The Great Gatsby-9

Something bizarre in chapter 5 of The Great Gastby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is the fact that Gatsby has a great deal of British lifestyle in his mansion. Although it is all luxurious, it is not normal that an American veteran would have such things. My thought about this is that Gatsby is hiding something from everyone about his past and his luxury. "A brewer had built it [Gatsby's mansion] early in the "period" craze a decade before, and there was a story that he'd agreed to pay five years; taxes on all the neighboring cottages if the owners would have their roofs thatched with straw" [Fitzgerald, 88]. Why would this brewer want to do this? They refused though, Nick says, because Americans are stubbornly unwilling to play the role of peasants. Why would they want to be peasants, really though? Isn't that what Americans fought for a long time ago? Gatsby is one weird dude.