Materialism and the Death of American Dream in The Great Gatsby

Set in the 1920’s, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, tells the story of Nick Carraway and the time he spends in New York City. Throughout the story Nick meets many characters from different backgrounds, and the story follows the interactions between them. While one could read this novel and see just an interesting story, a deeper look can reveal that the characters and their interactions actually represent a critique of the American Dream. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby argues that wealth and materialism kills the American Dream of class mobility. One of these characters, a flighty, selfish, woman named Daisy, represents money and material wealth. Nick describes this representation when he talks about Gatsby’s view

Talking to Nick he says, “‘Her voice is full of money,’ he said suddenly.” Some people say the eyes are the window to the soul, which would make the voice the door. Talking is how people convey almost everything about themselves. While body language could help a little to understand who someone is, without talking to that person (or hearing them talk) you would never know anything about who they really were. By saying that Daisy’s “voice is full of money,” he’s essentially saying that nearly everything he knows about her is directly related to

Reading on in the conversation between Gatsby would reveal that Myrtle ran out in front of that car. Myrtle’s actions led to her own demise, therefore, F. Scott Fitzgerald must be claiming that chasing class mobility will destroy you. It’s true that Daisy didn’t intentionally kill Myrtle, in fact Gatsby explains that “[Myrtle] rushed out at us.” At the same time, regardless of intent, Daisy still was the one responsible for the accident, and it was no mere accident. Gatsby says, “Well, first Daisy turned away from the woman toward the other car, and then she lost her nerve and turned back.” By explaining this scene in sequence using the words “first” and “and then”, we see that Daisy could have put the lives of others above her own, but she “lost her nerve” and instead chose to kill Myrtle. This alone may not prove that it was completely Daisy’s fault, but then Gatsby says, “‘it must have killed her instantly.’ ‘Anyhow—Daisy stepped on it.’” The phrase “anyhow” puts this in a very casual tone, as if Daisy saw that she had killed someone, then disregarded it just as quickly and kept moving. Daisy may not have killed Myrtle on purpose, but she definitely didn’t care that she ended her life after it happened, proving that materialism kills the dream of class mobility without remorse.

Daisy Buchanan, who comes from a very wealthy background, and Myrtle Wilson,