The American dream for many abides of of getting an education, graduating from the best university and getting accepted into the best paying jobs right after school, but that is not the case for most. What the American Dream acts on is the dream to prosper and achieve the life of the rich. Many struggle to even acquire a decent job to sustain their families and their incomes. What used to be the “American Dream” for most people has now become only that just a dream, due to all the unemployment and high demand of a high starting pay. What folks do not know is that in order to prosper in this life everyone must start from the bottom in order to work their way up to the top. When looking for a job society tends to only look at the one with the …show more content…
This causes many people to become greedy and unconscious about others’ feelings and thinking that because they had everything in their childhood they also deserve the best jobs not considering their actual work experience and training. Nick Carraway was an educated young man from The Great Gatsby book who recalls his father always mentioning to him to “just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had” (Fitzgerald 1) making him a more humble and patient man helping him to find a job opportunity. Unlike Nick, Scott had a different kind of thinking he believed he would “rather than waste early years in dead-end work, he reasoned, he would hold out for a corporate position that would draw on his college training and put him, as he sees it, on the bottom rungs of a career ladder” (Uchitelle 1) thinking he could just sit back and relax instead of working hard for what he …show more content…
These people are usually first generations to come to the U.S or people who did not receive an education and want their kids to prosper in the future. For example in Nick’s family he was the third generation in his family and had the opportunity to get one step closer to the American Dream “we have a tradition that we're descended from the Dukes of Buccleuch, but the actual founder of my line was my grandfather's brother, who came here in fifty-one, sent a substitute to the Civil War, and started the wholesale hardware business that my father carries on to-day” (Fitzgerald 3) he had the education and stability that first time generations do not have. Scott’s father had the same concept in mind when he mentioned “opportunities will present themselves — as they did in the father’s rise over 35 years to general manager of a manufacturing company”(Uchitelle 1) it took him a couple of years for him to prosper and make the wealth that he is making not by sitting around and not doing
...ott Fitzgerald displays the false reality that American Dream presents upon society through the immense variation in setting and corresponding wealth, as seen in West Egg, East Egg and the Valley of Ashes. While the people in East Egg have inherited money, those in West Egg acquired it through their idea of the American Dream which in turn has grave repercussions for the lower class. The Valley of Ashes is a desolate wasteland where many lower class citizens live; the result of, “the rich get richer, and the poor get –children” (Fitzgerald 95). For most people, the American Dream will always remain just a distant dream. Fitzgerald’s rendition of the American Dream and its distorted reality is not only an exceptional novel, but accurately echoes similarities in present-day American society.
He loses sight of the ultimate goal of his dreams, just as Fitzgerald must have seen in the hopeful eyes of ambitious young Americans. Poor, underprivileged people were developing dreams for better lives for themselves. But, in order to have better lives, they became too fixated on the means of getting there. Their dreams became blinded by money and misguided by the ultimate goal of bettering themselves. Thus, through Gatsby’s tragic nature, Fitzgerald argues that the American Dream becomes ultimately unobtainable by the material means required in pursuit of the ultimate goal of a successful and prosperous life.
The American Dream There is no set definition to be found anywhere of the true meaning of The American Dream. Any hope, dream, or goal pursued by anyone in the history of America is an American Dream. In modern times the accepted dream seems to be 2.5 children, a house with a white picket fence, and a perfect spouse. However, as it is shown throughout literature from the early days of America to contemporary times, the American Dream is not always so simple a concept. America was originally founded on the dream of freedom.
The American dream states that people can work themselves up "from rags to riches" by hard work.1 For this reason, the new society has developed dreams of the blind pursuit of material, wealth, and economic success. F. Scott Fitzgerald realizes this big change in society, and considering the fact that he is a fighter for the old values, this novelist tries to warn people not to continue this wrong way. The ideal of the American Dream is based on the fantasy that an individual can achieve success regardless of family history, race, or religion simply by working hard enough. Dysfunctional relationships, according to Fitzgerald's way of writing, are based on infidelity, carelessness, and loveless couples. Materialism, on the other hand, situates wealth as advancement, and money, besides from becoming a shelter from the realities of life, acquires more importance than people. Classism, in the meanwhile, refers to racism, discrimination and snobbery, in the case of The Great Gatsby, present in West Egg. In his influential book The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald recognizes and describes many of the less alluring characteristics of the 1920's and the pursuit of the American Dream including dysfunctional relationships, materialism and classism.
In The Great Gatsby, what does F. Scott Fitzgerald suggest about the state of the American Dream, the people who pursue it, and the impact of that pursuit through his depiction of Jay Gatsby and the people in Gatsby’s life? Include specific examples, quotations, and supporting details from the novel in your response. Do not merely summarize the story.
The American Dream is a powerful thing in the lives and hopes of its citizens, as shown in Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald’s book, The Great Gatsby. It is, and was, faith in individualism, expectation of progress, and mainly the belief in America as a land of opportunity. However, it also is differs from person to person. This plays a great part in Fitzgerald’s book, The Great Gatsby. His book took place in the 1920 's, which is also called the 'Roaring 20 's '. During this time, many Americans were freely spending. Moreover, the economy was doing extremely well and thus provided citizens with a sense of security and intense freedom. Many used that freedom and economic boom to become rich in business.
Within the veins of every American flows the undeniable drive to succeed. This power creates rich from poor, turns struggles into money and ultimately opens the window for all peoples to better themselves. Although the American dream still converts dirt into gold today, views on this leap to greatness have changed moderately since the 1920’s.
Scott Fitzgerald utilises timeless, universal themes which are still relevant to modern readers. One such theme, The Great American Dream, still resonates with readers today. The American Dream is a national ethos in which freedom includes the opportunity for prosperity and success, as well as an upward social mobility for the family and children, achieved through hard work. Nick Carraway, the novel’s protagonist, believes that his family has accomplished The Great American Dream of wealth and respectability through nobility. But the kind of nobility that was achieved through hard work. In chapter one, Nick tape records himself and says, “The Carraways are something of a clan, and we have a tradition that we’re descended from the Dukes of Buccleuch, but the actual founder of my line was my grandfather’ brother, who came here in fifty-one, sent a substitute to the Civil War, and started the wholesale hardware business that my father carries on today…”(p.5). This novel teaches children in modern times that nobility is still relevant and is more likely than not earned through hard work and dedication instead of bloodlines, lineage, and titles. In the western world, The Great American Dream can be achieved through the belief in self-improvement. In chapter nine, Nick sees Gatsby on the dock and narrates, “ I thought of Gatsby's wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy's dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn,
The Definition of the American Dream as the Merriam-Webster dictionary stated is a happy way of living that is thought of by many Americans as something that can be achieved by anyone in the U.S. especially by working hard and becoming successful With good jobs, a nice house, two children, and plenty of money. For a quite good number of americans and even other nationalities the phrase ' The American Dream ' is the motto of fine living for them. It's a motto that have been romanticized to the extreme, where unrealistic expectations are linked to the idea of living in America and what can the land provide for the individual. Also, it's a long ,controvertial and debated subject. The concept of the American Dream began with the settlement of
The ‘American dream’ is generally characterized by the way that people depict success in life. In a seminal text from a successful period in America’s history, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby shows how the ‘American dream doesn’t surround merely one definition, but rather the it is what we make it to be. Within the text, it can range from, wealth, fame, or falling in love with the man or woman of your dreams. In contrast, Fitzgerald’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” depicts the life of Benjamin Button who is anything else but normal, which is unfortunate as the dream for most characters in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is to be just that. Both explore how the American dream doesn’t necessarily have to be the same for
Throughout the novel, Fitzgerald criticizes the American dream very elaborately and shows the idea of the American dream to be connected with the goal of achieving wealth. Fitzgerald does not praise wealth in the Great Gatsby but condemns it by drawing attention to the dreadful fall made by Gatsby. Fitzgerald finds the desire of wealth to be a corrupting impact on people. Throughout the novel, the characters with money contradict the idea of the American dream. They are portrayed to be very snobbish and unhappy people. The American dream in the novel is shown to be unachievable. For some time, the American dream has been focused upon material things that will gain people success.
“I am still a little afraid of missing something if I forget that, as my father snobbishly suggested, and I snobbishly repeat, a sense of the fundamental decencies is parceled out unequally at birth” (Fitzgerald 6). Nick clarifies that money isn’t the only thing people are born for. Some people are naturally just nicer and more honest. The novel, The Great Gatsby displays us that our dreams do not constantly become reality. Finally, Fitzgerald shows the reader how life is without completing our dreams.
A major facet of the American Dream is opportunity, and the potential to climb the ladder of society, and Gatsby’s story mirrors this concept. While being a prominent embodiment of the American Dream, even the great Gatsby himself falls short, as his endless riches fail to regain Daisy Buchanan’s lost love. Nick Carraway, the Midwestern bondsman turned West Egger, further conveys the impossibility of the American Dream. Coming from a well-to-do family in Minnesota, he moves East to learn the bond business and reap the fruits of America’s economic growth in its leading hotspot. Nevertheless, Nick finds himself “within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the variety of life” (Fitzgerald 35).
Gatsby Has A Dream As people of the United States, they have a dream that was created and thought out. The dream is that all people should have an equal opportunity to achieve success through hard work. In 1931, James Adams first publicly defined what the American Dream was.
Rethinking the American Dream The term “American Dream” has its origins long before the Roaring Twenties, used to describe the American way of life. The ideology that every man, regardless of race, gender, class, religion, sexuality, and disability shall be treated to the same rights, democracy, equality and opportunity. A member of the Lost Generation in the 1920s, F. Scott Fitzgerald is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of all time.