife's murderer owns the yellow car. And Tom believes Gatsby killed his mistress. But what does Gatsby tell us when Nick asks?
"Was Daisy driving?"
"Yes," [Gatsby] said after a moment, "but of course I’ll say I was. You see, when we left New York she was very nervous and she thought it would steady her to drive—and this woman rushed out at us just as we were passing a car coming the other way. It all happened in a minute but it seemed to me that she wanted to speak to us, thought we were somebody she knew."
So the question is, did Daisy know who Myrtle was when Myrtle ran into the road, and if so, what choice did she make when she saw Myrtle?
"Was Daisy driving?"
"Yes," [Gatsby] said after a moment, "but of course I’ll say I was. You see, when we left New York she was very nervous and she thought it would steady her to drive—and this woman rushed out at us just as we were passing a car coming the other way. It all happened in a minute but it seemed to me that she wanted to speak to us, thought we were somebody she knew."
So the question is, did Daisy know who Myrtle was when Myrtle ran into the road, and if so, what choice did she make when she saw Myrtle?