Luxuries and Love in the Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

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The American Dream is an ideal that has been in existence since the day the Declaration of Independence was signed. Normally, the lower citizen yearns to rise from rags to riches, while obtaining such luxuries as love, high social status, and political/economic power on his or her way to the top. This dream has undergone various changes since its creation, however it is generally founded on ideas, of freedom, independence, and the desire of something greater. Early colonists’ desire to travel West in search of land and start a family has transformed into a materialistic vision of having a grand and extravagant house, a top notch car, and a life of ease. One of the major themes in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is the failure to fulfill the American Dream; this is exemplified by Jay Gatsby’s lost identity and poor choices.
The American Dream is the belief that “all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights to liberty, life, and the pursuit of happiness. In other words, America was a place where” men and woman alike are politically free to pursue whatever goal his or her heart desired (Pidgeon). “The theme of The Great Gatsby is the withering of the American Dream” this dream is anti-puritanical in that it shows the transition from rags to riches and in another sense, from rejection to acceptance (Pidgeon). According to 1920s culture, however, truly worthy achievement is that which leads to material gain. Even though, like most West Eggers, Jay Gatsby had amassed a vast wealth comparable to that of a multi-millionaire, he was still looked down upon and scoffed at by East Eggers who believed that they were better than everyone else. This shows that the American Dream is flawed, b...

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...elf is the list which he wrote as a child. It serves as further evidence of the failed American Dream by showing that even though Gatsby worked hard to improve himself he still failed in reaching his goal. Even through all of his bootlegging, despite his trials and tribulations Jay Gatsby failed to make his dream into a reality. After Daisy ran over Myrtle Wilson, at the Buchanan house that night she was seen colluding with Tom in what is implied by F. Scott Fitzgerald as their abrupt vacation from New York. Daisy fled. Jay Gatsby died waiting for a call that would never come. Jay Gatsby died faithful to his only love whereas Daisy Buchanan fled at the slightest sign of trouble. Gatsby’s death is essentially the destruction of the American Dream, “’Gatsby, the flower of the republic, the bootlegger who made the American Dream his own, and died by it’” (Kazin 31).

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