How Does Fitzgerald Present The American Dream In The Great Gatsby

Is the American Dream an illusion? Or is it a reality? To quote Benjamin Todd “No person can maximize the American Dream on the minimum wage.” Throughout The Great Gatsby, Scott Fitzgerald casts the American Dream in a negative light, portraying it as unachievable, while In I,Too, Sing America, Langston Hughes does the opposite, and tries to persuade the audience that the American Dream is achievable through hard work and determination. In The Great Gatsby, Scott Fitzgerald uses symbolism and foreshadowing to portray the American Dream as an illusion. While in I, Too, Sing America, Langston Hughes is able to use diction and foreshadowing to illustrate the American Dream as a reality.

In The Great Gatsby, Scott Fitzgerald uses symbolism and

foreshadowing to cast the American Dream in a negative light, and depict it as an illusion. “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”(Fitzgerald, 180) The passage symbolizes the struggle of a person’s act of pursuing the American Dream where as “the current” symbolizes all the odds and difficulties that a person faces while trying to achieve success.

Examples of which include; discrimination in terms of different classes, the relentless will of others to do “Whatever it takes” to get to the top, and the corrupt community and government officials. Another example of symbolism in this passage is when Fitzgerald states “(...) Borne back ceaselessly into the past.” This symbolizes the setbacks that come with the difficult circumstances where a person is taken back to the start of their journey to success. This links to The Great Gatsby as it being a roller coaster of events that are filled with rises and falls, an example of which would be how Gatsby spent his entire life dedicated to impress the woman of his dreams by spending most of his fortunes on his properties, and now that Fitzgerald killed him, it all means nothing. "I wouldn't ask too much of her," I ventured. "You can't repeat the past." "Can't

repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!"(Fitzgerald,110) This phrase addresses the difficulties of achieving The American Dream and how it is an illusion. In a conversation between Nick and Gatsby, Fitzgerald is able to foreshadow the outcome of Gatsby’s “American Dream”. This conversation reflects on how Fitzgerald portrays the American dream as an illusion with the use of foreshadowing as Nick tells Gatsby “You cant repeat the past”. This passage foreshadows the that Gatsby’s dream and hope that he and Daisy will one day be back together, will not be achieved. To conclude Fitzgerald uses symbolism and foreshadowing to depict the American Dream as an illusion.

In I, Too, Sing America, Langston Hughes is able to use diction and foreshadowing to cast the American Dream in a positive light, and illustrate it as a reality. “Besides, they’ll see how beautiful I am and be ashamed”(15-17) Through the use of Diction, Hughes is able to create an optimistic and hopeful tone, when he says, “They’ll see how beautiful I am”. This tone is created through his positive attitude and belief that one day everyone will realize that his skin color doesn't make him any more different than everybody else. “Tomorrow, I’ll be at the table. When company comes.”(8-10) This passage is another example of how Hughes is able to create an optimistic tone is through the use of foreshadowing, as he states, “Tomorrow, I’ll be at the table”. Hughes is able to create a positive tone through his assurance that one day, people's ways will change, and that one day he will be there “When company comes”. In Conclusion, I, Too, Sing America, Langston Hughes is able to use diction and foreshadowing to illustrate the American Dream as a reality.

Hughes and Fitzgerald both use symbolism to illustrate the lower classes that are striving to achieve their American Dream of Equality.

“I too, am America” (18) Hughes uses America as a symbolic figure to portray equality when he states that he has the same rights, just like anyone else in “America”. Through the use of symbolism, Hughes attempts to illustrate America a cohesive unit rather than a nation separated by race and class. “This is a valley of ashes — 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 and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.”(Fitzgerald,23) The valley of ashes is a long stretch of land, which is set right in between the East egg and the West egg. The long stretch of decaying land symbolizes the famine and hopelessness of the people living there who have been broken down and are now “crumbling through the powdery air.” The valley of ashes also symbolizes the hard working, lower class people who one day hope to achieve their American Dream. To Conclude, Hughes and Fitzgerald both use symbolism to illustrate the lower classes that are striving to achieve their American Dream of

Equality.

The Great Gatsby casts the American Dream in a negative light, portraying it as unachievable, while In I, Too, Sing America, the American Dream is rendered as attainable. Although one thing that the two have in common is that both use symbolism to illustrate the lower classes that are striving to achieve their American Dream of Equality. In The Great Gatsby, symbolism and foreshadowing are used to depict the American Dream as unattainable, While in I, Too, Sing America, diction and foreshadowing are used to portray the American Dream as obtainable.