The Real Western Dream
Since its discovery, the West has provided opportunities for people with little or no hope. For some, it is the land of rags to riches, while for others, it traps them into a similar cycle of poverty. Many people are disillusioned by the false sense of hope and security that the West promises. In The Great Gatsby, the author F. Scott Fitzgerald shows the disillusionment of the Western dream through Jay Gatsby’s loss of identity, his lifestyle, and his legacy.
Since he was young, Gatsby changes his identity in order to mold himself into the epitome of Western culture. In many instances, Gatsby attempts to conceal his initial poverty, such as when he claims, “[his] family all died and [he] came into a good deal of money”
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Sitting alone and observing the intoxicated crowd, Nick points out that “most of the remaining women were now having fights with men said to be their husbands” (51). Through the night, Fitzgerald shows the general discontent among those gathered at Gatsby’s house. Even with all the wealth, the unsettling dissatisfaction of his guests with their significant other evoked by the seemingly endless stream of liquor is a precursor to the love affair of Gatsby and Daisy. Although Gatsby lives alone, he always “[keeps] [his house] full of interesting people, night and day” (90). Despite not knowing half of the people who attend his gatherings, Gatsby allows anyone to show up. Gatsby becomes disconnected with his personability because he does everything for show and as a ploy to attract the public eye. During his last party at Gatsby’s house, Nick notes that he “[has grown to accept West Egg as a world complete in itself, with its own standards and its own great figures, second to nothing because it had no consciousness of being so, and now I was looking at it again, through Daisy’s eyes” (104). Nick is for the first time realizing how Gatsby’s parties are carefully planned in order to attract Daisy’s attention. Gatsby needs to capture Daisy’s interest with his extravagant lifestyle to fulfill his imagined dream even though she is married. Jay Gatsby’s
“ Its attitude is one of disillusionment and detachment; Fitzgerald is still able to evoke the glitter of the 1920s but he is no longer dazzled by it; he sees its underlying emptiness and impoverishment” (Trendell 23)The story is narrated from the point of view of Nick, one of Gatsby’s friends. The problematic and hopeless romantic, Gatsby, sets out to fulfill his dream in acquiring Daisy, his lifelong love, through his many tactics and ideas. Gatsby is introduced extending his arms mysteriously toward a green light in the direction of the water. Later, Gatsby is shown to be the host of many parties for the rich and Nick is invited to one of these parties where Gatsby and Nick meet. When Gatsby later confesses his love for Daisy he explains she was a loved one who was separated from him and hopes to get her again explained when he says, “I hope she'll be a fool -- that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool”(Fitzgerald 56). There are several obstacles that Gatsby must overcome and the biggest one that is Daisy’s current fiancé but that still does not get in the way of him trying to recover Daisy’s old feelings. His attempts are made through money and wealth because he tries to buy her love back instead of letting it happen naturally.
“The Great Gatsby” was a extremely sophisticated novel; it expressed love, money, and social class. The novel is told by Nick Carraway, Gatsby’s neighbor. Nick had just moved to West Egg, Longs Island to pursue his dream as a bond salesman. Nick goes across the bay to visit his cousin Daisy and her husband Tom Buchanan in East Egg. Nick goes home later that day where he saw Gatsby standing on his dock with his arms out reaching toward the green light. Tom invites Nick to go with him to visit his mistress Mrs. Myrtle Wilson, a mid class woman from New York. When Nick returned from his adventure of meeting Myrtle he chooses to turn his attention to his mysterious neighbor, Gatsby. Gatsby is a very wealthy man that host weekly parties for the
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby recounts a love story of fortune, sacrifice, and passion. Mystified by the foreign land of excessive capital and immense material possessions, the narrator, Nick Carraway, judges or exalts numerous inhabitants of the East and West Eggs, especially Jay Gatsby, whose mystery and secrecy attracts many. Although it seems like Mr. Carraway obsesses about Gatsby, strictly, for his wealth, a careful look at craft choices and his characterization reveals that Jay Gatsby captivates Nick because he is one of the only characters, who, unclouded by prosperity, recognizes his own fascination with money.
In The Great Gatsby Fitzgerald elucidates the hollowness of the American Dream, as the unrestrained longing for wealth and freedom exceeding more honorable desires. He illuminates the idea that having or attaining this American Dream will result in unethical behavior or unethical acts.
In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby provides the reader with a unique outlook on the life of the newly rich. Gatsby is an enigma and a subject of great curiosity, furthermore, he is content with a lot in life until he strives too hard. His obsession with wealth, his lonely life and his delusion allow the reader to sympathize with him. Initially, Gatsby stirs up sympathetic feelings because of his obsession with wealth.
He wants to marry her,but because of this problem to reach her standards. Once he reaches his goal of gaining the appropriate amount of wealth,he buys a house which is close to hers “Gatsby bought that house so Daisy would be just across the bay(p83).”He throws huge,extravagant parties,in hope that she might happen to show up at one of them. Gatsby does not actually even attend these parties,as he is not much of a socializer,instead he only watches them from a distance,inside his house. After a while Carraway,the narrator of the novel,who is a cousin of Daisy. After some discussion Nick agrees to set up a meeting between Gatsby and Daisy.
Gatsby 's failure of his financial and social stature obliges him ignore his own particular moral quality to pick up the fortune of a tycoon who he worked for, and transform into a well off and respectable man “ working for a millionaire made him dedicate his life to the achievement of wealth” (Spark Notes 5 with the sole motivating regaining the affection of his darling Daisy Buchanan “Gatsby cannot take Daisy from Tom with money, but without money he could not even have tried to take him from him” (Tredell 52).
The two were young lovers who were unable to be together because of differences in social status. Gatsby spends his life after Daisy acquiring material wealth and social standing to try and reestablish a place in Daisy’s life. Once Gatsby gains material wealth he moves to the West Egg where the only thing separating he and Daisy is a body of water. It is through the eyes of Nick Carraway, the narrator of the novel, that the reader gains insight into the mysterious Jay Gatsby. In Nick’s description of his first encounter with Gatsby he says, “But I didn't call to him, for he gave a sudden intimation that he was content to be alone—he stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling. Involuntarily I glanced seaward—and distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock.” The reader soon discovers that the green light is at the end of Daisy’s dock, signifying Gatsby’s desperation and desire to get her back. Gatsby’s obsessive nature drives him to throw parties in hopes that his belonged love will attend. The parties further reveal the ungrasping mysteriousness of Gatsby that lead to speculations about his past. Although the suspicions are there, Gatsby himself never denies the rumors told about him. In Nick’s examination of Gatsby he says, “He had one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced, or seemed to face, the whole external world for an instant and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself.” This persona Gatsby portrays shows how he is viewed by others, and further signifies his hope and imagination
Gatsby’s life story is continuously questioned by Nick because of slight tendencies that Gatsby shows. Despite his wealth, Gatsby acts differently than his wealthy counterparts. During the first party that Nick attends, the other attendees start out acting very civil, but they slowly become partiers later in the text. They drink heavily and all the wives begin to fight with their husbands. While they interact very socially with each other, not everyone is quite sure who Gatsby is. For part of the night, Gatsby is described as watching all the events. Nick states, “I could see nothing sinister about him. I wonder if the fact that he was not drinking helped to set him off from his guests, for it seemed to me that he grew more correct as the fraternal hilarity increased” (Fitzgerald 50). From this quote, the fact that Gatsby acting different is assigned to the fact that he has not been drinking, but even earlier during the party when Nick meets Gatsby, he describes him as “an elaborate elegant young roughneck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd. Some time before he introduced himself I’d got a strong impression that he was picking his words with care” (Fitzgerald 48). Nick later admits that “I would have accepted without question the information that Gatsby sprang from the swamps of Louisiana or from the lower East Side of New
Gatsby has all the money yet he is not happy when he throws gigantic parties at his house. Daisy, the one he tried to lure in with his parties, never cared to show up. The love shown by Gatsby towards Daisy, “’I want to wait here till Daisy goes to bed. Good night, old sport.’ He put his hands in his coat pockets and turned back eagerly to his scrutiny of the house as though my presence marred the sacredness of the vigil. So I walked away and left him standing there in the moonlight – watching over nothing” (Fitzgerald 145).
Gatsby’s poor childhood greatly influenced his admirable dream to want a better life for himself. Growing up, Gatsby was very poor. “His parents were shiftless unsuccessful farm people-his imagination never really accepted them as his parents at all.” (pg. 98) Growing up, he hated his parents for the fact that they were poor as well as their lifestyle. When he was a teenager, he left his home to pursue a more prosperous life. After Gatsby left, he saw a yacht that belonged to a wealthy man, Dan Cody. This represented the rich lifestyle that he longed for. His ambitions to be a part of the upper class grew. Gatsby worked on the yacht for Dan Cody until Cody died. After this period of time, he began to act “rich” and took on this new persona. Gatsby had to completely change who he was. He even changed his name. The name he was born with was James Gatz, When Daisy and Gatsby met, they fell in love. She was from a very wealthy family. Gatsby knew that obtaining her would prove that he had embraced the upper class lifestyle. They couldn’t marry because he was not from a well-known family. Gatsby though...
Up until now, the term American Dream is still a popular concept on how Americans or people who come to America should live their lives and in a way it becomes a kind of life goal. However, the definitions of the term itself is somehow absurd and everyone has their own definition of it. The historian James Tuslow defines American Dream as written in his book titled “The Epic of America” in 1931 as “...dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.” The root of the term American Dream is actually can be traced from the Declaration of Independence in 1776 which stated “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that
Starting at a young age Gatsby strives to become someone of wealth and power, leading him to create a façade of success built by lies in order to reach his unrealistic dream. The way Gatsby’s perceives himself is made clear as Nick explains: “The truth was Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God… he must be about His Father’s business, the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty” (Fitzgerald 98). From the beginning Gatsby puts himself beside God, believing he is capable of achieving the impossible and being what he sees as great. Gatsby blinds himself of reality by idolizing this valueless way of life, ultimately guiding him to a corrupt lifestyle. While driving, Nick observes Gatsby curiously: “He hurried the phrase ‘educated at Oxford,’ or swallowed it, or choked on it, as though it had bothered him before. And with this doubt, his whole statement fell to pieces…” (Fitzgerald 65). To fulfill his aspirations Gatsby desires to be seen an admirable and affluent man in society wh...
Gatsby downfall came when he sacrificed his morality to attain wealth. Gatsby realises that the illusion of his dream with Daisy, demands wealth to become priority, and thus wealth becomes the desire overriding his need for her [Daisy’s] love. Gatsby claims to others that he has inherited his wealth, but Nick discovers "[h]is parents were shiftless and unsuccessful farm people" (Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby, pg 104) and that Gatsby has lied about his past. In a society that relies on luxuries, Gatsby throws parties to attract Daisy’s attention. Also, Gatsby expresses that same need to keep busy, just as Daisy does, in a society of the elite. Nick describes Gatsby as "never quite still, there was always a tapping foot somewhere or the impatient opening and closing of a hand" (Fitzgerald, pg 68). Gatsby fills his house "full of interesting people...who do interesting things" (Fitzgerald, pg 96). Gatsby's dream is doomed to failure in that he has lost the fundamental necessities to experience love, such as honesty and moral integrity.
In the novel, The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby is the one waiting for Daisy. The story takes place during the roaring twenties where Jay Gatsby lives by himself in an elegant mansion and holds elaborate parties every Saturday night in the hopes to see Daisy. Nick Carraway, the narrator, is the cousin of Daisy and moves into the house next to Gatsby’s. When Nick first comes to visit Daisy and Gatsby’s name is mentioned in conversation, the audience can tell that Daisy is interested in him when she interrupts her friend, Jordan Baker, demanding, “What Gatsby” (Fitzgerald 11). When Gatsby’s first party takes place, Nick is the only one who is actually invited, which leads to Nick and Jordan being the only ones at the party who actually meet Mr. Gatsby face to face. The audience later realizes that Gatsby told Jordan how he and Daisy used to be lovers and he looks at the green light at the...