Corruption In The Great Gatsby Essay

Shallowness and hollowness of the upper class is shown in The Great Gatsby by Daisy’s love and addiction for wealth and money. Many people may look at Daisy and call her a ‘fool’ for her addiction to money. Eventually this not only corrupts her in the murder of Myrtle; however, her shallowness leads to the death of Jay Gatsby because of the carelessness of Daisy; which allowed Gatsby to take the blame of the death of Myrtle. Daisy represents the carelessness of most women in the Upper Class for her addiction to wealth and status. Daisy is characterized as ‘the smell of money’; therefore, it is obvious that Daisy loves Tom for his money rather than his personality. “ I hope she’ll be a fool- that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool,” (Fitzgerald, p23). This quote exemplifies the shallowness and hollowness of the woman in the novel. Daisy describes her daughter to Nick and Jordan as a girl who will be like her because she is in love and is manipulated into love with the idea of money. “They’re such beautiful shirts’ she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick folds. ‘It makes me sad because I’ve never seen such-such beautiful shirts before” (Fitzgerald, p 89). This quotes further more proves the shallowness and hollowness of Daisy because she is in love with the belongings of Jay Gatsby rather than his actual personality. Daisy obviously values the

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, published in 1925, is the story of the idiosyncratic millionaire Jay Gatsby. It is narrated by Nick Carraway, a Midwesterner from Long Island who later moves to Manhattan. Gatsby’s life is organized around one desire, Daisy, the woman he loved. This desire leads him on an expedition from poverty to wealth, reuniting with his old love, and his eventual death. In his novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald is able to portray the American Dream where people seek out self-gratification and pleasure. He captures the romance of the roaring twenties with the cars, money, illegal alcohol and the wildest parties one could imagine. Much like the character, Jay Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940), wasn’t born into the upper class. While Gatsby is from the lower class, Fitzgerald from the middle class, both end up becoming exceptionally rich, fall into the wildest and reckless life, and use their fortunes to win the love and approval of the women they once loved.

Gatsby has everything that he could wish for, except of love. Gatsby tried everything he could to achieve Daisy, but failed to do so. Gatsby always thought that Daisy actually loved him and that he was very close to achieving her. One time Gatsby showed Daisy all of his luxuries in the house. Daisy was impressed by how rich and wealthy Gatsby has become as time passed. Daisy says “never seen so many shirts like these” (87). This quote shows how Daisy likes materialistic things. Gatsby worked hard on his dream unlike Tom. Tom Buchanan who is the husband of Daisy has no purpose and goal in his life except his affair with Myrtle. He never really loved Daisy. On the other hand when Gatsby showed all of his English shirts Daisy begins to cry and they plan their future plans of meeting each other. We can see how Daisy is attracted to Gatsby simply because of his wealth. She loves Gatsby but she loves his money more then she actually loves him. This goes to show how people’s mentality worked in the 1920’s. Daisy, Gatsby, and all other characters live a very superficial life. Gatsby wants to achieve Daisy by the means of fortune and how Daisy is attracted to Gatsby because of his wealth.

F.Scott Fitzgerald is the author of The Great Gatsby which takes place in New York. The story takes place in New York and is centered around Nick Carraway who is an honest and an unbiased man, Daisy and Tom Buchanan who are a wealthy married couple, and Jay Gatsby, a wealthy man who hides many secrets. Some claim that The Great Gatsby is a love story but in reality the story about a secrecy, deception and loneliness that come with wealth.

The Great Gatsby is a classic American literature book filled with drama, and huge events important to America’s history. The book is set after World War 1; the main character is Nick Carraway. A friend of an old colleague Tom Buchanan, Daisy Buchanan Nick’s cousin once removed, and married to Tom. Finally, there is Jay Gatsby, Daisy’s old lover, and Nick’s very wealthy neighbor. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald suggests that the American dream is naïve, the people who pursue it are oblivious to reality, and foolish.

The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, uses numerous allusions in its story. The Great Gatsby is a novel that takes place in the summer of 1922, in New York City. It tells of a very wealthy Jay Gatsby, who’s believed to have earned his money in dishonest or illegal ways, and his endeavors to court Daisy Buchannon. Daisy is the wife a another very wealthy Tom Buchannon, and he gets in touch with her through Nick Carraway, a middleclass neighbor who narrates the story. There are many significant and clever allusions and representations in Fitzgerald’s masterpiece The Great Gatsby.

New York City, overwhelmed with success, money and image in the 1920s was drowning in corruption. F Scott Fitzgerald composed a riveting novel, The Great Gatsby, which follows the journey of several characters dealing with love, greed, confusion and lust during the 1920s. Fitzgerald illustrates the corruption of the American dream by allowing us to follow the downfall of Jay Gatsby, revealing the reality of the American dream.

As a society, America has created certain ideas and stereotypes of each class including the citizens within them. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald focuses around the superficial communities of West and East Egg, and their misconceptions of one another. The citizens of East Egg, such as Daisy and Tom Buchanan, frown upon the up-and-coming men of West Egg. This includes Gatsby, who dreams of the riches they take for granted. Gatsby, who obtains his money through dishonest means appears villainous, unsuccessfully attempting to join the wealthy and elite society of East egg. However, there may be more to Gatsby's story. As Nick, the narrator, says he is “worth the whole damn bunch put together”(154). Through his descriptions and comparison of Tom’s house and Gatsby’s house, Fitzgerald reveals the true nature of the two men. While Gatsby appears to be morally corrupt, in the end he actually has pure intentions, instead it is Tom who emits negativity and is ungrateful for his life.

The Great Gatsby follows Nick Carraway as he leaves the Midwest and comes to New York City in 1922, an era of loosening morals, jazz and bootlegging. Chasing his own American Dream Nick ends up living next door to a mysterious, party throwing millionaire, Jay Gatsby and across the bay from his cousin, Daisy and her husband, Tom Buchanan. Throughout the novel there is a theme of Racism and Anti-Semitism. Racism and Anti-Semitism in the 1920s will greatly influence the ideas of Tom Buchanan and Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby.

During the time in our country's history called the roaring twenties, society had a new obsession, money. Just shortly after the great depression, people's focus now fell on wealth and success in the economic realm. Many Americans would stop at nothing to become rich and money was the new factor in separation of classes within society. Wealth was a direct reflection of how successful a person really was and now became what many people strived to be, to be rich. Wealth became the new stable in the "American dream" that people yearned and chased after all their lives. In the novel entitled the great Gatsby, the ideals of the so

Throughout the novel The Great Gatsby, there is a constant theme present: social class. Fitzgerald makes a connection between the theme of social class, and the settings in the novel for example The Valley of Ashes which is described as a “desolate area of land” (p.21) and a “solemn dumping ground” (p.21) which is where the poor people live. The Valley of Ashes is situated between West Egg and New York, West Egg being the place where the aspiring classes are situated, which is the “less fashionable of the two” (p.8), this is where Gatsby lives. West Egg is the place of ‘new money’, Fitzgerald shows this by the idea of the main character Jay Gatsby, rumoured to be selling illegal alcohol (prohibition) which means he is quickly making vast

Money is essential for survival; it can bring happiness, despair, or corruption. It rules our daily lives, is preferred in large amounts, and separates us into different social classes. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, is a perfect example of this since the class structure within the novel, portrays how money or the need for it can cause corruption in all the different social classes. This is shown through the three distinct classes: old money represented by the Buchanan’s and their self-centered, racist nature, new money represented by Gatsby and his mysterious, illegal ways, and a class that can be called no money represented by the Wilson’s and their attempts at

The Great Gatsby is a novel that takes place in the 1920s in the upper class of Chicago, Illinois. The two main protagonists are Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway. Jay Gatsby is a young, wealthy man who is known for throwing extravagant parties. Even though Mr. Gatsby is a show off, Jay is very naive when it comes to the people he meets. In the novel, he believes since everyone attends his parties that people love him.

The American Dream is the belief that you can become prosperous and successful through dedication and hard work. Fitzgerald uses settings in his novel ‘The Great Gatsby’ to present the good, the bad and the ugly sides of the American dream to communicate with the reader and show the darker side of the time period and the negatives of The American Dream behind the glamour and glitz, some of which we can even link to today’s society. His idea in ‘The Great Gatsby’ however may have been drafted from some stories from ‘Tales of the Jazz Age’, and more specifically ‘The Diamond as Big as The Ritz’.

The novel The Great Gatsby, written by F.Scott Fitzgerald follows the life of an average man by the name of Nick Carraway. The novel references the 1920s era and the regress of the American Dream. Born in 1896, writer F.Scott Fitzgerald was a flourishing writer known for his works that illustrated the Jazz Age. The Great Gatsby novel, set in the time of the rolling 1920s during the time of the prohibition, revolves around a wealthy, incomprehensible man named Jay Gatsby and is told through the eyes of one of his close acquaintances, Nick Carraway. Nick through a strange friendship with Gatsby, soon becomes aware that Gatsby is in love with and has been for years with Daisy Buchanan, Nick’s cousin. The novel follows the affair between Daisy and Gatsby as well as Gatsby’s quest to make his dreams come true between him and Daisy. While the novel illustrates the culture of the 1920s , the novel also consists of numerous symbols that relate to the theme of the novel as a whole, such as Gatsby's mansion and the green light both of which symbolize Gatsby's desires and dreams for the future, specifically with Daisy Buchanan as well as the decline of the American Dream.