Who is Nick Carraway (at the beginning)?
We know very little about Nick. The facts he chooses to present are few: he grew up in a respectable Chicago family and went to Yale, he likes literature and considers himself one of those “limited” specialists known as a “well-rounded man,” and he works in the bond business (that is to say, in finances) in New York City. He’s connected to wealthy and important people, like his cousin Daisy and Tom, a college acquaintance, but he is by no means one of them. Unlike the people who surround him, Nick Carraway isn’t drowning in wealth. His perch on the outside of these lofty social circles gives him a good view of what goes on inside; he has a particularly sharp and sometimes quite judgmental eye for character, and isn’t afraid to use it. While Nick is fundamentally a pretty honest guy when first we meet him, it doesn’t mean that he’s always a very nice one. He’s skilled in the art of getting along with everyone in public and rather sassily analyzing them in private (that is, to us, his re
