Theme Of New Money In The Great Gatsby

The 1920s is the era where a lot of people are gaining wealth through bonds, credits, and bootlegging. “New Money”, or people who suddenly became rich, are rising, and the “Old Money”, people who inherited their wealth from their family, just becomes wealthier. In the novel, although “New Money” people are already considered wealthy, “Old money” still considers them as an outcast of the wealthy society for they think “New Money” people does not have the elegance and grace of the old aristocracy. In the novel, Fitzgerald, portrays wealth as an identity, which contributes to their level of success and power to control and destroy the society. In the first chapter of the novel, Nick introduce us to three other important characters: Tom Buchanan,

People who lived in pool of money since they were born would never accept people who just acquired a new found wealth in the Jazz era. They might be successful in the eyes of low class people but to the society of aristocrats, they will never be successful in life for they are “just big bootleggers” (pg. 82). Tom gave Gatsby the identity of a bootlegger because he will never accept Gatsby in his “superior” society. Gatsby’s identity as a ‘new money’ may be acceptable and perceived as a successful life for the people who had never been in the high class society, but for the people who rules this high society Gatsby will never be “successful life”. They will perceive this success as something that will crash down anytime because the ‘new money’ people does not have grace and knowledge of how to be someone successful. Gatsby himself, like other West Eggers, “foolishly believes that the money he has earned erases much of that social gap so that no one will think, as he tells Nick, that ‘I was just some nobody’ (71), ‘some kind of cheap sharper’ (145)” (Oxymoron in The Great Gatsby, PLL 319). He believes that since he is a wealthy man, everybody will accept him in the higher society; however, this idea proven wrong when Tom, along with Mr. Sloane and another woman. The three of them talked about

Gatsby would always try to control everything in Nick’s life and everyone that surrounds him. Nick has a very friendly and nice personality, and he, most of the time, sides with Gatsby. It can be implied that Gatsby take this nice character for granted for in one part of the novel, Gatsby tried to control everything that was needed to be taken care of when Daisy arrives. Gatsby used his money to buy the flowers and all the arrangements necessary for this