Corruption Of The American Dream In The Great Gatsby

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,

“It is the elusive Gatsby, the cynical idealist, who embodies America in all of its messy glory.” Clearly as Adam Cohen asserts in his New York Times article “Jay Gatsby, Dreamer, Criminal, Jazz Age Rogue, Is a Man for Our Times”, this phenomenon is indeed true in that the American Dream is presented in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby as an idea that has been depraved into a dream characterized by the constant shift in ethics and fraudulence centered around materialistic visions of opulence and wealth.

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’s novel The Great Gatsby focuses on the corruption of the American dream during the 1920‘s. For the duration of this time period, the American dream was no longer about hard work and reaching a set goal, it had become materialistic and immoral. Many people that had honest and incorruptible dreams, such as Jay Gatsby, used corrupted pathways to realize their fantasy. People’s carelessness was shown through their actions and speech towards others. Fitzgerald uses characterization and symbolism from different characters and items to convey the corruption of the American dream.

“That locality is always vaguely disquieting, even in the broad glare of afternoon, and now I turned my head as though I had been warned of something behind. Over the ashheaps the giant eyes of Doctor T.J Eckleberg kept their vigil, but I perceived, after a moment, that someone’s eyes were regarding us with peculiar intensity from less than twenty feet away”(Fitzgerald 124). The eyes of Doctor T.J Eckleberg watches over all the characters while they live in what they consider the “American dream”. The Great Gatsby, a historical fiction novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, speaks to the readers about the illusion of the American dream. Gatsby’s life and death is a product of an illusion because of Gatsby’s determination for wealth in his youth, the unlawful money he receives, and Gatsby’s love for “old money”.

In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald employs the use of characters, themes, and symbolism to convey the idea of the American Dream and its corruption through the aspects of wealth, family, and status. In regards to wealth and success, Fitzgerald makes clear the growing corruption of the American Dream by using Gatsby himself as a symbol for the corrupted dream throughout the text. In addition, when portraying the family the characters in Great Gatsby are used to expose the corruption growing in the family system present in the novel. Finally, the American longing for status as a citizen is gravely overshot when Gatsby surrounds his life with walls of lies in order to fulfill his desires for an impure dream. F.

In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald employs the use of characters, themes, and symbolism to convey the idea of the American Dream and its corruption through the aspects of wealth, family, and status. In regards to wealth and success, Fitzgerald makes clear the growing corruption of the American Dream by using Gatsby himself as a symbol for the corrupted dream throughout the text. In addition, when portraying the family the characters in Great Gatsby are used to expose the corruption growing in the family system present in the novel. Finally, the American longing for status as a citizen is gravely overshot when Gatsby surrounds his life with walls of lies in order to fulfill his desires for an impure dream.

Illness… American Dream… Corruption. In this book “The Great Gatsby” by Fitzgerald has much symbolism that relates to the American Dream. Specifically, Fitzgerald points out the difference between corruption of an America dream and the causes of illness. “The Great Gatsby” by Fitzgerald

The novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is set in New York during the 1920’s. The underlying cause for everything that happens in the novel is an idea, an idea towards which everyone strives and dreams of. This idea is none other than the omnipresent notion of the American Dream. Throughout the novel this dream has suffered a decline through the immoral actions of Fitzgerald’s characters. Demonstrated through F. Scott Fitzgerald’s characters in The Great Gatsby, the morals and values of the American people are corrupted when money and power eclipse ones American Dream. With this in mind, F. Scott Fitzgerald incorporates imagery, symbolism, and conflict to convey the theme of the novel.

The American Dream was first evinced in the Declaration of Independence, which expresses the idea that all men are created equal with the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. However, the phrase “The American Dream” was disseminated by James Truslow Adams, in his novel Epic of America. He described the American Dream as “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.". However, in the 1920’s the meaning of the American Dream morphed from the opportunity and right to achieve a better life through hard work to the impatient attainment of material possessions. This corruption of the American Dream can be seen in the novel The Great Gatsby. In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerld demonstrates the corruption of the American Dream through three social groups within West Egg, East Egg, and The Valley of Ashes.

The Roaring 20's was an era of decadence and endless possibility. The American Dream was something that everyone coveted. Essentially, The American Dream meant that anyone who had the talent and worked hard enough, could achieve it. Money, a loving spouse, and status all showed that a person had been successful in their life and were vital points to the American Dreams of the Characters in the Great Gatsby. Many of them strived in their own way to achieve “the dream”, however, twisted ideals of love, wealth, and class led to the eventual fall of the American Dream in The Great Gatsby.

Ever since its publication in April 1925, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel “The Great Gatsby” has become one of the most criticized, cited, and analytical pieces of fiction in American literature history. It is a great representation of an era known as the Jazz Age when anything and everything was possible, or at least that is what people thought. Fitzgerald provides the reader with an insight of the internal mindsets of the characters, which justifies their actions and behaviors instead of simply just describing their historical, social, and economic conditions. The overall cause for the majority of this novel is based on one vast idea, an idea that everyone attempted to do during this time period. This idea is the ubiquitous notion of the American Dream. “Critics from several different generations have noted how Fitzgerald used his conflicts to explore the origins and fate of the American dream and the related idea of the nation. The contradictions he experienced and put into fiction heighten the implications of the dream for individual lives: the promise and possibilities, violations and corruptions of those ideals of nationhood and personality “dreamed into being,” as Ralph Ellison phrased it, “out of the chaos and darkness of the feudal past”” (Callahan). One of the main characters, Jay Gatsby, is created to magnify Fitzgerald’s personal feelings and beliefs about

The American Dream has gone down in history as an arduous journey, one that can only be accomplished by a select few willing to push their ambitions and capabilities as far as possible in order to achieve a new life full of status, wealth, and happiness. This dream, back in the 1920’s, brought upon a new sense of value and a greedy corruption that spread like a wild fire and settled like poison in the hearts of those less fortunate. In the classic twentieth-century novel, The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses these elements present in that time and apply them to the character of Jay Gatsby who cheats fate and becomes a man of sophisticated poise in order to gain his dream of being a part of the elite class by achieving love, wealth, and

The Great Gatsby is a superb exploration of American society, ideals, and values. It serves fresh and biting criticism of the nature of the supposed “American Dream”. Fitzgerald, through the many characters in the novel, investigates many aspects and perspectives of the American Dream. He comes to the conclusion that, although alluring and attractive, the dream has a dark underbelly ripe with corruption. Fitzgerald also reveals how the dream is contradictory, unfulfilling, unattainable, and fueled by reckless idealism.

As the roaring 20’s swept through the country, it brought along the fantasy of the American Dream, a stable life with a surplus of money. But along with that came the paradoxical scenario, an unstable life with no money. This event caused a division in the country and widened the gap between the poor and rich, leading to the concept of social classes. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s book, The Great Gatsby, caused great controversy, as it challenged the sought after American Dream and portrays it as a burden. Through the use of three contrasting settings, Fitzgerald depicts the divergence of each social class and their hidden truth. Therefore, he is able expose the reality of the American Dream. In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald criticizes the idea of the American dream as a false perception in society, through the use of setting to portray the harsh truth of each social class.