Birdyline Book Blog

Nick Carraway is possibly the last choice someone would have to narrate The Great Gatsby. After all, he isn’t important to the story. The other characters are more exciting and have a bigger impact on the plot and messaging. So why Nick? Here’s my thoughts.

The narrator of The Great Gatsby is chosen because of his notable advantages as a witness over the other main characters. Nick could be an unimportant side character from another person’s point of view, but this is used as an advantage. Nick’s ability to relate to both the high class figures like Gatsby and Daisy and to the more presumably normal reader make him a familiar voice, the best possible choice to explain what is going on to someone who cannot identify with the other characters. His convenient personality and links to Daisy and Gatsby prove valuable to provide the reader with information no one else could contribute. If anyone else narrated The Great Gatsby, it would be much more complicated to get the complete and accurate story. 

In a book named after the man, Gatsby would be the obvious choice for the narrator, but the use of Nick instead gives the story a unique lack of bias because he doesn’t have direct connection to all of the book’s dramatics. The Great Gatsby from anyone else’s point of view would be largely partial towards the narrator’s side or against whoever they didn’t like. Nick, though, is trusted for the most part by each and every character at some point in the book. He is also a firm advocate for “reserving judgements,” (Fitzgerald, 1925) as he reminds us throughout the novel. While Nick is, of course, not entirely free of bias or judgment as he egotistically claims, describing himself as “one of the cardinal virtues,” (Fitzgerald, 1925) it is true that if The Great Gatsby had been written by anyone else, the bias would have been much heavier. There were many conflicts in the book, from the issue of Tom’s mistress at the dinner party, to the fight between Myrtle and George when the wife was locked up in the apartment above the garage, and so on. Nick saw all of these conflicts, but is not directly involved. Nick witnesses the majority of the issues in the novel but does not cause them and in most cases does not intervene. He is, quote, “within and without,” (Fitzgerald, 1925) and so while he gets to see things most did not, he is puzzled by them along with the reader. He is important enough to be a witness, but not important enough for anyone to have a problem with him, and this is what gives him the perfect impartiality to be the narrator. (Fitzgerald, 1925)

Nick is not as wealthy or powerful as the other lead characters of The Great Gatsby, and so he seems to be an outlier who can’t relate to the main three characters- Gatsby, Daisy, and Tom. Fitzgerald writes Nick this way on purpose, using him to bridge the gap between those extremely rich and successful characters and the average reader. Nick has some advantages, coming from a “prominent, well-to-do” (Fitzgerald, 1925) family, but when compared to the likes of Gatsby and many of his party guests, he’s much lower class. He admits that while his family has “a tradition that we’re descended from the Dukes of Buccleuch,” (Fitzgerald, 1925) the actual founder of his family line was a former soldier turned hardware wholesale worker. He couldn’t afford a fancy mansion in the East Egg, instead living in the “less fashionable of the two.”  (Fitzgerald, 1925) Still, he is located around many people who enjoy a more leisurely, upscale life. This puts him in the perfect position to relate to both the lavish lifestyles of his upper class acquaintances and to the “normal” lives of any generic person who may read the novel. (Fitzgerald, 1925)

Nick’s personality and a touch of luck also grants him the opportunity to be a witness to multiple events that not all of the other main characters were there for. In the first chapter Nick writes that he became “privy to the secret griefs of wild, unknown men.” (Fitzgerald, 1925) He confesses that this information is not often granted to him directly. He confesses to frequently pretending to sleep or to be distracted by something else in order to “accidentally” overhear something, because he has a skill for realizing when “an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon.” (Fitzgerald, 1925) Not all of Nick’s tendency to end up with extra details is attributed to skill, though. In The Great Gatsby, a bit of luck also assists. Nick is Daisy’s “second cousin once removed” (Fitzgerald, 1925) and Gatsby’s next door neighbor. Nick can not control either of those things, but they work together to put him in the exact position to be the missing link that draws Daisy and Gatsby to be reunited. Without him, Gatsby may never have been able to get Daisy near him. He proves himself indispensable to Gatsby and is possibly even considered his friend. As a result, he is strung along to witness what goes down. Through his natural ability to discover things that would remain hidden to others and also a touch of good fortune, Nick is able to write things that other characters couldn’t and arguably is the cause of everything that happens. (Fitzgerald, 1925)

There are a few reasons that Nick may not be the best narrator, however. Firstly, Nick is not completely unbiased as he claims to be. The book is clearly called The Great Gatsby, giving away who he favors the most. Early on in the book he is already curious about and fascinated by his mysterious neighbor, watching him on the dock and even considering that he should “call to him.” (Fitzgerald, 1925). He asks questions about Gatsby to the other party goers and listens to the fantastic rumors and thinks positively about Gatsby long before he even knows of the man’s connection to Daisy. Even after he knows about them, he is more than willing to assist Gatsby and invite Daisy over. He sees no problem helping this man meet alone with a married woman while he seems mildly disgusted by Tom’s affair with Myrtle. Secondly, Nick may not be the most reliable person. While he writes a lot about Gatsby and almost as much about the other prominent characters, he doesn’t reveal much about himself other than what he states at the very beginning. At the dinner party with Tom and Daisy he is asked about a girl, and an engagement that apparently didn’t work out. He replies, “it’s a libel. I’m too poor.” (Fitzgerald, 1925) but then admits to the reader that he ”knew what they were referring to, but [was not] even vaguely engaged.” (Fitzgerald, 1925) He does not give the couple any more information, and does not mention it again. This shows that Nick is willing to lie or leave out information about things that he doesn’t feel like addressing. Without knowing his background or even possibly certain chunks of information he could have left out of his narrative at will, it is reasonable to assume that the story the reader is fed is not completely accurate. However, considering that no character in the book could truly be without bias and unlikely to tell the complete truth, Nick is still the best candidate for the role of narrator. (Fitzgerald, 1925)

So there you have it- I think Nick was the perfect choice of narrator for The Great Gatsby because the other characters are handicapped when it comes to their ability to give a complete, unbiased, and easy to understand narrative. Nick holds back his judgment until he is sure of his opinion, allowing the reader to think for themselves. He also is able to connect to the reader because of his more relatable upbringing than the others. Of course he also happens to be in the perfect place to witness all of these things and write them down. This makes him better at the job he has than anyone else could be.