great gatsby

“Now we have an American masterpiece in its final form; the original crystal has shaped itself into the true diamond.”

(James Dickey)

The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald is deemed to be a true classic in all terms. The Novel is a timeless masterpiece that any era throughout history can relate to. “Though written in the 1920’s The Great Gatsby stands as

... one of the masterpieces of the twentieth century American literature .“ The book has “transcended its own age and turned into a timeless classic.” The novel may have been written to justify society at that time, however the entire storyline can be related to anyone that reads it.

William Faulkner is an author who wrote a famous Nobel Prize acceptance speech. “He writes not of love but lust, of defeats in which nobody loses anything of value, of victories without hope and worst of all, without pity or compassion.” Here Faulkner speaks of issues that also pertain to that of The

Great Gatsby. Gatsby desired Daisy throughout the entire story. Everything he did and thought had been decided upon by his undying lust. When Daisy married Tom, Gatsby lost his chance with her. Then Gatsby won a glance at happiness with Daisy when she fell in love with him. There was no hope though, his poor youth kept him from being an aristocrat. Daisy only wanted to be with an aristocrat. Finally when Faulkner said “without pity or compassion” this relates to The Great Gatsby in how Tom and Daisy packed up and moved far away without even showing their faces at Gatsby’s funeral.

The Plot of the novel, is based on the fact that the newly rich, (those who were not born into money, but have acquired it over time), will never have the power of those who were born in to family wealth. The woman that Gatsby, the main character, is in love with, is married to Tom, a man of higher power than Gatsby.

Living in East Egg, the couple looked down on those in West Egg. West

Egg was “The less fashionable of the two,”(pg. 9) the area where those who had just acquired their new money lived.

Daisy, Gatsby’s love interest, deserted him after their past relationship and married Tom while Gatsby was at war. Gatsby’s newly obtained money was still not good enough for Daisy. This type of scenario is still typical today in society. Much of the world today is based on materialism and the worth of one’s fortune is more valuable than their own happiness.

For the most part the characters, their problems they face, and how they