The Jazz Age was a gilded time in America, a period of excitement and carelessness, the entire nation obsessed with good looks and money. As wealthy reputations became more important than ever, Americans grew increasingly materialistic and craved the "good life"– a life with big houses, fancy cars, and lavish parties. The highest level of success was not derived from a hard work ethic as in the olden days, but instead from this new, gaudy American Dream, a dream focused neither on happiness or satisfaction, but instead solely on the attainment of wealth. Americans wrongly associated ultimate happiness with the possession of money, and often intertwined the two, reducing the old American Dream to nothing but a corrupt vision of wealth. In his novel The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald exposed the birth of this cheap, gilded, materialistic American Dream, as well as the empty lives it created. By illustrating both the ceaseless dissatisfaction and the immoral ignorance of the rich East-Egg socialites during this garish jazz age, Fitzgerald demonstrated how money can destroy and contort the beautiful purity of a simple dream. Fitzgerald emphasized the extent to which money could corrupt a dream in the character of Jay Gatsby. A young Gatsby, constantly improving himself, had always worked towards some kind of goal. "Jimmy was bound to get ahead...he was always great for that" (Fitzgerald 173). Uninfluenced by money at this time, Gatsby's motives were pure. He worked to accomplish something, and when he did, he did not rest– effortlessly moving on to another part of his life that required perfection. Gatsby's perseverance and determination to improve were characteristics of old dreamers– people that defined success not as wealth, ... ... middle of paper ... ... The Great Gatsby beautifully documents the death of the pure American Dream in the 1920s, when wealth and the materialistic attitudes began replacing the pure ideals of success and genuine content. Through Gatsby's dissatisfaction with the unfulfilling life that money provided him and through the immoral recklessness of Tom and Daisy caused by their selfishness, Fitzgerald accused the rich of killing the old American Dream and of creating a materialistic society that was rarely satisfied with what they had. Fitzgerald credited the destruction of the old American Dream to money and to those that obsessively worshipped that money, exposing the nation's open willingness to give money the power to control and corrupt American lives. Works Cited Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. 2004th ed. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1925. 1- 180 . Print.
The novel The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, deals heavily with the concept of the American Dream as it existed during the Roaring Twenties, and details its many flaws through the story of Jay Gatsby, a wealthy and ambitious entrepreneur who comes to a tragic end after trying to win the love of the moneyed Daisy Buchanan, using him to dispel the fantastic myth of the self-made man and the underlying falsities of the American Dream. Despite Gatsby’s close association with the American Dream, however, Fitzgerald presents the young capitalist as a genuinely good person despite the flaws that cause his undoing. This portrayal of Gatsby as a victim of the American Dream is made most clear during his funeral, to which less than a handful
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. "The Great Gatsby." Barnes & Noble. N.p., 1920 's. Web. 08 Mar.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott, and Matthew J. Bruccoli. The Great Gatsby. New York, NY: Scribner, 1996. Print.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott, and Matthew J. Bruccoli. The Great Gatsby. New York, NY: Scribner, 1996. Print.
Gibb, Thomas. "Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby" The Explicator Washington: Winter 2005. Vol. 63, Iss.3; Pg. 1-3
Since its publication in 1925, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald has indisputably been one of the most influential and insightful pieces on the corruption and idealism of the American Dream. The American Dream, defined as ‘The belief that anyone, regardless of where they were born or what class they were born into, can attain their own version of success in a society where upward mobility is possible for everyone,’ was a dominant ideal in American society, stemming from an opportunist pioneer mentality. In his book ‘The American Tradition in Literature’, Bradley Sculley praised The Great Gatsby for being ‘perhaps the most striking fictional analysis of the age of gang barons and the social conditions that produced them.’ Over the years, greed and selfishness changed the basic essence of the American Dream, forming firmly integrated social classes and the uncontainable thirst for money and status. The ‘Roaring Twenties’ was a time of ‘sustained increase in national wealth’ , which consequently led to an increase in materialism and a decrease in morality. Moreover, the
F. Scott Fitzgerald. The Great Gatsby. New York London Toronto Sydney Singapore: First Scribner Paperback Fiction Edition Published by Simon & Schuster, 1995*
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.
Bruccoli, Matthew J. Preface. The Great Gatsby. By F. Scott Fitzgerald. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995. vii-xvi.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Scribner, 2004. Print. The.
Through the use of symbolism and critique, F. Scott Fitzgerald is able to elucidate the lifestyles and dreams of variously natured people of the 1920s in his novel, The Great Gatsby. He uses specific characters to signify diverse groups of people, each with their own version of the “American Dream.” Mostly all of the poor dream of transforming from “rags to riches”, while some members of the upper class use other people as their motivators. In any case, no matter how obsessed someone may be about their “American Dream”, Fitzgerald reasons that they are all implausible to attain.
...er and money are so powerful they can control someone. People criticize others who are lower than them but they don’t realize they were once in the bottom also. In the roaring 20’s Fitzgerald shows how the American Dream has deteriorated. The American Dream originally was about bettering yourself, discovery, and finding happiness. This changed for Gatsby instead he wanted money and to be involved in social circles he did not belong in.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott, and Matthew J. Bruccoli. The Great Gatsby. New York, NY: Scribner,1996. Print.
In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald cynicism about the American Dream in the 1920’s is represented by the character Jay Gatsby, Nick Carraway, and Daisy Buchanan. The people who were born with wealth are careless, awful people, and the people who attain it or seek to attain it end up destroyed. FItzgerald believes that the American Dream in the 1920’s is ruined by the unworthiness of money and pleasure, these changes affected his belief about the American Dreambecause when people in the book pursuit a better life, they end up getting hurt or hurting others. Fitzgerald’s attitude was represented because Gatsby was poor and he went into the criminal organization industry to come up in social ladder just so he live his dream of marrying Daisy and he ends up getting killed.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. Ed. Matthew J. Bruccoli, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1925