The Great Gatsby

What does nick mean when he says, "There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired?"

Nick says, "There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired." What does Nick mean? How does each character in the novel fit into this schema?

Chapter 4

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Nick is categorizing people by the way they live their lives; while it is a rather simplified grouping, he sees everyone on one side of the line or the other. For example, Gatsby would be pursuing Daisy who would be the pursued. The busy might be Myrtle who wants to be kept busy being something other than the wife of a garage mechanic while the bored might be the mechanic who struggles day in and day out to keep his head above water. All in all, he is noting the way people live their lives in the frenetic world of the 1920s.