What Is The Difference Between East And West Egg In The Great Gatsby

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Throughout history and still to this day, there has always been a class system. The class system was dominated by wealth and social status and existed during the Roaring ‘20s. Prohibition, the banning of manufacturing and selling alcohol, occurred during the 1920s and caused an increase in bootlegging and organized crime. This Era contained people of great wealth, as well as people in extreme poverty. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby explores East and West Egg and the differences in social status between them. East and West Egg are physically the same, but the perception of each area of land is portrayed differently. Fitzgerald relates the East and West division of the States on the division of class and society in the 20th century. …show more content…

Coming from a bird’s eye view, “twenty miles from the city a pair of enormous eggs, identical in contour and separated only by courtesy bay” was what they saw (9). From this point of view, the two areas of land are physically the same, with huge mansions and rich people. “They are not perfect ovals-like the egg in Columbus story they are both crushed flat at the contact end- but their physical resemblance must be a source of perpetual confusion to the gulls that fly overhead” (9). The only true difference among the Eggs lies in the minds of the people living in the East and West. Because they are separated by Courtesy Bay, no matter how hard Gatsby or Nick tries to become and East Egger, it will not happen. At one of Gatsby’s lavish parties, Nick met a professional golfer named Jordan Baker. ““You live in West Egg,” she remarked contemptuously (15). Jordan Baker shows contempt and already views Nick differently just because he lives in West Egg. This quote helps captures others in response to the American Dream. People that lived in East Egg did not think a person in West Egg’s wealth was legitimate. Most people that were born into wealth had a harsh perception among the people that wanted to be like

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