Having Dreams and Dealing with Reality

Everybody has dreams, and everybody must deal with reality – that is

the nature of life.

A dream can be defined as something imagined, an ambition or an ideal,

and reality is the term assigned to all things real. Humans, by our

very nature, are ambitious, ever pursuing our dreams, our deepest

desires. It is the very purpose of life to make our goals our

aspirations, real. Therefore it is the nature of life to live through

reality and to dream. It is fitting, then, that many texts have been

composed based on ‘Dreams and Reality’. ‘The Great Gatsby’, ‘Great

Expectations’, ‘the talented Mr. Ripley’, and ‘Cat’s in the Cradle’

are some such texts.

We all need to have dreams and goals, they give us purpose. This is

evident in the novel ‘the Great Gatsby’, which was written by F.S

Fitzgerald. In it he uses a variety of literary techniques in his

examination of life in the 1920’s. These techniques include the

masterful use of theme, characterisation, a narrator, symbolism and

irony. All of the characters have dreams, Gatsby dreams to posses

Daisy, Jordan dreams to be independent, Wilson dreams to sell Tom’s

car, Myrtle dreams to marry Tom, and the techniques above stated

explore these dreams.

Among the main themes of the novel, is the American Dream, or the

corruption thereof. Fitzgerald attempts to communicate the false and

impossible nature of this ideal, and the ease with which it can be

corrupted. It is through the pursuit of the American Dream that Jay

Gatsby makes his fortune, however, he makes this fortune not only

through hard work, but through his involvement in organised crime,

thus he has corrupted the concept. Fitzgerald also presents the rich

as being immoral and wicked, and many of the rich in the novel did not

work for their money. The poor, on the other hand, are portrayed as

being rundown and beaten, and simply unable to get ahead despite their

sincerest efforts; “One thing's sure and nothing's surer, the rich get

richer and the poor get - children.”

Fitzgerald stresses that unless you are born into wealth, it is

virtually impossible to achieve it.

Social Class, therefore, is depicted as being unavoidable, and in the

novel the characters are separated by it. There are the rich, snobby

members of the upper class; Tom, Daisy, Jordan, and there are the

hardworking ‘chums’ of the lower class; George and Myrtle.

Characterization plays an important role in the novel. Fitzgerald

creates his characters to suit the very themes that he is trying to

communicate. Tom, for example represents the callous, immoral nature

of the very rich; “-even in college his freedom with money was a