It's Getting Hot in Here!

The Great Gatsby
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Pages 113-136

"Their eyes met, and they stared together at each other...She had told him that she loved him, and Tom Buchanan saw," (Fitzgerald, 119).

As this chapter opens up, we are presented with a description of the unbearable heat. I interpretted this change in the weather as foreshadowing to a "heated" confrontation of some sort. And boy, was I right...

With a single glance, Tom Buchanan was able to distinguish the affair from the stares of the lovers, thus reiterating the reoccuring presence of eyes in the story. But another thing I noticed about Tom Buchanan was his eagerness to pick at the phrase "old sport" which was such an omnipresent selection in Gatsby's diction. For so long, it had gone unquestioned, yet Tom uses it to initiate his inquisition of his wife's affair.

To add to his control of the argument, Tom maintained his composure and managed to convince Daisy of their love through past experiences. Again, time comes into play in their argument; Gatsby attempts to tell Tom that Daisy had loved him for the past five years, but his plan backfires when Daisy realizes how much more Tom had contributed to her within that timespan. Finalizing his dominance over the discussion and Daisy, Tom orders Gatsby and his wife to ride home by themselves because he is sure that he has ruined any inkling of an affair that may have continued to exist.