Analyse the symbolism of colour in The Great Gatsby.

505 Words2 Pages

Analyse the symbolism of colour in The Great Gatsby.

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel “the Great Gatsby” he uses many

literary devices. One of the most obvious is colour, and in this essay

I will explore how Fitzgerald uses colours like white, green and

yellow to help convey 1920’s America and Gatsby’s struggle for Daisy

Buchanan.

White features most strongly in the novel and becomes a way for people

to hide behind false facades. In “The Great Gatsby” white symbolises

royalty innocence and purity and can also be seen to represent the way

the wealthy falsely themselves. On the surface, the white symbolises

their innocence and purity, like when Nick first meets Jordan and

Daisy in “flowing white dresses.” Daisy’s name is also that of a

flower with white petals, but a yellow cen...

Show More
Related

  • The Color White In The Great Gatsby Analysis

    608 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby, many colors are used to represent various meanings. One color in particular that signifies a deeper meaning in the novel is the color, white. In Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, the color white is used to symbolize both fake innocence and fake purity as well as to develop the character perception.

    Read More

  • gatcolor Great Gatsby Essays: Importance of Color

    612 Words  | 2 Pages

    In literature, colors are often purposefully chosen for different characters to represent the character’s personalities. In The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the colors green, yellow/gold, and gray are used to represent the attributes of the colored person or place.

    Read More

  • What Does The Color Green Symbolize In The Great Gatsby

    1216 Words  | 3 Pages

    Daisy has a beautiful, innocent, and white look, but on the inside she is an evil wench. The color white symbolizes Daisy’s exterior

    Read More

  • What Does The Water Symbolize In The Great Gatsby

    658 Words  | 2 Pages

    Symbolism plays an important role in any novel of literary merit. From objects, to traits, to the way something is portrayed, it can have a whole different meaning. Like death and taxes, there is no escaping color. It is ubiquitous. In the novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald displays a superior use of symbols such as color, light, and heat. Fitzgerald’s superior use of color as a symbol is the focus of this essay.

    Read More

  • Colors In The Great Gatsby

    1588 Words  | 4 Pages

    Upon first impression, one might believe Jay Gatsby is nothing more than a self-satisfied, well-to-do bachelor living in luxury in West Egg. However, as his story unfolds, the reader finds out that he is an industrious man and a hopeless dreamer. The quintessential colors of yellow, green, and blue are used by F. Scott Fitzgerald to describe Gatsby’s characteristics in his magnum opus, The Great Gatsby. Yellow, an incandescent color, stands for his vivacious outward disposition, the shallow people around him, and his seemingly self-indulgent spending habits, for which he has an ulterior motive. Green represents the extreme lifestyle changes Gatsby has made in adulthood and his staunch hopefulness in finding love. Blue is a symbol of the

    Read More

  • The Importance Of Colors In The Great Gatsby

    1105 Words  | 3 Pages

    Scott Fitzgerald used colors in the The Great Gatsby to portray more than just imagery. Fitzgerald used colors to convey emotions, the setting, and underlying tones for motives. The character Daisy can be interpreted as a metaphor. One can connect the colors used to describe Daisy in the book to interpret her motives and emotions through the dichotomy of a daisy flower. One way to interpret Daisy is the green of the stem describes the structure of her character, the white of the flower describes what others see of her, and the yellow inner of the flower describes what is really on the inside of her

    Read More

  • Symbolism in The Great Gatsby

    737 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Great Gatsby is one of the most renowned books known to mankind. A story about a man’s quest to fit into a society built for the rich whilst wooing a childhood crush may seem extremely simple and straightforward, however, the mystery is not behind the plot, but rather, it is in the writing itself. The words F. Scott Fitzgerald used were chosen with such delicacy, one cannot even hope to assume that anything was a mere coincidence. The book is laced with intricate strands of symbolism bound together by a single plot. One of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s more major themes is the use of locations. The importance of location as symbols are further expressed through the green light at the end of the dock as well as the fresh, green breast of the new world.

    Read More

  • The Symbolism of Colors in The Great Gatsby

    459 Words  | 1 Pages

    The use of a green light at the end of a landing stage to signal a romantic

    Read More

  • Red In The Great Gatsby

    1224 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the book The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald uses a vast amount of colors to represent characters in the book. For instance, Gatsby is one of, if not, the main character in the book. Every single color in the book has to do with Gatsby. The three main colors in this book or most used colors are red, yellow, and black. These three colors seem to have the most meaning. When it comes to Gatsby, these colors represent him in many ways.

    Read More

  • F. Scott Fitzgerald: Ambition and Aspiration

    2303 Words  | 5 Pages

    Unbeknownst to the literary world, a future great American novelist, Francis Scott Fitzgerald was born in 1896. As an intellectual young man with great ambition, F. Scott Fitzgerald attended Princeton in the fall of 1913 with great hopes of fulfilling his dream to become a writer (“F. Scott Fitzgerald – Bio”, 2015). Unfortunately, Fitzgerald did not find much success at Princeton, was put on academic probation, and in 1917 left the school and enlisted himself into the U.S Army. During his time spent on base in Alabama, Fitzgerald met a woman, Zelda Sayre, and fell in love. Following his discharge at the end of the war, Fitzgerald and Zelda moved to Great Neck, New York on Long Island to pursue his literary aspirations

    Read More

  • Symbolism of White and Green in The Great Gatsby

    683 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Great Gatsby is full of symbolism, colors, for example. Throughout the book the author uses them to represent different themes of the novel. Some of these colors are white, yellow, grey, green, pink, red and blue. However, I picked white and green for my commentary because I think these colors have a special meaning different from the others. White is mainly used to describe the character’s innocence, fakeness, and corruption. While green represents Gatsby’s hopes, ambitions, and dreams. In addition, sometimes green symbolizes the jealousy of certain characters.

    Read More

  • Essay On The Color Green In The Great Gatsby

    615 Words  | 2 Pages

    The color green can signify many things in the every day life, people may think of it as “go” or as something positive. F. Scott Fitzgerald is an author known to use a lot of symbolism in his writings. In his famous novel, “the Great Gatsby”, Fitzgerald uses the color green to represent various things. His use of the color green represents mostly what Gatsby desires most in life, but he also includes it to represent little things that need thinking to figure out.

    Read More

  • The Colorful Characters of the Great Gatsby

    1980 Words  | 4 Pages

    Daisy Buchanan is the preeminent female character in the story. Her name, Daisy fits her exceptionally, she is bright and sunny like the flower. Daisy is best represented by the color yellow. She’s the story’s golden girl, the wife of wealthy broker, and the love of the mysterious Gatsby’s life. Grok describes the color yellow as “Deities with glowing halos and golden hair…But it also evokes a few negative responses in associations with dishonesty, cowardice, egoism, betrayal, and caution” (Grok). Daisy is described physically as a blonde, and back then the style along women was the flapper headband, like the glowing halo. In the story Daisy is dishonest, she cheats on her husband with Gatsby. Daisy is also a coward, she couldn’t leave Tom, her husband, who treats her like property for Gatsby, who truly loves and idolizes her. Daisy once tells Nick when telling him about her daughter, “I hope she’ll be a fool. That’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool” (1.17). Daisy is immensely obsessed with what people think of her, she likes being the girl who has this beautiful and graceful aura. This quote displays how she want’s her daughter to grow up to be just like her, the image of a weak foolish girl who lets men push her around. Betrayal is the emotion that Nick feels when she skips town instead of attending Gatsby’s funeral. Grok also writes that, “When paired with black, it suggests warning” (Grok). Gatsby is the color black, while Daisy is the color yellow. When the couple reconcile there is a multitude of trouble that eventually leads to the death of Myrtle, George, and Gatsby himself. Daisy isn’t just the bright ray of sunshine; she is also just as troublesome as Grok describes her, which is why th...

    Read More

  • gatcolor Color Symbols and Symbolism in The Great Gatsby

    806 Words  | 2 Pages

    Color Symbolism in The Great Gatsby & nbsp;      Colors can symbolize many different things.  Artists use colors in their paintings when they  want you to see what they are trying to express.  Like if an artist is trying to express sorrow or death. he often uses blacks, blues, and. grays. Basically he uses dreary colors.  You automatically feel what the artist is trying to express.  When the artist uses bright colors you feel warm and you feel happiness.  In the novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald is like an artist.  He uses colors to symbolize the many different intangible ideas in the book.  He uses the color yellow to symbolize moral decay, decadence, and death. Then he uses the color white to symbolize innocence.  He also uses the color green to express hope.  Fitzgerald's use of the color green the strongest.

    Read More

  • gatcolor Color Code in The Great Gatsby

    634 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Great Gatsby is full of symbolism. Colours, for example, are used to represent many different things; some even represent a theme of the novel. White, yellow, grey, green are just some of the colours which Fitzgerald uses in a special way, because each of these colours has a special meaning, different from the ones we regularly know or use.

    Read More

More about Analyse the symbolism of colour in The Great Gatsby.

Open Document