Mobility In The Great Gatsby

In everyday society, as well as in literary works, many Americans view their country as the land of opportunity, and marvel at the prospect of becoming a self-made success story. The concept of the “American Dream” to many is just that – the concept that any individual who puts in the work will achieve their goals. This ideal parallels the likes of literary characters we have analyzed this semester. For the characters of “The Great Gatsby,” in particular, achieving the American Dream was the promise of upward mobility. In the novel, both the narrator, Nick Carraway, and the protagonist, Jay Gatsby, move to New York in search of their American Dreams; each, however, with different plans of execution and different motivations backing their

“I suppose he’d had the name ready for a long time, even then,” Nick Carraway said of Gatsby (Fitzgerald, 98). “His parents were shiftless farm people – his imagination had never really accepted them as his parents at all” (Fitzgerald, 98). Not only did Gatsby know at a young age that he did not want the life that was planned for him in North Dakota, it is also clear from the text that Gatsby had dreams of great luxury and decadence in his sights from a young age. “An instinct toward his future glory had led him” as a “universe of ineffable gaudiness spun itself out in his brain,” Nick Carraway recounts (Fitzgerald, 99). “The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself” (Fitzgerald, 98). Gatsby’s persona was merely a representation of what he thought was the ideal human being. And he set out to fulfill his dream on these grounds, except that his brain spun him out of

Gatsby’s original plan was upward mobility; he wanted to find a life with wealth and luxury that reminded him nothing of his humble beginnings in North Dakota. What sabotaged him was when he went so above and beyond. Gatsby appeared to get very caught up in the lifestyle that he began to lead that he began to lose himself as a human. Even Nick found that Gatsby was little more than “the proprietor of an elaborate road-house next door” (Fitzgerald, 64). Gatsby’s obsession with wealth prevented him from fulfilling his dream, and it ultimately pushed Daisy back into Tom’s arms; Tom’s wealth provided the financial security that Daisy craved, and Gatsby’s wealth – likely accumulated through illegal activity – was not worth the