Jay Gatsby, hero or villain?

If any of you are studying F. Scott Fitzgerals's 'The Great Gatsby'  or just reading it for pleasure you may be wondering about the title of the book.  What makes Gatsby so 'great'? He was a compulsive liar making up stories about his past, he grew incredibly wealthy from bootlegging, the illegal sales of alcohol, in today’s terms he would be called a drug lord.

Its supposed to be all okay because he was only doing it so he could win Daisy's love back, but Daisy is married with a child and some people, myself included, think he doesn't even really love her, He just wants her as a status symbol to show off like his new car.  Why should we like this guy again?

It because of how pure he is.  When he was younger he thought he would never achieve success as James Gatz, so he destroyed that identity and became a new man, free from all the vices that halt everyone else.  He became the ideal candidate to achieve the American Dream.

Ever since then he has had one goal in life, to overcome every obstacle that stood between him and his dream. Since he had already created a whole new identity why not go a step further.  If he needed to be educated, cultured and rich to impress Daisy then he would.   Its like watching a pitcher throw a perfect game, its something you could never do yourself, but you really want the guy to succeed because you want to watch something special.  That's why the reader should be cheering him on, this is a once in a generation chance to prove everybody wrong and show the American Dream is attainable.

Looking at some quotes from The Great Gatsby you can see that he starts of with perfect morals and attitude.  It was everyone else that dragged him down.  People's prejudices meant no body would except him is they knew his true background so he had to lie about it.  Daisy was obsessed with money so he had to get it somehow, and fast before they were both too old, so he turned to a life of crime.  He didn't even enjoy having the material possessions, he never even used his own pool.

Something about the naïve way Gatsby believe that if he only works hard enough he can have anything he wants, he trusts completely the idea of the American Dream and when it turns out to be a sham, and he dies miserable and alone the reader feels sorry for him. What he was told was the noblest and purest pursuit he could of made, what he sacrificed everything for, was all a lie.

So maybe it he was a gangster, and maybe he lied about his past, but he only did it because it was the only way to survive in the broken and corrupt world that he lived in.