Answer:
In the opening chapter of *The Great Gatsby*, our narrator, **Nick Carraway**, introduces himself as a nonjudgmental observer. He shares a lesson his father taught him: to avoid hasty opinions about others, considering that not everyone has had the same privileges and opportunities. Nick characterizes himself as both tolerant and forgiving.
Nick has recently returned to his home in a wealthy Midwestern family from the East Coast after a devastating disappointment. This disappointment is the story he is about to tell, which happened two years before. He moves to New York, renting a house in West Egg, a part of Long Island characterized by the "new rich." Unlike the aristocratic East Egg, West Egg lacks social connections and refinement.
Nick's modest West Egg house is next door to the sprawling Gothic mansion of **Jay Gatsby**, a mysterious and wealthy man. Nick, who graduated from Yale and has connections on East Egg, attends a dinner party at his cousin Daisy Buchanan's home. Daisy's husband, **Tom Buchanan**, is a powerful figure with racist views. During the dinner, Daisy teases Tom about a book called *The Rise of the Colored Empires*, which espouses white-supremacist attitudes.
Later, Nick sees Gatsby for the first time, standing on his lawn and gazing out across Long Island Sound. Nick notices a distant green light blinking at the end of a dock, which might mark the end of a dream or aspiration. The setting of opulence, social divisions, and hidden desires sets the stage for the unfolding drama in this classic novel.
