To Weave a Tangled Web of Love

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Chapter 7 pages 113-125

"Her expression was curiously familiar - it was an expression I had often seen on women's faced, but on Myrtle Wilson's face it seemed purposeless and inexplicable until I realized that her eyes, wide with jealous terror, were fixed not on Tom, but on Jordan Baker, whom she took to be his wife" (Fitzgerald, pages 124-125).

The dawning of a new chapter has brought a new, more tangled mess of a social web. Gatsby finds himself reinventing his home to suit his new secret life with Daisy. As all his staff are switched out and his parties die down, Gatsby has Daisy come to his house more often. Things do not heat up until Daisy invited Gatsby and Nick to come to her house one day. I found myself not surprised when I found out that Daisy knows of Myrtle Wilson and her husband yet she does not seem to care. Furthermore, I had no idea Daisy and Tom had a child. It is possible that it was mentioned earlier and I missed it, but I also found it strangely awkward for Daisy to have her child come out and meet Gatsby and Nick. The meeting of the child seemed to put a spark in my mind as Nick did not seem to know the child's name yet he is Daisy's cousin and I presumed that he would know those kinds of facts if he had been spending a great deal of time with her family. 

I have never heard of this book but the title seemed fitting.

Lastly, Alcohol seems to be growing in its role in the plot. The alcohol of the afternoon has taken over Tom's actions and made him quite rude and irresponsible. As far as alcohol's role in the entire story, I am finding it to be used by people to drown their feelings and mask themselves to be different people. As I am finding many of the characters to have another man or woman besides their husband or wife, I am also connecting that a lot of them drink. As Tom confided in Jordan and Nick that everyone thinks he is dumb, I believe that Tom is unraveling his mask of not caring about his wife having another man because he has another woman, that is, until he finds out his woman is planning on leaving with her husband to go west. And the web just keeps getting  larger as Myrtle believes Jordan is Tom's wife.