What Does West Egg Symbolize In The Great Gatsby

From the East Egg to the West, each Egg contains its own assortment of intricate detail defining East to West, and from those details come Fitzgerald’s usage of simple American locations to symbolize the rise and decay of American society. Nick Carraway, West Egg’s newest resident describes his sights across the bay, the “white palaces of fashionable East Egg glittered across the water,” (5). Just like any new resident of any neighborhood, Nick soaks in the sights and sounds surrounding his newly-purchased house, one of the sights being the Buchanans’ castle. Like all large and prominent houses, Tom and Daisy’s residence screams lavish, inherited, and most evidently, old. As Nick continues basking, he notices Gatsby’s residence, a “colossal

affair by any standard—it was a factual imitation of some Hotel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden” (5). Like a young individual after receiving their first paycheck, people with newly acquired wealth spends their fortune on plenty superfluous luxuries and items. Gatsby appears to have spared no expense on his mansion, but spends additional on nonessentials such as a large enough area of greenery to house a few families. The following day, Nick lists the unusual sights seen at his neighbor Gatsby’s mansion: “the earth lurches away from the sun, and now the orchestra is playing yellow cocktail music, and the opera of voices pitches a key higher. Laughter is easier minute by minute, spilled with prodigality, tipped out at a cheerful word” (40). Not only does Gatsby hold numerous amounts of redundancies, he holds numerous amounts of large parties as well. Even when invited to Gatsby’s party, Nick is overwhelmed by the count of people who come uninvited, other people new wealth. Comparing the 1920s with modern society and their money, each generation’s old money and inheritance with the new money and its habit of throwing cash away as if genuinely wealthy implies a cultural corrosion where the old money lives peaceful, harmonious with all of society, while the new money tears the tranquility with annoyances and wastes.