Love is difficult. Love is difficult to find, difficult to keep, and difficult to understand. However, love is even more difficult when you mix in lies and a materialistic mindset. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece, The Great Gatsby, the reader is told a tale of just what can happen when you live a life of lies and illusions. It also shows how materialism can make you overlook the love you have in front of you. Through lies and materialism, love is tested, and it does not always come out alive. A man by the name of Nick is who the story begins with. The stories action begins to rise right as Nick goes over to his cousin Daisy’s house. Normally a small family gathering doesn’t entail much, however this gathering changed Nick’s life. This …show more content…
is when Nick first becomes involved in not only his cousin Daisy’s life, but also her husband Tom’s life, as well as beginning a friendship with his neighbor (and Daisy’s former lover) Jay Gatsby. Not only does Nick’s involvement with these people begin during this get together, but so do the lies and illusions. When they all sit down, Tom receives a phone call, “couldn’t be helped!” exclaimed Daisy. This is a lie, inside all of the lies Tom is telling to Daisy to cover up his mistress. There was also another man who lived a life of lies, however he was also described as materialistic. When Nick walks up to Jay Gatsby’s house he describes it as “a colossal affair”, and continues to describe it in awe. It seems as in the beginning the only thing people think about Gatsby is that he is rich and has lots of fancy and expensive things. Ever since the first meeting with Daisy, Nick has heard the name Gatsby many times.
Nick ends up meeting him, as they are neighbors. When Nick meets Gatsby it seems as though Nick’s life has more of a purpose. He now has a friend, a partner to help him get acclimated to his new home land(because Nick is new to the area and does not know too many people). Soon, Gatsby ask a favor of Nick and that is to invite Daisy over for tea. This bring upon the rising action, in which Gatsby and Daisy reunite after five years apart. It begins however, with another lie. “To my overwhelming surprise the living room was deserted” expresses Nick, very confused. Just after Daisy arrives, Gatsby knocks on the door and pretends as though he wasn’t there to begin with. They begin to realize they both have feelings for eachother still, even after being apart so long. There still seems to be materialism at this point though, as Gatsby knocks over Nick’s clock while the three of them are talking. “Luckily the clock took this moment to tilt dangerously” it seems as though everyone is more concerned with the clock at this point than the actual conversation itself, which is extremely important. Both lies, and materialism are shown, but love overcomes both during this part of the rising
action. Up to this point love has been able to overcome all its obstacles. Soon after Nick, Jordan, Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby leave the city, love begins to struggle. Gatsby has now fallen for Daisy, and tells Nick “I don’t think she ever loved him.” This is yet another lie from Gatsby, as Daisy has explained that there was a time in which she loved Tom, however Gatsby does not seem to comprehend this. This brings a whirlwind of emotions from all around. It begins by upsetting Daisy and Gatsby, and then quickly it makes Tom angry. Since Daisy is upset, Gatsby lets her drive his car back home from the city. On the way home Myrtle (Tom’s mistress) is hit and killed by Gatsby’s car. Lies continue to flow, as Tom tells Myrtle’s wife that Gatsby was driving the car. Someone also says that Myrtle was “completely happy with her husband”. This made it seem as though Gatsby pressured her into an affair, another illusion. This also leads to Myrtle’s husband killing Gatsby, and then himself. As the action begins to slow once Gatsby is dead, the materialism does not. Nick tells about the rest of the day, “I remember the rest of that day, and that night and the next day, only as an endless drill of police and photographers and newspaper men.” Even after Gatsby has died and all love is lost, there is still an overwhelming sense of materialism by all involved.
Andrew T. Crosland, an expert on the Jazz Age writings of author F.Scott Fitzgerald, wrote that Fitzgerald 's The Great Gatsby included over 200 references to cars (Crosland). This is not surprising as the automobile, like the flapper were enticing novelties at the time this book was written. The main characters in The Great Gatsby who, by the way, all drive cars are Nick Carraway, Jay Gatsby, Tom and Daisy Buchanan, Jordan Baker, and Myrtle and George Wilson. Attractive, yet enigmatic, Gatsby tries to win the love of an aristocratic woman, who rebuffs Gatsby for her upper class husband. This leads to Gatsby’s tragic murder after he is falsely accused of killing Myrtle with his Rolls Royce. The automobile, as
After his time in the army during World War I, Nick Caraway refuses to return to the kind of boring life he thinks he would find back home. He consequently migrates East. As he moves near New York City, at the beginning of the novel, he says, “Life was beginning over again with the summer,” (4). This sentiment displays his general attitude toward his new life at West Egg. He considers it full of hope, and this positive feeling does not start to fade until his first interaction with Tom and Daisy Buchanan. After their dinner party he feels “confused and a little disgusted,” (20). He had just found out that Tom was having an affair, and that Daisy had a uniquely complacent attitude about it. He sensed a general falseness about the whole night that he found very unsettling. Soon after, Tom takes Nick to meet Myrtle, Tom’s his mistress. It is then Nick’s responsibility to keep the secret of Tom’s affair, making him complicit. Nick never even considers telling Daisy who Myrtle is, or trying to get Tom to stop his adultery. Later, Nick plays a very large role in starting an affair with Gatsby and Daisy. He allows them to use his house to meet, knowing that Gatsby loves Daisy, and she is a married woman. Nick doesn’t ju...
The book starts off with the narrator Nick Carraway. He is from Minnesota and in 1992 he moves to NYC in the summer. He starts by giving us advices that his father told him about not to make fun of people what so ever. Daisy Buchanan is Nick’s cousin; she is married to Tom Buchanan. Jordan Baker is Daisy’s close friend. Daisy Baker falls in love with Nick, and he loves her back. He goes to NYC to study about the bond business.
The dawn of the 20th century was met with an unprecedented catastrophe: an international technological war. Such a horrible conflict perhaps threatened the roots of the American Dream! Yet, most do not realize how pivotal the following years were. Post war prosperity caused a fabulous age for America: the “roaring twenties”. But it also was an era where materialism took the nation by storm, rooting itself into daily life. Wealth became a measure of success and a facade for social status. This “Marxist materialism” threatened the traditional American Dream of self-reliance and individuality far even more than the war a decade before. As it morphed into materialistic visions (owning a beautiful house and car), victims of the change blindly chased the new aspiration; one such victim was Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby. As his self-earned luxury and riches clashed with love, crippling consequences and disasters occur. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby delves into an era of materialism, exploring how capitalism can become the face of social life and ultimately cloud the American Dream.
F. Scott Fitzgerald third book, “The Great Gatsby”, stands as the supreme achievement in his career. According to The New York Times, “The Great Gatsby” is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s. In the novel, the author described Daisy Buchanan as childish, materialistic, and charming. These characteristics describing Daisy is also description for the way women were seen during the 1920s.
In the beginning, Nick moves into New York and his neighbor turns out to be a very famous person around the city. This mysterious person turns out to be Jay Gatsby who is very well known but no one really knows who he is; they just know him from his extravagant parties that he throws all the time. As a result of these parties, he gets to know Gatsby as this very important, popular and well looked up to figure. Later throughout the novel, he starts to get to know who the real Gatsby is after Gatsby refers to him as one of his greatest friends. As he gathers this information about him, he comes to the conclusion that Gatsby is a fake who is not from a rich family, and that he has lied about a big part of his life. His reason for doing so is to gain the love of Daisy again because she comes from a rich family and he comes from a poor family and her parents would not allow her to marry him. As a result of this, Nick’s opinion about him changes from him looking up to Gatsby to shaking his head at him. Nick also learns about the seriousness of the affair between Daisy’s husband Tom and Myrtle when he sees Tom’s reaction after Myrtle was hit by Daisy in the car and was killed. Nick then begins to think that there is no faith or loyalty between anyone anymore. It is evident that Nick is a dynamic character through the novel
The Great Gatsby shows the ambition of one man's achievement of his goal, the disappointment of failing, and the hopelessness of it. During the era of this novel, which is around the 1920's, America was a country with huge misery, ambition, and lack of humanity values. The novel shows a reflection of this decade, it illustrates the burning passion one man has toward his objective and the different aspects of the American principles. As the sequence of events continues in the story, someone will narrate the singular aspects of it; exposing the idea of the conflicts that will happen among different social levels.
How does reading a story benefits an individual and improve his or her daily life? Extensive reading does not only serve as an entertainment purpose, but it is also beneficial to many readers because reading fiction can help enhance a person’s understanding of the type of society the reader lives in. For example, the famous novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is regarded as a brilliant work of literature, for it offers a detailed glimpse of the American life in the 1920s and comments on various social problems during that time period. The novel tells the story of a mysterious millionaire named Jay Gatsby who lives in the fictional town of West Egg, located on Long Island, during the summer of 1922. Gatsby wants to pursue his first
In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald shows that a materialistic mindset will corrupt the chance at true love. Gatsby tried to get Daisy to love him again by showing off his money and failed because he didn’t put his heart and self into their relationship. Myrtle mistakenly married a man whom she thought was wealthy and turned out he was poor. She quickly attempted to evade their marriage, but then had an affair with Tom Buchanan, a well known rich man. Fitzgerald demonstrates how none of these relationships worked out because of the materialistic ways of these characters. Finally, this theme is explored because it proves how true love isn’t real with fake values. True love should be two people who love each other unconditionally and is not based on money-oriented things.
An important theme of The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is wealth and the process of attaining it. This yearning for material wealth and possessions is known as materialism. Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan are both extremely materialistic and put a lot of value into the possessions and wealth of a person while Nick Carraway doesn’t display any materialistic desires and accentuates the contrast between characters. Gatsby’s materialism is driven by his longing for wealth and civility. He loves the idea of Daisy because she is the embodiment of wealth and the ideal lifestyle of
Nick finds out a few days after his move that an adored man by the name of Jay Gatsby lives next door to him. He hears about the parties that he throws and such from a friend of his cousin Daisy. He meets Daisy Buchanon, her husband Tom Buchanon, and friend Jordan Baker, at their house in East Egg. This is when everything begins to unravel. Nick is then invited to Gatsby 's party and attends it. After the party it is very apparent that Nick is intrigued in Gatsby. He even watches the party unwind, "There was music from my neighbor 's house through the summer nights. In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and he champagne and the stars. At high tide in the afternoon I watched his guests diving from the tower of his raft, or taking the sun on the hot sand of his beach while his motor-boats slid the waters of the Sound, drawing aquaplanes over cataracts of foam. On week-ends his Rolls-Royce became an omnibus, bearing parties to and from the city between nine in the morning and long past midnight, while his station wagon scampered like a brisk yellow bug to meet all trains. And on Mondays eight servants, including an extra gardener, toiled all day with mops and scrubbing-brushes and hammers and garden-shears, repairing the ravages of the night before." (3.1) Nick eventually meets up
Some people get so caught up in the dreams and fantasies of life that they forget what can actually be achieved. They set goals so high and think they have all the power in the world to obtain a goal that ultimately fails. One may pour all of one’s money into the goal, or every second of one’s day, or every ounce of energy in one’s body just to fail. Everything one ever wished for may be simply unattainable. It leads to the ultimate feeling of disappointment. In 2012, Presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, felt disappointment and sadness when he lost the election. During some interviews after losing the election Romeny expressed his emotions after losing all that he worked for, “We were convinced we would win… It 's hard,
Materialism has a negative influence on the characters in the novel, The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. “The most terrible thing about materialism even more terrible than its proneness to violence, is its boredom, from which sex, alcohol, drugs, all devices for putting out the accusing light of reason and suppressing the unrealizable aspirations of love, offers a prospect of deliverance.” This quote, stated by Malcolm Muggeridge, says that people get bored with the things that they have when they get new things all of the time. When they get bored with these things, they turn to stuff like sex, alcohol, and drugs. In The Great Gatsby, Myrtle, Daisy, and Gatsby are greatly influenced by money, and material things. The negative influence that materialism has on these characters is shown throughout the entire novel.
Materialism may be defined as attention to or emphasis on material objects, needs or considerations, with a disinterest in or rejection of spiritual values.
America has been labeled "The land of opportunity," a place where it is possible to accomplish anything and everything. This state of mind is known as "The American Dream." The American Dream provides a sense of hope and faith that looks forward to the fulfillment of human wishes and desires. This dream, however, originates from a desire for spiritual and material improvement. Unfortunately, the acquisition of material has been tied together with happiness in America. Although "The American Dream" can be thought of as a positive motivation, it often causes people to strive for material perfection, rather than a spiritual one. This has been a truth since the beginnings of America, such as the setting of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, which is an example of this set in the 20’s. The characters in this novel are too fixed on material things, losing sight of what is really important.