preview

Archetypes In The Great Gatsby

Decent Essays

According to psychoanalyst Carl Jung, everyone has a collective unconscious. The collective unconscious inhabits human instincts and archetypes. In literature, archetypes are defined as “recurring patterns that bring about deep emotional responses in all readers” (Griffin). An example of the use of archetypes would be in the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The Great Gatsby tells the story of a man and woman that split up just before the man went off to war. Gatsby, said man, returns from the war only to find out Daisy, the woman, has married. Throughout the novel Gatsby tries to woo Daisy by throwing big parties and showing off his expensive house and car. The Great Gatsby begins in late spring/early summer; Both seasons align with a certain genre, which then contain several literary patterns. Spring and summer can signify the birth of a hero; Gatsby came back to the West egg towards the end of spring and beginning of summer. Autumn can signify the downfall of the main character; Gatsby was murdered in the fall. The Great Gatsby reflects the death & rebirth of Gatsby through the use of several archetypes.

An archetype is something that reccurs, situational archetypes are situations that happen over and over again. One situational archetype that occurs in The Great Gatsby is the journey. The journey “sends the protagonist in search of some truth necessary to restore something missing, eventually the protagonist discovers the deepest truths” (Griffin). In

Get Access