Tom Buchanan Annoys Me!

Tom Buchanan, husband of Nick's cousin Daisy in The Great Gatsby, is a very irritating character. Upon first introduction of him in the first chapter, the reader knows their in for a real ire when Tom's in the scene. When Nick first notices him on his porch, he says smugly, "I've got a nice place here". It gets worse from here. Tom shows up in the most unruly places throughout the story, and, most of the time, doesn't even acknowledge Nick's existence, as if he's richer and better than everyone else. He also acts as if he doesn't care what happens to anyone but himself. He really doesn't mind the fact that his wife is alone with Gatsby; most men would be concerned if their wives were alone with another man, a single man at that. Whenever people he knows are being mistreated, he doesn't defend them; this is present in the scene where the people he's with sarcastically invite Nick and Gatsby to dinner, and he just sits back and watches. Although Tom is a very frustrating character, the author may have written him this way on purpose.

There are metaphors and symbols all over F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing; Tom Buchanan may very well be a symbol in this novel. He symbolizes the typical person in the Roaring Twenties: a wealthy, well-known man who parties, day and night, and doesn't really care what happens to other people, only himself. Fitzgerald may have written him as a frustrating person to get the readers of his novels to see that this is not the way Americans can live and still be considered as "a model for other countries". The United States is the only country to successfully overthrow a monarch, we are supposed to be a model. He may not symbolize Americans but just America in general, implying that America is becoming a nation of partying and apathy instead of the hard work and liberty that shaped the "American Dream" decades before. Whichever he is a symbol of, one thing remains certain: he's a very annoying character.