Who Was Responsible For Jay Gatsby's Downfall

Fitzgerald depicts Jay Gatsby as a paragon of self-made man of success. He starts everything from the very beginning and from living his childhood days in poverty becomes a millionaire. He achieves the success that everyone in America was seeking for at the period. Gatsby has a huge house, servants and many friends that attend his parties. All the success he has achieved and the status he has will assist in his decay.

Given the abovementioned culture of consumerism, Jay Gatsby falls into the same tendency as the others like him. His dressing style was often pompous. Also, he inclined to show off with his “circus wagon” car (Fitzgerald) and his large house where he organizes huge parties and consumes lavishly and great amount of alcohol. The

wealth and power is not sufficient for a wealthy person to maintain his esteem. By putting it into evidence, thus by showing it to others, makes these people more confident.
Gatsby succeeded to give the impression that he had achieved the American Dream though from the inside he still sought assurance about him being impressive enough.

In the book he asks Nick to assure him about how impressive his house looks. The house of Gatsby was made just for the sake of its outward appearance and for public entertainment. It had a swimming pool that Gatsby says in the book that “he never had used” (Fitzgerald), large lawns and gardens surrounding it and a tower. All these details depict the importance that he paid to making evident his richness. This is due to his lack of being part of the “old rich” society. Another means for him to display his successes and great wealth are the huge parties that he organizes in his mansion. His guests are mostly from the newly riches and, according to Fjeldstrom, “It is easy to see that the guests at Gatsby’s party are completely unable to exist independently of each other, for all of these people are similarly trying to become a part of the rich set.” (Fjeldstrom, p. 38). Belonging to the same strata of society, and attempting all of them to achieve the American Dream that they believe that Gatsby had already achieved, they could not understand that he was indeed lacking it. His American Dream was not only that of success. His American Dream was to win

Daisy.
After the WWII, there was a great change in the economy of American people and a shift of status happened while the poor became rich and vice versa.

It was a time when the riches bankrupted and many industries or companies crashed and went out of business. Therefore, the people from the lowest strata of the society could collect money through corruption and illegal means. Hence, the American Dream that once could be achieved only through hard work and self-discipline, during 1920s turned out to be one of luxury, idleness and leisure. The newly rich had they achieved their goals regarding material wealth, did not persist in the Protestant ethic of hard work that the American Dream was supposed to be achieved. Regarding this, Cervo says

America is the land of opportunity, but all the opportunities that really matter are basically criminal in character, like bootlegging. To spin off from this a bit, it may be truly said that in America, no noncriminal ever becomes rich. By “crime” I mean not only the illegal, but the immoral; that is, breaches of decency, like honesty and trust, and a fair product for a fair price (Cervo,

2010).

Yet, one must admit that not all became rich because of their criminal accounts but related to immoral aspect it is true. Also, regarding Gatsby it is true in both aspects while Jay Gatsby and others coming from a poor setting involved themselves into these illegal works in order to achieve their dream. Gatsby deals with bootlegging business. Because Gatsby differs from some others that achieved their materialistic dream in that respect that he earns his wealth not in an honorable means, he lacks this work ethic. It is the means through which he accumulated his material wealth that contributed in the corruption and the demise of the American Dream and Gatsby’s downfall.
It is previously mentioned that Gatsby’s American Dream is tightly bound to Daisy and winning her back, ergo he uses many different attempts, one might consider even naïve ones, to reach her. As long as Daisy is already a member of that part of the society that has always been rich and wealthy, only money cannot satisfy her and cannot make Gatsby reach her. She is already rich enough and has a rich husband. Gatsby fails to realize and understand that no matter how much Daisy involves with him, she will never leave the life that she has and the society she belongs to or being an “old money” representative.
The belief that having more material wealth for Daisy he would have higher chances to be loved by she makes him involve in these businesses, but it concludes that money cannot make him happy. Also when they have the car accident and murder Myrtle, Gatsby cares only about Daisy and that she will have no problems. Having Daisy become the only important thing about him, he starts to become just as careless as she is. He lies about the cause of Myrtle’s death in order to save Daisy and is killed by George after that. Thus, the means Gatsby chooses to win his dream cause him to die and, as a consequence, the failure of his American Dream for that he never could fully complete it.