Unfortunately, there always will be a class system. People are constantly being judged on what material possessions they own or just being judged outwardly. Society has come to accept being classified and yearning for the top spot. No matter where you go people seem to form classes or cliques, begging the question as to why we feel the need to constantly rank ourselves according to society’s standards. Novels are good representations of these rankings because you then get to look at this silly idea from the outside looking in. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald examines class distinction in the 1920s and how it affects one’s ascension to higher social classes in order to achieve the American Dream.
In The Great Gatsby, one setting we are introduced to is the valley of the ashes, which is in between East and West Egg. There you will find Myrtle Wilson, Tom Buchanan’s mistress, along with her husband George, who owns the gas station where Nick first meets them. There is a great representation of the American dream in Myrtle. Myrtle has a very strong personality and she knows what she wants out of life. She strives to be a part of the higher classes like Tom and Daisy, but it is unattainable. She pursues the “American dream” to the point of obsession. The first thing she does when Tom takes her to their place in the city is change her dress, along with purchasing the town gossip magazine (Fitzgerald 31). Myrtle wants to be Daisy, she wants that rank in life. She changes her clothes to try and fit that mold because she is greedy and unsatisfied with her life. On the other hand, her husband, George, is very happy with where he is in life. He is very naive in thinking that Myrtle is faithful and happy. When Nick asks what Wilson ...
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...y numerous times, but he is unable to come to terms with the past with his multitude of hope, which symbolizes his tragic flaw. The American dream cannot be achieved, it is symbolic of the impossibility of the 1920’s. There was so much dissatisfaction, unhappiness, and a lack of hope in most, a part from Gatsby that the American dream was only a dream; no one could comprehend it as a reality.
Works Cited
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York, NY: Collier Books, 1992. Print.
King, Noel. "In Theaters and with 'The Great Gatsby,' It's High Class or Class War." Marketplace. Marketplace, 9 May 2013. Web. 25 Feb. 2014.
Powers, Liza T. "Epic Grandeur and Gatsby." Epic Grandeur and Gatsby. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Feb. 2013.
Roberts, Jonathan, and Monica Wheelock. "The Not-So-Roaring '20s." The Pre-Depression Depression. N.p., 18 Nov. 2008. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.
During Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, it is apparent to be an absurd time for the wealthy. The shallowness of money, riches, and a place in a higher social class were probably the most important components in most lives at that period of time. This is expressed clearly by Fitzgerald, especially through his characters, which include Myrtle Wilson, Tom and Daisy Buchanan, and of course, Jay Gatsby. This novel was obviously written to criticize and condemn the ethics of the rich.
F. Scott Fitzgerald uses The Great Gatsby in order to display the wretchedness of upper-class society in the United States. The time period, the 1920s, was an age of new opulence and wealth for many Americans. As there is an abundance of wealth today, there are many parallels between the behavior of the wealthy in the novel and the behavior of today’s rich. Fitzgerald displays the moral emptiness and lack of personal ethics and responsibility that is evident today throughout the book. He also examines the interactions between social classes and the supposed noblesse oblige of the upper class. The idea of the American dream and the prevalence of materialism are also scrutinized. All of these social issues spoken about in The Great Gatsby are relevant in modern society. F. Scott Fitzgerald uses this novel as an indictment of a corrupt American culture that is still present today.
In the book Great Gatsby there are many examples of society and social class, many are shown to us as the book progresses. Some are shown to us very up front while, others are hidden in the text. Society and social class play a critical part in this book such as how people interact with the lower classes, to how the rich live their lives. When we look deeper into on how the Great Gatsby handles sociality and social class, which puts the characters in the positions they are in.
Samuels, Charles T. "The Greatness of ‘Gatsby'." Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby: The Novel, The Critics, The Background. Ed. Henry D. Piper. Charles Schribner's Sons, New York: 1970.
In Gatsby's death Fitzgerald suggest that the American dream is a false attraction, "[Gatsby] paid a high price for living to long with a single dream" (169, Fitzgerald). Corruption of the dream is especially apparent when Nick discusses the origins of the American dream, "Dutch sailors eyes-a fresh, green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby's house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of human dreams…his capacity to wonder" (189, Fitzgerald). Fitzgerald illustrates that the dream has vanished and Gatsby's "capacity to wonder" is all that is left of the original dream.
Gibb, Thomas. "Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby" The Explicator Washington: Winter 2005. Vol. 63, Iss.3; Pg. 1-3
"The Great Gatsby." Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Linda Pavlovski. Vol. 157. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 15 Jan. 2014.
Back in the roaring twenties America was seeing such world-changing phenomenons such as The Great Gatsby, and penicillin, but what took the world by surprise was none other than Walt Disney and his lovable creation, Mickey Mouse. Walt Disney, throughout his entire lifetime and career, always had an idea, a spark, and a way to make things better. Even in the face of tough times, he never failed to keep his optimistic attitude and kind faith in humanity from infecting those around him. A major part of his success was due to the technological innovations that revolutionized the film industry.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott, and Matthew J. Bruccoli. The Great Gatsby. New York, NY: Scribner, 1996. Print.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald focuses on the lifestyle of a group of people who will do anything to accomplish their goals. The characters go through different changes that come to affect their life decisions and will cause them to lie, sacrifice and feel lonely in their lives. They live the American dream and have power but chase a dream that would affect and change their lifestyles. They judge and discriminate against one another not knowing they have a certain symbol in common in their lives. Their desire to accomplish their goals became a type of new life to the characters.
Social classes have been around since the beginning of time. Most people are lead to believe that rich people live in beautiful and extravagant homes, throw luxurious parties and do not give a damn about keeping it a secret. The poor people are happy to have a roof over their heads and have food on the table and will work their asses off to make a penny. The higher the class that someone is in, the better that person’s life is perceived to be and vice-versa. There is old money versus new money, which determines which side of town one lives on. Everyone knows the difference in social classes and is able to see where most people fit in. In the classic novel, The Great Gatsby, the reader is exposed to many things that show a difference in social class that sadly, still exist in today. Most people have a dream of being in a certain class; whether they ever get to experience it or not, the dream is there. The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1925, shows how social class plays a theme in the story.
Trouble emerges when the wrong people and the wrong time collide, but a tragedy is not always necessarily the solution of that collision. However, in The Great Gatsby, Gatsby got murdered in the end of the novel. Despite the cause of it, his death itself is tragic. This novel leads the way to the fateful end of such a collision between the wrong man and the wrong time.
Lust is a desire that can drive an individual to go to all extents, just to get what they wish for. Literature is very broad in the way that it is available to everyone and can help us gain knowledge in many different aspects. In my opinion, I believe that literature is about gaining knowledge about a certain event and being able to connect with the story and relate the situations to what is actually happening in reality. I also think that literature can cause people to form different opinions that can end up being very eye opening when things are looked at from a different perspective. As a class, we read a variety of stories, all with different types of knowledge and opinions associated with them. The two stories that stood out to me were The Great Gatsby and “The Cask of Amontillado.” In these two stories the general message is lust and how lust can take over one’s body and the way they live their life.
Witkoski, Michael. "The Great Gatsby." Magill’S Survey Of American Literature, Revised Edition (2006): 1-2. Literary Reference Center. Web. 4 Mar. 2014.