Corruption In The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby, a novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, embodies many themes as the story progresses. Some of these themes are social classes, wealth, and most importantly the American Dream. The American Dream is the idea that every US citizen should have an equal opportunity to achieve success and prosperity through hard work, determination, and initiative. The Great Gatsby is a highly symbolic meditation on 1920s America as a whole, in particular the disintegration of the American Dream in an era of unprecedented prosperity and material excess. Through the use of characters and symbols, F. Scott Fitzgerald implies the American Dream may not really exist and that everyone in the U.S. aims for survival of the fittest, rather than equality.

In The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, symbols are used to support the theme of corruption. During the Roarin’ Twenties. prohibition drove many Americans, especially around big cities, to disregard the law and become bootleggers. They threw large, extravagant parties in which morals were not present. Fitzgerald used the Valley of Ashes, the American Dream, and the Eyes of T.J. Eckleburg to symbolize the corruption of America.

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 American dream can mean many different things and can be interpreted in different ways. To some people, the American dream is the belief that if a person works hard enough, he or she can be successful in America no matter what race, gender, or nationality. In the 1920’s, the concept of the American dream was very much the same, that an individual can achieve success in life regardless of family history or social status if he or she works hard enough. By having money, a car, a big house, expensive clothes, and a loving family symbolizes the American dream. In the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the 1920’s is a time period in which the American dream becomes corrupt and dangerous. For Jay Gatsby, a main character in the novel, his American dream is about gaining wealth and material possessions in order to find happiness. Through his decision to symbolize wealth, superficiality, irresponsibility, and foreshadowing, Fitzgerald conveys the the theme that the American dream is a perfect concept and is something that can never be accomplished, but can always be reached for.

In The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, characters are depicted as corrupt human beings influenced by their own personal agendas. With an indistinguishable line between right and wrong, they remain unaware of the consequences that follow their actions. Daisy Buchanan is portrayed as the “golden girl” of her time. She is the woman every man wants to call their own, although they only focus on her superficial features rather than personal qualities. Throughout the novel, her true self begins to unfold, displaying how she misleads others to protect her social stature and reputation. Daisy’s submissive nature continuously hurts the people she cares about by allowing her to engage in dishonest activities.

The wealthy in the late 20’s was corrupt and selfish. In the Great Gatsby the upper class is shown as corruptive. The people in the upper class such as Tom and Daisy don’t really care about their actions because they feel invincible due to their amount of money and the power they have. Fitzgerald illustrates the corruption in the way upper class is care-less about their behavior.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is about a writer named Nick Carraway. He leaves the Midwest and comes to New York City in the spring of 1922 . Nick chases his American Dream and ends up living next door to a mysterious, party-loving millionaire, Jay Gatsby, who is  across the water from his cousin, Daisy and her husband, Tom Buchanan. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald reveals that the upper class society is corrupt from money. This is best proven through Gatsby, Daisy, and Tom.

The idea of American Dream as presented by F. Scott Fitzgerald in the Great Gatsby novel involves rising from poverty or rags to richness and wealthy. The American Dream exemplifies that elements such as race, gender, and ethnicity are valueless as they do not influence the ability of an individual to rise to power and richness. This American Dream makes the assumption that concepts such as xenophobia are non-existent in America a concept that is not true and shows vagueness of the American Dream. In his novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses the Great Gatsby to demonstrate the overall idea of living the American dream. Gatsby leaves his small village of farmers and manages to work his way up the ladder although some of the money he uses to climb the ladder is associated with crime “He was a son of God and he must be about His Father's Business, the service of a vast, vulgar and meretricious beauty” (Fitzgerald 6.7). This phrase shows that Gatsby wasn’t meant for a life similar to that of his father but rather destined for greatness. However, his dream his short-lived and he doesn’t make it to the top as Daisy who is a symbol of his wealthy rejects her and a series of events transpire that result in his death before he could live his American Dream alongside everyone else who was working up the ladder to live the American Dream.

The Great Gatsby is about how corrupted the American Dream was and how it affected many individual’s lives. The characters in the novel have a huge role in portraying the corruption and lifestyles of those living the dream during the 1920’s. Due to the idea of a success promise that the East had to offer, many westerners packed their lives up and headed that way in hope of a better life. Nick Caraway, one of the main characters, is one of the westerners that took the gamble of moving east during this time period. Nick who was originally from Minneapolis- St. Paul, wanted to experience what New York had to offer. “Instead of being the warm center of the world the middle-west now seemed like the rigid edge of the universe- so I decided to go east and learn the bond business. Everybody I knew was in the bond business so I suppose it could support one more single man” (Fitzgerald 20). In the summer of 1922, he decided to rent a house in what is known as West Egg, Long Island. The only connections Nick had in the East were his cousin Daisy and her husband Tom Buchanan, whom he had met at college years ago. Daisy and Tom, along with their young daughter lived in the East Egg. The mansion next to Nick’s house belonged to Jay Gatsby. In the beginning of the novel, Nick makes it known to readers that he hasn’t seen Gatsby even though he was throwing large, loud, and outrageous parties almost every night. However, when Nick and Gatsby do meet they become rather close and by the end of

The Great Gatsby is a novel based off of the American dream, which is something that everyone strives for. The author of the book F. Scott Fitzgerald has his own American dream to become a well known writer, and to have the girl of his dreams, and throughout the novel this dream reflected in The Great Gatsby within in the characters Gatsby and Daisy. Fitzgerald had developed the character Gatsby by incorporating some of his own dreams. For example Gatsby has a forbidden love for Daisy, but he cannot have her because she does not want to leave her husband, Gatsby also wants to do everything he can for Daisy but since she will not leave her husband Gatsby is doing all of this for no reason, and in the

The Great Gatsby is a story about how corruption causes absence of true love, and how the desire for true love can cause disastrous consequences. Jay Gatsby had a number of downfalls and he is a great example of the desire for true love. Gatsby’s downfalls were his dreams and aspirations about Daisy, social class and how others viewed him.

The Corruption of the American Dream and Society, first took place in the 1920’s, also commonly known as the “roaring twenties”, when this new ideology erupted. Therefore, this idea of the free market and opportunity took over the market industry, especially in stocks. People started seeing possibility to become very wealthy without anyone to stop them. They ended up liking this lifestyle which boosted the decay of the American Dream and Society. Where people could care less about the true meaning of American Dream which is about freedom, hard work and prosperity; instead, people had begun to care a great deal about social status. In addition, The Great Gatsby, which is set in the heart of the “roaring twenties”, where F. Scott Fitzgerald ties his thoughts and his life experience of this damaging effect on the people into his book. Using the main characters he shows us how the men and women in his life were, how they were caught up in all of this. In addition to the downfall of the American Dream the reader can also pick up the themes of corruption of Society and the emptiness behind the glamour of the Jazz Age from the characters.

In the novel, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald many of the characters could be classified as corrupt and morally dishonest. Not one character in the story is not hiding something that can affect someone's else's life. The characters are backstabbers are just filled with lies . The mains character like Gatsby and Nick Carraway are both ok with lying, deceiving, tricking,and messing with people's lives. Both men involve themselves in immoral affairs with women and they both know of the illegal system going on. Daisy is one of the most corrupt character, she plays with the hearts of Gatsby and Tom, the only men in her life. Then there is Tom and Ms.Baker, Tomis in involved in the speakeasies, Ms baker rigged the golf tournament she played in. You can’t anyone in the novel because they might end up biting you in the butt or having you killed like Gatsby.

For the people who don’t live in America, but wish to migrate and create a new life in America, their main motivation is the American dream. People describe the dream as being all US citizens have an equal opportunity to gain success and prosperity through hard work, determination, and initiative. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald illustrates the corruptness of the “American dream” through Jay Gatsby, a rich man with a more than shady background regarding how he came to be in the West Egg of New York. Consequently, the American dream during the 1920s, as Fitzgerald exemplifies, has turned into a competition among the people for status and wealth, with no such thought of gaining happiness in the process. Furthermore, Fitzgerald illustrates the corruptness of the