The Great Gatsby
Meyer Wolfsheim
Gatsby’s business partner
A shrewd, sentimental man with a sideline in secrets, who is the link between Gatsby and the underworld.
Meyer Wolfsheim is a small, stocky man with sharp eyes and a famous pair of cuff links made from human molars. Gatsby introduces him to Nick in a dim cellar restaurant in Manhattan. He is theatrical and guarded, sentimental about old friends, and quick to ask whether Nick is looking for a business connection.
Wolfsheim is the man who gave Gatsby his start in business. He tells Nick that Gatsby is a man of fine breeding who would never look at a friend’s wife, and he casually mentions that he fixed the 1919 World Series.
“Looking for a business gonnegtion, Mr. Carraway?”
In the story
Contains spoilers.
Wolfsheim’s name comes back at the Plaza Hotel, when Tom accuses Gatsby of belonging to the crowd that hangs around Meyer Wolfsheim and says he knows what Gatsby’s drugstores really were. That connection is what turns Daisy from Gatsby.
Wolfsheim does not appear again in the pages of the adaptation, but his shadow stays over Gatsby’s fortune. The man who seemed so friendly over lunch is the key to why Gatsby is rich, and the reason Tom is able to use the truth against him.
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