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F. Scott Fitzgerald 's The Great Gatsby

Decent Essays

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, (1925) depicts the story of Jay Gatsby, a self-made millionaire, who has moved to West Egg, New York to reunite with his former love, Daisy Buchanan. Through the novel, the representation of class and gender embody the social views on either subject during the 1920’s. Fitzgerald has used the characters within the novel to exemplify the social stratas and also the decades view on men and women. Fitzgerald has thereby utilized the characters within the novel to depict the complexity of the American social classes as well as the views of women and men of the decade. The social hierarchy within Fitzgerald’s novel depicts the complexity and difficulty of migrating between classes and the attitudes held by people within each class. There are three distinct groups in the novel, those with old money, new money and no money. Characters with old money are those such as Daisy and Tom Buchanan who have inherited their wealth and are seen as the social elite or the very established upper class. Men within this class appear to be very critical of those with ‘new money’ and hold an attitude of superiority to those they believe to be beneath them. Whereas the women are seen being carefree and careless with regard to their life and material possessions. For example, Daisy constantly has her daughter in care with a Nanny rather than raising her herself. Both genders of this class appear to not work or hold full-time jobs and appear to amuse

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