As intangible as it is elusive, the American Dream has always been an iconic symbol of the United States. Whether born on the West Coast, East Coast, or anywhere in between, the Dream has become the entitlement of every individual. Evolving from its traditional desires of a good home and plot of land, the Dream has become defined by grand-scale properties and materialistic possessions. As the Dream evolves and time passes, there are those who can’t seem the change with it. People find themselves trapped in the past, some desperate to stay, and others who will do anything to escape. Fitzgerald’s main character, Jay Gatsby, from The Great Gatsby is an example of the former, while Walter Younger, from Hansberry’s A Raisin in The Sun, plays the …show more content…
But because of his obsession with the past, he can never accept the present as it is, resulting in his failed Dream and his inability to reach happiness. Originating from a poor midwestern family, Jay Gatsby joins the army as a boy in an attempt to achieve honor and glory in the only way he feels he can. When at his training camp in the South, he meets and falls in love with Daisy Buchanan, a gorgeous debutante in whom “Gatsby’s meretricious dream was made flesh” (Trask 214). When Gatsby’s deployment note finally comes, he is reluctant to leave Daisy and the relationship he has begun with her, but his desire to fulfill his Dream with Daisy comes with the requirement that he become the wealthy young man he has portrayed himself to be. He departs with the fervent hope that Daisy will wait for him while he becomes “rich and gentlemanly… so he will be worthy to ask Daisy to… marry him” and maintains complete belief in the attainability of his Dream (Mizener 81). Unfortunately for Gatsby, Daisy falls victim to the pressures of her surroundings, caving to the demands of her parents and society that she marry Tom Buchanan, an enormously wealthy and powerful man from East Egg. From then on, Daisy is placed outside of Gatsby’s grasp, ruining the attainability of his Dream. They reunite five years later, Gatsby …show more content…
Gatsby is unable to understand the flaw in his plan, for in his mind Daisy “is frozen in time forever”and will always be as perfect and pure as when he first saw and fell in love with her (Miller 126). Gatsby realizes for the first time that his Dream cannot be a reality when it begins to crumble before him as a result of Daisy’s refusal to revert to the woman she had been when she was with him. When called into question, she finds herself unable to deny her marriage, the evidence of her past saying, “I can’t help what’s past … I can’t say I’ve never loved Tom” (Fitzgerald 140). Her life with Tom has become a part of her, and she can’t bring herself to ever cast that away. This revelation crushes Gatsby, leaving him feeling lost since all this time he had been “clutching at some last hope”, working for the Daisy she had been during their time together (155). Whenever he speaks of his goals, he says in a matter-of-fact manner, “Can’t repeat the past?... Why of course you can!” (116). Gatsby now sees that Daisy is not willing to change, and revert her life to fit into his Dream, instead “she [vanishes] into her rich house, into her rich, full life, leaving Gatsby--nothing” (157). Gatsby’s Dream has been taken from him by Daisy’s refusal and with his Dream gone, the phrase “you can 't live
In The Great Gatsby, Gatsby functions under the illusion that Daisy is perfect and is living in such distress because she was forced to marry Tom due to Gatsby being away at war and being poor. This illusion leads Gatsby to spend his entire adult life pining after Daisy and cheating his way up the social and economic ladder in order to win her over. Gatsby believes that Daisy will someday come back to him because she loves him so much and they will live happily ever after together.
Gatsby is unrealistic. He believes he can relive the past and rekindle the flame he and Daisy once had. He is lost in his dream and accepts that anything can be repeated, "Can't repeat the past…Why of course you can!" (116, Fitzgerald). For Gatsby, failure to realize this resurrection of love is utterly appalling. His whole career, his conception of himself and his life is totally shattered. Gatsby's death when it comes is almost insignificant, for with the collapse of his dream, he is spiritually dead.
Jay Gatsby from The Great Gatsby is an ambitious and hopeful character. He is the protagonist of the novel and he is pursuing an unrealistic dream, thinking that Daisy Buchanan was a nature of perfection that could not possibly be real. He believes in the idea that he could change the past and the future. In Chapter 7, page 154; Gatsby waited outside of Daisy 's house on a needless vigil until she went to bed, he does not realize that his dream is not a reality. He thinks that by waiting outside her house guarding her, he might get a glimpse of Daisy. Daisy is perfection to
He never wanted to give up on her, so he tried to recreate their past in hopes of rekindling a love they once had. “Gatsby's gospel of hedonism is reflected in his house, wild parties, clothing, roadster, and particularly in his blatant wooing of another man's wife. Daisy, a rather soiled and cheapened figure, is Gatsby's ultimate goal in his concept of the American dream. However, he falls victim to his own preaching. He comes to believe himself omniscient-above the restrictions of society and morality. His presumption extends to a belief that he can even transcend the natural boundaries placed upon human beings. He will win back Daisy by recapturing the past” (Pearson). Gatsby lies about his lifestyle including the parties, clothing, and almost all of the other aspects he reveals about himself, to impress his teenage love, Daisy, who also happens to be Tom’s wife. He believes he can win Daisy back from her husband by throwing lavish parties, and putting on a deceitful lifestyle in an attempt to lead her in believing he qualified to be one of the elite. “The book's chief characters are blind, and they behave blindly. Gatsby does not see Daisy's vicious emptiness, and Daisy, deluded, thinks she will reward her gold-hatted lover until he tries to force from her an affirmation she is too weak to make. Tom is blind to his hypocrisy; with "a short deft movement" he breaks Myrtle's nose for daring to mention the
The American Dream has long been thought the pinnacle idea of American society. The idea that anyone, regardless of race, ethnicity, or financial status, could rise from the depths and become anything they wanted to be with no more than hard work and determination has attracted people from all around the world. Two writers from America’s past, however, have a different opinion on the once-great American Dream. F. Scott Fitzgerald and John Steinbeck have given the public their beliefs on the modern Dream through the novels they have written, The Great Gatsby, and Of Mice and Men, respectively. One novel placed during the Great Depression and the other during the Roaring Twenties both illustrate how their author feels about the Dream itself through the use of many literary devices. While both novels have main characters with hopes for something better, all the characters seem to fall into the same plagued pit. Through depravity and decadence, the American Dream seems to have become exactly what its name implies: A dream, not a reality.
Daisy becomes harder to grasp when Gatsby’s unworldly views on time and what is achievable causes her to fade from his dreams. His determination encompasses naivety because his dreams are unrealistic. Gatsby not only wants Daisy back, but he also wants to remove her past with Tom Buchanan, Daisy’s husband. Gatsby demands Daisy to tell Tom how she never loved him, but Daisy struggles to because it is not the truth. She tells Gatsby, “’Oh, you want too much!... I love you now – isn’t that enough? I can’t help what’s past.’… The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby” (132). Gatsby’s expectation for Daisy to delete the memory of her past love for Tom like words on a computer is naïve. It is Gatsby’s fault for fabricating a false idea of Daisy that separates his idea of her from her. He has a vision of a perfect story, but Daisy’s inability to erase her past with Tom critically ruins Gatsby’s vision. In his mind, Daisy only loves him, but when Daisy admits to the truth of once loving Tom as well, it is intolerable to Gatsby and his dream begins to fall apart. Similarly, Gatsby’s perception of time is flawed due to his obsession with Daisy. Ever since Daisy left Gatsby, he chases after her, looking for the past. When he finally meets her after many years, he sees an opportunity to start over and strives to avoid losing her
Gatsby’s love life has become surrounded by ideas from the past. No longer is he able to fall in love with the moment, but instead he is held up on what have and should have been. He spends his time reminiscing on old times and previous relationships while he has also been building up a new life in order to return to the past. The unreal expectations he has for Daisy prove to us that he has trouble letting go of his old romantic ideas. Gatsby doesn’t want to accept and love this new Daisy, and instead he is hoping for the Daisy he knows to come back. But people change and there can be no expectations for someone to continue to remain the same after a number of years. Instead we must let go of the past and embrace the future for everything it could be.
Tom noticed an affair between Gatsby and Daisy, and everything boiled over. Tom, furious at Gatsby, complained how Gatsby is trying to take Daisy, while Gatsby persuades that Daisy never fell in love with Tom in the first place. “‘She’s never loved you, do you hear?’ he cried. ‘She only married you because I was poor and she was tired of waiting for me. It was a terrible mistake, but in her heart she never loved any one except for me!’” (Fitzgerald 130) Later, Gatsby continued to pursue Daisy. “‘Daisy, that’s all over now,’ he said earnestly. ‘It doesn’t matter any more. Just tell him the truth- that you never loved him- and it’s all wiped out forever’” (Fitzgerald 132). The two quotes show what Gatsby desired: to win Daisy. Gatsby believed that Daisy still loved him, just like she did five years ago. He thinks that history can repeat itself, and be like the past. Unfortunately for him, he didn’t realize that many things
The American dream originated when immigrants came to America searching for new opportunities and a better life. In the early 1900’s all people could do is dream; however, those dreams gave many different meanings to the phrase “American dream”, and for the most part, wealth and hard work play a very large role in the pursuit of “the dream”. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, and Arthur Miller’s drama, Death of a Salesman, both protagonists, Jay Gatsby and Willy Loman, are convinced that the way to achieve a better life is by living the “American dream”. However, the dream does not end up successfully for these two characters. In fact, their ideals and hopes of rising to success cause their American dream to take a turn into a nightmare.
The American dream has been a tangible idea, greatly sought after by many over the course of American History. The dream has eluded many, to strive for achieving in America’s open markets, and become a self-made man from the sweat of one’s brow. The idea of become self-sufficient, and have limitless dreams that take one as far as they are willing to imagine is captured very differently from The Great Gatsby to A Raisin in the Sun. Both novels seem to have the American dream as their subject, but both end up having very different outcomes to how one achieves it, and if the dream is truly in existence, namely with the characters of Jay Gatsby and Walter Younger. The books mainly brushes upon the idea of what the American dream truly is, how one achieves the dream, and what the real fulfillment the dream encompasses.
Instead of investing in their marriage, they chose to actively destroy it by looking for fulfillment in other uncalled for relationships. Their true love for each other is doubted. When Tom finds out that Daisy and Gatsby are having an affair, Tom says to Gatsby, “...what 's more, I love Daisy too. Once in a while I go off on a spree and make a fool of myself, but I always come back, and in my heart I love her all the time” (“Great Gatsby” 19). Tom does not seem to view his “spree” as he views Daisy. He wants Daisy to be loyal to him even though he himself is not loyal to her. Though Tom claims to love Daisy and does not like that she is after Gatsby, he says that he loves her in his heart, and meanwhile is still interested in Myrtle. Love is an action, not just a feeling, so his statement of “love” contradicts him. Interestingly enough, though Daisy loves Gatsby, her love for him is not enough to persuade her to completely give Tom up. Gatsby tells her, "‘Daisy... Just tell him the truth-that you never loved him...’ She hesitated...she realized at last what she was doing-and as though she had never, all along, intended doing anything at all. But it was done now. It was too late” (“Great Gatsby” 20). Her hesitance shows that she was torn between Tom and Gatsby, but when she realized the tight spot she was in, she gave in to Gatsby- for the time
Daisy Buchanan, in reality, is unable to live up the illusory Daisy that Gatsby has invented in his fantasy. After Daisy and Tom Buchanan leave another one of Gatsby’s splendid parties, Fitzgerald gives the reader a glimpse into what Gatsby’s expectations are. Fitzgerald claims that “he wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: ‘I never loved you.’” (109). Here it is revealed that Gatsby’s one main desire is for Daisy to go willingly...
Jay Gatsby is another character who chases an empty dream which results in a life of hardship and misery. Jay Gatsby devotes his entire life to chasing this dream he has of him and Daisy Buchanan being together. Gatsby explains that the main reason for chasing this dream so relentlessly is, “[Daisy] only married [Tom] because I was poor” (Fitzgerald 120). Gatsby believes that the only way to achieve his dream is to become wealthy. In order to acquire this high economic status, Gatsby partnered with criminals to carry out the illegal distribution of alcohol. His attempt to gain wealth to obtain the love of Daisy is very unrealistic due to that Daisy is already married into a very wealthy family. At the end of the novel, evidence is revealed
The American Dream is what we all aspire to achieve. The idea of starting off with nothing and to become something has caused millions of people from all corners of the world to immigrate to this country for over 300 years. However, what exactly is the American Dream? F Scott Fitzgerald answers this question within his novel The Great Gatsby. Through the eyes of Nick Carraway, Fitzgerald analyses the high class of the 1920s and reveals that the American Dream has been distorted from a pure ideal of security into a convoluted scheme of materialistic power. Fitzgerald incorporates the aspects of both the Òold dreamÓ & the Ònew dreamÓ in his tragic story to depicts how the inflexible dream has been corrupted and lost forever.
With new modernist American literature, Americans lose faith in their traditional beliefs and values, including the American dream. Many novels used the concept of the American dream to make people question whether the dream still existed in the mist of the First World War and the Great Depression. In describing the American dream, one is led to believe that the individual is led to self-triumph, and their life will progressively get better and better in America. In Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby, published in 1925, the American dream is perceived originally by the thought of discovery and the pursuit of happiness. Money, parties, and relaxed social views came with ease to the American people in the 1920s. However, Fitzgerald demonstrates how the American soldiers re...