Nick Carraway
| Character | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Nick Carraway |
| Occupation: | Bondsman |
| Relationships: | Daisy Buchanan (cousin), Jordan Baker (ex girlfriend), Jay Gatsby (friend, neighbor) |
| Fandom: | The Great Gatsby |
| Other: | at Wikipedia Page |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Nick Carraway is a young man around 30, a neighbor and friend of Jay Gatsby, as well as Daisy Buchanan’s cousin. Nick helps rekindle the romance between her and Gatsby.
He comes from a Middle Western family, studied at Yale, fought in First World War and moved to West Egg, Long Island, NY. For a portion of time seems to be in a relationship with Daisy's friend, Jordan Baker.
As the narrator of the book, The Great Gatsby is told entirely through Nick’s eyes; his thoughts and perceptions shape and color the story.[1]
Fandom
As of 2022 over 700 fanworks on the AO3 are tagged with Nick Carraway, making him, along with Jay, one of the most popular characters in the book and consequently its adaptations. On AO3 the most popular Nick ship is Nick Carraway/Jay Gatsby (a non-canon slash pairing), and there are relatively few fanworks tagged with Nick Carraway/Jordan Baker, a canon het relationship. There are some works with Nick having relationships with original characters, both male and female.[2]
Sexuality
One of the great analyzes made by several readers – among fans and critics – is the question about the queer subtext of Nick and Gatsby. Greg Olegar for example, addresses in his article GA(tsb)Y how the subtlety of Fitzgerald's text neither confirms nor denies that Nick is in love with Jay and that he likes men.[3]
Nick, when describing women throughout the book, never shows any interest in them, always praising ephemeral things like her voice, her dress, the fact that her body looks like that of a boy – to his short-term girlfriend, golfer Jordan Baker.
[theleafprince]
Nick could most likely be gay since the one woman he does fall for is "boyish" and rather stereotypically masculine in her behaviours.
There is also the point that Nick is very peculiar in how describes other people - especially those of whom that he does not like.
[...]
To me this suggests that he does subconsciously prefer men, but he is not even aware of this himself. [4]
On the other hand, he describes each man in great detail, ranging from the beauty of his eyes and lips, to the virility of his bodies and muscles.
In one scene, we see Nick in a room at 3 am, with a man dressed only in his underwear talking to him, a man already described as effeminate and who invites him to visit him intimately while they are in an elevator amid groans.[4]
His courtship is short-lived, his interest in women is almost nil, his family worries about him, and his fixation on Gatsby only proves that Nick is possibly gay, as he is written throughout the book like a perfect picture of the closeted gay man from the 20's.
Some readers however believe that Nick was asexual.
[Zofia]
I’ve been thinking about it and what if Nick is asexual? He just seems like a person lacking any kind of emotion and doesn’t really show love towards anyone and only admiration? He just seems to dismiss Jordan and the idea of being with her however, that could also be due to her being a “modern woman” BUT still I just don’t see him particularly loving anyone or anything other than weirdly obsessing over Gatsby.[4]
Example Fanworks
| Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples. |
Archives, Communities & Resources
- Nick Carraway tag at AO3
- Nick Carraway is gay and in love with Gatsby,[5] a republishing of the article GA(tsb)Y by Greg Olegar
References
- ^ "The Great Gatsby: Character List SparkNotes". 2022-03-22. Archived from the original on 2022-03-22.
- ^ Nick Carraway AO3 tag, Archived version (Accessed 4 November 2022.)
- ^ "GA(tsb)Y The Weeklings". 2013-01-08. Archived from the original on 2022-03-23.
- ^ a b c "Is Nick gay (or bisexual)? [Archive] - Literature Network Forums". 2006-03-27. Archived from the original on 2022-03-23.
- ^ "Nick Carraway is gay and in love with Gatsby Salon.com". 2013-01-09. Archived from the original on 2022-03-22.