Response to Lois Tyson's Marxist Reading

For the first time, I have agreed with one of Lois Tyson’s analyses. She says that in The Great Gatsby you are what you own and that is 100% true. This adage applies best when looking at Gatsby. Lois Tyson eloquently reiterates that, “Gatsby has risen from extreme poverty to extreme wealth in a very few years.” (73) Gatsby having once been poor and careless, was now feeling like he needed to bend over backwards to impress the  stereotypical high-society bourgeoisie and eventually become one of them in order to win the heart of his lover. To that superficial high class, you are what you own, nothing more. As does Marxism, The Great Gatsby does a great job of separating society into two parts, one of which is clearly viewed as “better” than the other. Tyson proves it with examples, “The Great Gatsby’s representation of American culture, then, reveals, the debilitating effects of capitalism on socioeconomic “winners” such as Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby, as well as on “losers” such as George and Myrtle.” (75) Finally, Nick is envious of Gatsby for his wealth, and all that he has, through the Marxist lens, he doesn’t see how the bourgeoisie can ask for more than they’ve got. Gatsby is incomplete, unlike the stereotypical bourgeois. For Nick, Lois Tyson diagnoses that, “He is in collusion with Gatsby’s desire, and his narrative can lead readers into collusion with that desire as well.” (77) Do you, reader, feel your desires influenced by those of Gatsby because of his position? Do you have sympathy for Nick in that regard?