The Pursuit Of The American Dream In The Great Gatsby Analysis

In the 1920s, America underwent a period of economic prosperity and growth often referred to as the Roaring Twenties. In this era, the country saw a boom in technological advancements, culture, and modernization, illustrating a common feeling of happiness and progress. In reality, however, corruption and greed hid within the prospering cities, and the supposed American Dream becomes corrupted in empty pursuit for money and wealth. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Gatsby, a man who throws extravagant parties in his attempts to win over his past lover, is caught by corruption and his past. Because of his social standing and his illicit ties with bootlegging, he ultimately becomes unable to pursue his love, Daisy, as she pursues a member

In his attempts to win back Daisy, Gatsby portrays himself as a man stuck in the past, unwilling to accept the reality and futility of his pursuit of his American Dream, as Daisy has since found security in her own family. As a result of the war, Gatsby and Daisy are separated, and Gatsby’s life becomes “confused and disordered since then, but if he could once return to a certain starting place and go over it all slowly, he could find out what that thing was…” (110). Gatsby hopes to return to the past, where he can live in his vision and fix the mess that the present has created. The use of the ellipsis emphasizes the illusive state of his vision, as if he is lost in

When Gatsby leaves Daisy for the war, she searches for a “decision… made by some force—of love, of money, of unquestionable practicality—that was close at hand. That force took shape in the middle of spring with the arrival of Tom Buchanan” (151). The repeated use of the word “of” separated by the em dashes reflect Gatsby’s struggle to compete with the old rich, as he cannot meet all of Daisy’s expectations due to his social position. Tom, like Daisy, comes from the old rich, and he provides an easy sense of security that Gatsby cannot provide because he is wealthy. As a result, Gatsby’s dream is hindered by his social standing, and he still cannot win back Daisy later even when he does have large sums of money. When Daisy first falls in love with Gatsby, she is drawn to him because “he let her believe that he was a person from much the same stratum as herself… [but] he had no comfortable family standing behind him, and he was liable at the whim of an impersonal government to be blown anywhere about the world” (149). Whereas Tom is reliable because of his wealth and family, Gatsby is forced to work to meet Daisy’s expectations of a secure, dependable man. These underlying differences in social class prove to be an obstacle to Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship, ultimately preventing Gatsby from