Cars as a Symbol in The Great Gatsby

Cars as a Symbol in The Great Gatsby

Cars play a very important part in the telling of The Great Gatsby.

The Great Gatsby is a very dark, unhappy book, and the cars really

exemplify this. "…cars change their meaning and become a symbol of

death" (Dexheimer). Cars also give the reader insight into some of the

different characters in the book.

One of the most important jobs of cars in this book is to foreshadow

upcoming events. Throughout the book, there are many devastating and

dark events that these cars represent. A line from the book that

really drives this home is, "So we drove on toward death through the

cooling twilight" (Fitzgerald 143). Fitzgerald deliberately chose to

put the words drove, implying cars, and death, together. This is an

idea that appears many times. The dead man went

An incidence of this is when Nick and Gatsby are driving over the

Queensboro Bridge on their way to the valley of ashes. This paragraph

in the book is very dark, and it helps set the awful mood for the rest

of the book.

A dead man passed us in a hearse heaped with blooms, followed by two

carriages with drawn blinds and by more cheerful carriages for

friends. The friends looked out at us with the tragic eyes and short

upper lips of south-eastern Europe and I was glad the sight of

Gatsby's splendid car was included in their somber holiday. As we

crossed Black Wells Island a limousine passed us, driven by a white

chauffeur, in which sat three modish Negroes, two bucks and a girl. I

laughed aloud as the yolks of their eyeballs rolled towards us in

haughty rivalry. (Fitzgerald 73)

On this bridge, any number of different types of cars could have

driven by, but a hearse and a black limousine were chosen to help

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...ruption in the

novel" (Symbolism in The Great Gatsby). "Instead of being a 'rich

cream color,' a witness is quoted saying 'It was a yellow car,'

implying that the dream is dead" (Swygert). In the East Daisy becomes

corrupt, and the color change is the way that the reader is shown this

change in her, and the death of Gatsby's dream of marrying Daisy.

As I have shown, cars play a very important part in helping portray

the darkness in The Great Gatsby. The cars symbolize the death and

despair of the story and help to characterize some of the main

characters.

Works Cited

Dexheimer, Melissa, Lauren Locke and Mosang Miles. "Student Led

Seminar Presentation and Summary".

Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Simon & Schuster,

1995.

Swygert, Shavaun. "Color Symbolism in The Great Gatsby". 1 June

1998.

"Symbolism in The Great Gatsby".