The Corruption Of Daisy

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald is one of the best American novelists in the 20 th century and the most outstanding representative for that age. In 1998 Fitzgerald’s masterpiece The Great Gatsby is voted the 20 th century’s best American novel and second best novel in the English language.As a famous novel, there have been many studies about it from many perspectives.While many studies discuss the female character Daisy, few of them analyze her character changing process and her dream objectively. Daisy is depicted as a fallen woman in the novel, but she is not born evil. This thesis studies Daisy’s character changing process and the break of her dream from a feminist perspective based on a close reading of the text,and explores the cause of her change and fall.This thesis consists of six parts. Introduction reviews scholarly studies on The Great Gatsby and presents the significance of the study, and it also introduces the theory and methods, the basic views, and the content and structure of the thesis. Chapter One mainly presents the historical and social background of the Jazz Age, the appearance of flappers, and the main Feminist views used in the thesis. Chapter Two mainly analyzes Daisy Fay’s innocent girlhood, her love for Gatsby, and her betrayal under the pressure of her patriarchal family and society. Chapter Three mainly discusses how Daisy changes from a wife guarding her marriage to a hopeless housewife. Chapter Four analyzes how Daisy betrays marriage and love. Through the analysis of Daisy’scharacter changing process and the break of her dream, the thesis concludes that Daisy becomes a corrupted woman from an innocent girl, but she cannot control her fate, nor can she make her humble dream come true. She is the victim of that time and society,and is forced into corruption by patriarchy.