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How materialism drove the decisions of the characters in the great gatsby
How materialism drove the decisions of the characters in the great gatsby
Relationships in the great gatsby essay
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America. It is known as "The Land of Opportunity," a place where anything is conceivable. This perspective is known as "The American Dream." The American Dream gives a feeling of trust and confidence that anticipates the satisfaction of human wishes and cravings. This fantasy begins from a longing for profound and material change. Sadly, the ownership of materialistic items has been entwined with joy in America. In spite of the fact that "The American Dream" can be considered as a constructive inspiration, it frequently allows individuals to make progress toward material flawlessness, as opposed to a destructive one. This has been a truth since the beginnings of America; the 1920’s raved with people who wanted it all--the money, mansions and …show more content…
status. If you didn’t have it, you envied the ones who did. F.
Scott Fitzgerald's novel, The Great Gatsby, proves how materialism was of importance through the characters in this novel who are excessively settled on Material things, dismissing what is truly …show more content…
essential. The Valley of Ashes a lifeless, grey and solemn area where everything seems to be covered in smog and soot. The Valley of Ashes seems to represent what is truly underneath West and East Egg if it wasn't glamorized by wealth that inhibits it. It's an area completely different from the ones we've been introduced to in the novel, described as "a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens, where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke" (Fitzgerald 23). This sentence is a contradiction as it calls the Valley of Ashes "a fantastic farm" yet it is made out of ashes and polluted with smoke. This represents that when money and consumerism lacks, a city can’t amount to more than ashes. The Valley of Ashes depicts the complete opposite of “The American Dream”, as people who inhabit this valley do not prosper and do not possess social mobility. The author uses word choice with negative connotations , like "grotesque ", "ashy " , "solemn" to depict an image in the reader's head of how truly terrible it would be to have to live without materialistic objects. Gatsby swings to wrongdoing and bootlegging to win riches and status to win the heart of Daisy Buchanan, a lady he becomes hopelessly enamored with five years before.
It is not just her that Gatsby wishes he had, it is her old money status and belonging also. Gatsby squanders his whole adult life attempting to get Daisy back, while simultaneously building up his wealth .Gatsby's fixation on Daisy gives him a false deception of her, and his hallucination of the “American dream”. When Gatsby works his way up to the amount of materialistic wealth he thinks is acceptable for Daisy to love him, he “[takes] out a pile of shirts...shirts of sheer linen and thick silk and fine flannel...while we admired he brought more and the soft rich heap mounted higher...suddenly with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shirts and began to cry stormily”(118). Daisy is overwhelmed by the wealth Gatsby possesses, showing Daisy’s shallowness, foreshadowing how important materialism is to her. This speaks to how much materialism can be the way into creating an entry of a relationship between Gatsby and Daisy. Fitzgerald uses imagery to convey how much wealth Gatsby has amassed to, like “shirts of sheer linen” “thick slick”, “soft rich heap” to describe how expensive and rich Gatsby truly is. This depicts an image of a man who has more money than he knows what to do with. Daisy’s tears at the end symbolize her realizing that she could have had everything she wanted in life, the wealth,
and the love; she realizes she lost the American Dream everyone in this day and age strived for. Nick Carraway, as the narrator he sees all the chaos going on between all the characters, leading him at the end to realize he doesn’t want any parts of this twisted lifestyle. Yet, Nick understands that Gatsby is superior to the other people who only find meaning in material items due to Gatsby’s devotion to a fantasy. Nick’s acknowledgment that "They were careless people, Tom and Daisy...smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made" (187). The author describes these characters as “careless” and “creatures,” depicting an image of people who are not even enough to be called humans but rather lowlives , no matter how much money they have. The diction being used seems exaggerates on how much Daisy and Tom care for consumer items, but yet this is a truthful depiction. Putting Nick as an onlooker, Fitzgerald can effectively demonstrate to the reader that it is so absurd to base your self worth over material things, showing that the American Dream, is more of a nightmare for people such as Nick. The Great Gatsby is truly a pitiful story of of a young fellow and his struggle to achieve “The American Dream”, through amassing lots of wealth. It is shown that this nation promotes such positive inspiration, yet this has transformed human kind into such a narrow minded people. America, the place where there is fresh new chances, has ultimately transformed into a financial fight. Society is so stressed over being the best, individuals trying outperform each other to achieve bliss.
Initially, Gatsby stirs up sympathetic feelings because of his obsession with wealth. Ever since meeting Dan Cody, his fascination for wealth has increased dramatically. He even uses illegal unmoral methods to obtain hefty amounts of wealth to spend on buying a house with “ Marie Antoinette music-rooms, Restoration Salons, dressing rooms and poolrooms, and bath rooms with sunken baths.” (88) His wardrobe is just as sensational with “ shirts of sheer linen and thick silk and fine fennel.” (89) Gatsby buys such posh items to impress Daisy but to him, Daisy herself is a symbol of wealth. Jay remarks, “[Daisy’s] voice is full of money.” (115). For him, Daisy is the one who is “ High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden gir...
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
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.
“Gatsby was overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves, of the freshness of many clothes, and of Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor”(150). Daisy is described as valuing wealth and hearing her voice symbolizes materialism and wealth. Gatsby is aware that he has to use money to manipulate Daisy into loving him. F.Gerald chose the word “clothes” to imply materialism and Daisy is a symbol of wealth throughout the novel. She is "safe and proud," she is safe from poverty, and proud, because she is materialistic in her ways, thinks she is better.
Gatsby is a very rich young man who lives in the West egg and always throws big huge expensive parties. Gatsby is the main character of the story. Gatsby only cares about having Daisy and having money and material things. In the book Gatsby how Daisy his beautiful shirts Daisy cries of how beautiful they are she states that she has not seen nothing more beautiful than that ¨There are such beautiful shirts,¨ she sobbed, ¨It makes me sad because I've never seen such- such beautiful shirts before” (Great Gatsby 92).
Daisy’s character is built with association of innocence and purity. Narrator in the novel mentions, “They were both in white, and their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house” (18). In this passage, the narrator talks about Daisy and Daisy’s friend, Jordan. They both were dressed in white, which represents the purity and innocence. Daisy’s exterior beauty is pure and innocence, but her interior self represents false purity and innocence in the novel. When Daisy and Gatsby reunites after five years, they seem to have found their love for each other, although Daisy loves the attention. Daisy is aware of her husband’s affair but still does nothing about it. Daisy’s response to Gatsby’s wealth proves the love Daisy has for money, especially the shirts. Narrator mentions in the novel, “Suddenly, with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shorts and began to cry stormily” (92). This describes that’s for Daisy the shirts represents wealth. Daisy bows her head into the shirts representing her interest in wealthy materialism. Daisy doesn’t cry because of the pure affection unlike Gatsby.
Gatsby tries to make Daisy love him through his money and excessive spending on non essential, things. When he and Daisy first reconnect their relationship, he brings her over to his house to show off the clothes in his closet: “He took out a pile of shirts and began throwing them, one by one, before us, shirts of sheer linen and thick silk and fine flannel, which lost their folds as they fell and covered the table in many-colored disarray. While we admired he brought more and the soft rich heap mounted higher — shirts with stripes and scrolls and plaids in coral and apple-green and lavender and faint orange, and monograms of Indian blue. Suddenly, with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shirts and began to cry stormily. (Fitzgerald 92).” Gatsby is throwing his shirts everywhere to show that he has a tremendous amount of money ...
In The Great Gatsby written by F. Scott Fitzgerald money, power, and the fulfillment of dreams is what the story’s about. On the surface the story is about love but underneath it is about the decay of society’s morals and how the American dream is a fantasy, only money and power matter. Money, power, and dreams relate to each other by way of three of the characters in the book, Gatsby, Daisy, and Tom. Gatsby is the dreamer, Daisy cares about money, and Tom desires and needs power. People who have no money dream of money. People who have money want to be powerful. People who have power have money to back them up. Fitzgerald writes this book with disgust towards the collapse of the American society. Also the purposeless existences that many people lived, when they should have been fulfilling their potential. American people lacked all important factors to make life worthwhile.
Gatsby strives to wear the “gold hat,” a color associated with abundance and success to gain the affection of Daisy, who is a vanity worshipper (D’Invillier). Aware of Daisy’s “excite[ment]” for materialistic possessions, Gatsby throws “gleaming, dazzling parties,” for five years straight in hopes of her appearance (Fitzgerald 67,114). Strategically wearing the “gold hat,” upon reunion with Daisy, Gatsby shows Daisy his “enormous,” “well looking” house (Fitzgerald 93). The house, conveniently located across the bay facing Daisy’s house, is laced with expensive, cherished decor that Gatsby revalued “according to the measure of response it drew from her well-loved eyes” (Fitzgerald, 59). Wholly absorbed by Daisy and her interest in his regal home, it is evident Gatsby solely values materials on it’s ability to “move” Daisy closer to him (D’Invillier). Similar, to the tour of his house, Gatsby’s display of his “beautiful shirts,” were intentional to romance her (Fitzgerald 59). Gatsby’s wealth, proving to be overwhelming as Daisy cries for “n...
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.
As the poem suggests, Gatsby uses his wealth to live a luxurious life to impress Daisy. He flaunts his expensive material possessions rather than his personality for the means of attaining more of Daisy’s interest than her husband. Gatsby also uses his newly earned money to raise his social standing and elevate to the economic and social status equivalent of Daisy. F. Scott Fitzgerald disguising himself as Thomas Parke D’Invilliers reveals the major motif of the book, which is the distinction of what is truly real and what only seems to be true, exhibited as James Gatz creates a façade for himself of the elegant and refined Jay Gatsby.
In summary, the characterisation used by Fitzgerald throughout this novel strongly supports the theme of the hollowness and superficiality of the upper class, and the idea that “you are what you own.” This novel shows how materialistic wealth is valued over morals by the upper class in the 1920s. Although this novel is a direct commentary of the social status of America during the post war economic boom, the ideals and social commentary are still relevant within our current society and thus makes The Great Gatsby, a definitive novel.
In his novel, The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald states the American Dream is Materialistic through his description of character’s carefree, and wealthy lifestyle. The American Dream is a lifestyle of freedom, choices, and love. In the story it shows how the characters have different lifestyles and different perspectives of what they want to accomplish in their life. Although, in the Great Gatsby the American Dream shows how different characters have riches, and unhappiness because they don’t have the love of their life.
AS 91479 -- Hypothesis of The Great Gatsby. Let’s get critical, critical! After reading and evaluating F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel ‘The Great Gatsby’ I have found that while a cursory view of this text may seem to highlight the glorious lives of those richest and most powerful, a more comprehensive approach to this text is required to delve past the surface themes of thwarted love between a man and a woman, and into the deeper set themes such as moral demise. Fitzgerald claimed to be a moralist at heart, preaching about the degeneracy of the wealthy.