Shakespeare's plays are as popular as they are because he was perhaps the greatest writer who has ever lived. It's partly because he was writing plays which go on being performed and therefore which can be brought freshly to life for each generation by actors of the present.
Gatsby is killed because Tom Buchanan told Mr. Wilson that Jay Gatsby had killed Myrtle even though Daisy Buchanan was the one behind the wheel when Myrtle was struck. Therefore, Mr. Wilson believes that Gatsby killed his wife Myrtle Wilson.
