Comparison Of The Lost Generation In The Great Gatsby

Fitzgerald depicts 1920’s America as an age of decline in traditional social and moral values; primarily evidenced by the cynicism, greed and the relentless yet empty pursuit of prosperity and pleasure that various characters in The Great Gatsby exhibit. He presents a society in which uninhibited consumerism, materialism and an all-pervading desire for wealth have perverted the previously righteous qualities of the American Dream, corrupting it in the process.

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was born on September 24, 1896 in St. Paul, Minnesota. He was very

The roaring twenties is a time cemented in American history because of the ideas of prosperity that permeated daily life. World War One was complete, and citizens were excited at the new world superpower they had become. Electricity filled urban homes and new commodities, like the radio, made waves. Overall, happiness filled the masses and brought most to ever-increasing levels of hope for the future. This prosperity-aligned culture is famously tied to one book in particular- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Written in the 1920s, Fitzgerald’s tale of glamour and money culture creates a dramatic perspective of the American Dream through the use of pessimist Nick Carraway. While the idea of The American Dream, and the appreciation thereof,

The 1920s were years of economic prosperity and radical change both socially and politically. During the decade, the American Dream was sought-after by numerous people throughout America, which is reflected in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. The novel is a highly symbolic meditation of America in the 1920s, focusing particularly on the disintegration of the American Dream in a time of unprecedented prosperity and material excess. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses Jay Gatsby, George and Myrtle Wilson, and Nick Carraway to illustrate that the American Dream is unnatainable, and striving for it only creates an disasterous ending.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, a St. Paul, Minnesota native, was born on September 24, 1896. His father, Edward Fitzgerald, had co-written a novel in his youth and often read works by Edgar Allen Poe and Lord George Gordon Byron to Scott during his childhood. While Fitzgerald’s father praised his literary attempts, both of his parents encouraged him to pursue other career paths. Nevertheless, Fitzgerald was steadfast in his literary endeavors, writing for both his high school and college newspapers. He later dropped out of Princeton University in order to join the army and continued to pursue writing, penning both magazine articles and musical lyrics (Adams 10-11).

The USA in the 1920s is remembered as the ‘Roaring Twenties’, an age of new life, of hedonism and opportunity following the horrors the Great War. The decade is synonymous with wealth, materialism and unprecedented freedom. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby provides an insight into the exciting and prosperous lives of the American people as they embark on the limitless potential of the American Dream and therefore it conveys a picture of 1920s American society. With

Fitzgerald superbly describes the era due to the fact that he himself lived a life of grandeur, he married his wife Zelda Sayre in 1920 and had a “raucous honeymoon in New York City’s famous Biltmore Hotel” (F. Scott Fitzgerald: An American Icon). Soon after the wedding, they rose significantly on the social scene of New York. Fitzgerald originated from St. Paul’s, Minnesota, he attended Princeton University and was a great writer from an early age, he enlisted in the Navy during The Great War. Five years into his highly dysfunctional marriage he conceived one of America’s most significant works of literature. The splendid story Fitzgerald composed closely mirrored his own life, it is because of this that he was able to accurately depict the feelings and behavior of an era. Many sought pleasure through the form of materialism and happily indulged in the vices of mankind, Fitzgerald beautifully captures this all whilst enduring personal hardships of his own. He lived the life of a sensualist, just like the characters he wrote about in his magnum opus. Fitzgerald’s participation in setting the atmosphere of the decade and embodying the Roaring Twenties is the gift that he has bestowed to American literature, without it there wouldn’t be a text that can as precisely sum up some of America’s greatest years. Another major literary figure in the 1920s, though they had their differences, was a close friend of Fitzgerald nonetheless.

In 1920s, America undergoes a period of cultural and social revolution. After the shocks by the chaos and violence of WWI, with a burst of economy which brought unprecedented levels of prosperity to the country, the generation turned into a lifestyle of wild and extravagant. Both published in 1925, the time when the jazz age at it’s peak, “The great Gatsby” by Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald and “Soldier’s Home” by Ernest Hemingway depict the fragmentation of the soared society by narrating the experience of characters.

As the plot progresses and the character is exposed to the conflict, they have an epiphany that ultimately changes his perspectives and persona.

   The beauty and splendor of Gatsby's parties masks the decay and corruption that lay at the heart of the Roaring Twenties. The society of the Jazz Age, as observed by Fitzgerald, is morally bankrupt, and thus continually plagued by a crisis of character. Jay Gatsby, though he struggles to be a part of this world, remains unalterably an outsider. His life is a grand irony, in that it is a caricature of Twenties-style ostentation: his closet overflows with custom-made shirts; his lawn teems with "the right people," all engaged in the serious work of absolute triviality; his mannerisms (his false British accent, his old-boy friendliness) are laughably affected. Despite all this,

Why is affluence so significant? It was not always this way. For hunter-gatherer and agricultural societies, personal properties were insignificant or even disadvantageous unless it was food. For the sake of development and standards of life, this had to change. As wealth gained in value, people also lived better, longer lives, but at a certain point, it began to manipulate the society around it. Some may argue that this occurred around the 1920’s in America. The changes of this time were monumental. People were moving to cities in large numbers, the party lifestyle was adopted by men and women alike due to dramatic social change, and the economy was booming, they were not called “the roaring 20’s” for nothing. The large economy enabled people to gain more wealth than ever. A multitude of people, primarily in older generations, did not encourage this lifestyle, finding it fake, licentious, flashy, and unchristian. This disapproval of change is apparent in The Great Gatsby due to Nick’s distaste for the frivolous and gaudy lifestyles of the East and West Eggers and Gatsby in particular. This distaste, also conveyed heavily by the author, is most significantly formed around the iniquitous value of money and adultery. Ergo, In the novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald suggests that Modern America has become irrationally focused upon immorality and wealth rather than the true American values of hard work and faith, which is demonstrated through the motif of the colour

Considered as the defining work of the 1920s, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald was published in 1925, when America was just coming out of one of the most violent wars in the nation’s history. World War 1 had taken the lives of many young people who fought and sacrificed for our country on another continent. The war left many families without fathers, sons, and husbands. The 1920s is an era filled with rich and dazzling history, where Americans experienced changes in lifestyle from music to rebellion against the United States government. Those that are born into that era grew up in a more carefree, extravagant environment that would affect their interactions with others as well as their attitudes about themselves and societal

Francis Scott Fitzgerald, otherwise known as F. Scott Fitzgerald came into this world on September 24, 1896. ** Named after his cousin that wrote the Star Spangled Banner, Francis Key Scott, F. Scott Fitzgerald began writing at the young age of 15.** During this time, Fitzgerald left school and joined the US Army. While being stationed outside of Montgomery, Alabama, he met the love of his life, Zelda Sayre. As life proceeded, he became known as a playboy. IN 1924, Fitzgerald moved to France and published the well-known novel, The Great Gatsby. Within the novel, Fitzgerald critiques the American Dream. ** The Great Gatsby also achieved the stature of being a definitive portrait of the “Roaring Twenties”**.

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was born in a family of a failed business man which caused many moves between Buffalo and Syracuse. (Brucker) After the loss of his father’s job, they were left to move back to St. Paul, Minnesota and live from his mother’s inheritance. (bio.com) F Scott Fitzgerald grew as a very intellectual young boy who published a detective story in his school’s newspaper as a teenager. (bio.com) He was encouraged by his parents, along with educators to continue pursuing a writing career. His dedication of writing soon harmed him when he was put on academic probation as his school work was put aside. He then decided to enroll in the military despite his fears of dying without living his dreams. Upon being commissioned Fitzgerald met a crazed young woman named Zelda, who represents the basis of the desires of the world. Her greed of wealth, fun, and extravagance soon took a toll upon F. Scott. He became lazy with his writing and instead of devoting himself to novels, he quickly put

One of the best writers of the Lost Generations is F. Scott Fitzgerald. He writes exceptionally well on this subject because he was also part of it. One of the many famous novels that he wrote was The Great Gatsby. The characters in this story represent the many different sides of the Lost Generation. The narrator, Nick, is caught between the two worlds, the world of moral corruption and the world that has meaning. Nick realizes the moral corruption of the wealthy and decides he must separate himself from them to reach personal maturity.