The Great Gatsby as well as the Handmaid’s Tale are full of color symbolism. Throughout the books, the authors use color to represent various themes of the novels. In the two texts, the eminent colors are white, red, green, and black. There are some symbols filled with mixed conceptions as the color red in the modern society. For example, red in most societies represents violence as well as surging emotions, blood and fire. However, in other societies such as ancient Arabian and Roman societies, red is symbolic of divine favor and light, or revolution and war. Therefore, it is evident that various societies possess different perceptions and interpretations to the usage of colors. In their texts, Atwood and Fitzgerald use colors to depict oppression, …show more content…
However, white is used to depict different aspects in each text. The infant daughters of commander’s wear the color white in the Handmaid’s Tale. These daughters wear white to differentiate themselves from the handmaids. Atwood refers handmaids as “sexual soldiers”(Atwood 56) because commanders use them to satisfy their sexual needs. Therefore, in this case color defines the role of an individual in The Handmaid’s Tale society. On the other hand, the color white in The Great Gatsby discriminates those who have innocence from those who lack innocence. There are experiences that Gatsby goes through in his life before the story starts. One of the essential experiences involves a girl called Daisy Fay. “She dresses in white clothes and has a white car” (Fitzgerald 56). In this case, white illustrates the straightness of the girl and her personality as morally untarnished. The Great Gatsby also stipulates that the girl is clean and upright when it states, “High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden girl.”(120) The statement also illustrates the honor that the king is given by living in house that is different from the other members of the society. Moreover, white also represents the preciousness of the palace in which the king dwells. In the novel, a character by the name Fitzgerald uses the color in describing a place he calls the real West. He states that the place resembles snow. “When we pulled out into the winter night and the real snow, our snow.”(187) “ on the white steps an obscene word, scrawled by some boy with a piece of brick, stood out clearly in the moonlight, and I erased it”(192). The color is used to explain the opposite nature of the people in the book who were offensive to the current standards of morality in the
Colors are very important in novels because they help the reader understand the deeper meaning of the topic. The Great Gatsby novel is one of the most well-known books ever to be written. In the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the narrator, Nick Carraway, describes a tragic story of a rich man, Jay Gatsby, in search for his true love, Daisy Buchanen. Daisy and Gatsby were previously in love, but Gatsby left for war and Daisy left him for more money. Jay Gatsby constantly throws extravagant parties hoping that his true love will visit one night and they will fall in love again. Instead, Nick Carraway invites Daisy and Gatsby to his house in hope that the old couple will connect again. Daisy and Gatsby finally fall in love again after several years of loneliness. Eventually, their love ends in disaster. In the novel, color symbolism plays an essential role in the novel.
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.
Colors can be a symbol that many people overlook. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses color imagery to describe the characters. Nick's neighbor, Jay Gatsby, is a mysterious man that lived in the past. Gatsby and Daisy have always loved each other, but Daisy also loves her brutal husband Tom. In a twist of events three people die and some you never hear from again. The Main character, Gatsby, is described using various colors including gold, pink, and blue.
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
The use of a green light at the end of a landing stage to signal a romantic
The color black is often thought of as being sophisticated. When thinking of the color, people often relate it to death, intimidation, unfriendliness, and authority; however, it can relate to confidence, seduction, secrecy, and elegance as well. People exhibiting this behavior are naturally conservative and usually fear things beyond their control. An example of this type of person would be Tom Buchanan. Tom Buchanan’s demonstration of authority, fear of inferiority, and ability and willingness to keep himself and the ones he love hidden from others, all symbolize how the color black is represented within the novel.
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.
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...
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.
"... he stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, as 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..." (Fitzgerald 21). In The Great Gatsby, the color green is frequent. It is more than just a color; it symbolizes many things, especially desire and hope. The color green also seems to be connected to Daisy and Gatsby's love for her old self. Indeed, green is used in The Great Gatsby to symbolize hope and desire for the past.
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.
Colors have been used as symbolism for many years. It is easy to remember what each one symbolizes and has a lasting impression on people. These colors and feelings are then remembered throughout daily life, with the color yellow is often connected to happiness and wealth. In the fiction novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses colors to help convey the depth of each character and the truth behind each character. The colors run through the entire novel and often have double or hidden meanings than what it seems. When we are told the meaning to associate with a different color it is sometimes hard to disassociate the exact meaning we already gave it. The colors in the novel don't go against the ideas we have but enhance the background
Fitzgerald’s use of symbolism and colors in The Great Gatsby is prominent in every chapter of his novel. To fully understand the meaning of his color use, a reader must recognize the situations in which these colors are used. Throughout the novel Fitzgerald uses the color green. Green has many possible interpretations, and its’ use to reveal insight into Gatsby’s character is probably the most meaningful.
For most people, a certain colour may represent something meaningful to them. While in the Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, many of the colours used in the novel are meant to represent something. The novel’s setting is in East and West Egg, two places in New York. Our narrator, Nick Carraway, lives in the West Egg. Along with living in West Egg is a friend of Nick’s, Jay Gatsby; a character that is in love with Daisy Buchanan. Unfortunately, Daisy is married to Tom. As the plot unravels, the reader notices the connection between certain colours and their importance to the novel. The use of colours within The Great Gatsby symbolizes actual themes, as grey symbolizes corruption, blue symbolizes reality, and green symbolizes jealousy and envy.
“High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden girl”(Fitzgerald 120) The colors in the Great Gatsby have a lot of symbolism to them throughout the whole novel. Like the color white used in that quotation, it portrays a sense of innocence in the novel and also portrays class. Innocence is used in this quotation because it creates a sense that the palace is like a fortification for Daisy, by keeping her far away from the commoners that are below her. The class is illustrated in the quotation because of the virtue that is associated with the castle that Daisy is living in. Daisy relates to the color white because she is pure and innocent just like the color white but towards the end of the novel it shows the color white can be deceiving