Portrayal Themes Of Dreams In F. Scott Fitzgerald's Winter Dreams

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story, “Winter Dreams,” ambitious, “desirous” Dexter stands at the threshold between admiring “glittering things” and finding out that the “glittering things” he admires fade away sooner or later. Dexter‘s character throughout this short story, changes in many ways, from being unaware of what he really wanted in life to being aware of what he actually became.

The Great Gatsby is a novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald about Jay Gatsby, the embodiment of a rags to riches narrative, and his undying love for Daisy Buchanan. Told in the point of view of friend Nick Carraway, we learn about Gatsby and the lengths he would go to for love. “Winter Dreams” is a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald about Dexter Green, another character who went from rags to riches, his love for Judy Jones, and dreams of being rich. “Winter Dreams” is a prototype of The Great Gatsby because the characters in both works are similar in that Dexter resembles Gatsby, they both cover the theme of time, and the topic of unrealistic love in both of the stories is similar.

People who come from similar backgrounds may share similar experiences. This applies to the characters of Jay Gatsby and Dexter Green, who progress throughout The Great Gatsby and Winter Dreams to achieve the lifestyle that they always wanted, but fall short when it comes to love. F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote The Great Gatsby and Winter Dreams. Both of these stories give an insight to what life was like in the 1920s. Jay Gatsby is one of the major characters in The Great Gatsby. He came from a poor family and eventually becomes extremely wealthy, but he isn’t satisfied without his past lover, Daisy Buchanan. Dexter Green worked as a golf caddy when he was young boy, which is where he met his love interest, Judy Jones. As he grows older and rises

The American Dream was the vision that brought many people to America to start a new life in a strange and foreign land. This vision or dream is a common discussion topic by modern writers such as F. Scott Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby follows a cast of characters living in the fictional town of West Egg on Long Island in the summer of 1922. On the surface, it seems that the novel is a story of the thwarted love between a man and a woman, but the masterpiece major theme is about the American dream. The author writes about a man who takes the dream too far and becomes unable to distinguish his false life of riches from reality.

Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, a novel documenting the experiences Nick Carraway has in New York, is ultimately used to voice Fitzgerald’s perception of the American dream. Nick, voicing the message from Fitzgerald, affirms his confidence in the matter that the American Dream will always be unattainable. From the beginning of the novel, Gatsby is illustrated as a mysterious character who constantly changes his backstory in an attempt to appeal to the “old rich.” As Nick and Gatsby became acquainted, Nick abominated Gatsby as he ascertained that Gatsby’s methods to pursue wealth and Daisy were scandalous. In the end, Nick conceived a new perspective on life proceeding Gatsby’s death which is portrayed through his thought that, “Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us.

Fitzgerald's dominant theme in The Great Gatsby focuses on the corruption of the American Dream. By analyzing high society during the 1920s through the eyes of narrator Nick Carraway, the author reveals that the American Dream has transformed from a pure ideal of security into a convoluted scheme of materialistic power. In support of this message, Fitzgerald highlights the original aspects as well as the new aspects of the American Dream in

Nick notes, “He came down with a hundred people in four private cars, and hired a whole floor of the Seelbach Hotel, and the day before the wedding he gave her a string of pearls valued at three hundred and fifty thousand dollars”(76). Fitzgerald allows this flashback to be in the book simply to show how the luxuries of the world can control us and make us do actions we may not ever consider if they are not present. Nick expresses, “Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther… And one fine morning –— So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past” (180). Gatsby dream of obtaining not only the American dream, but also his dream of pursuing Daisy ultimately ended his life. The pursuit of wealth and status in the world degrades the meaning of true happiness because it takes away from the sincerity of life

The short story of “Winter Dreams” was written around the same time that Fitzgerald was developing ideas for a story to turn into a novel. While The Great Gatsby wasn’t published until 1925, “Winter Dreams” débuted in 1922 and the similarities between the novel and short story were done on purpose. “Winter Dreams” became a short draft which Fitzgerald paralleled The Great Gatsby after, but also differentiated the two in specific ways (“Winter Dreams” 217). The main characters are both men, Jay Gatsby and Dexter Green, who desire for the American dream, not necessarily for themselves, but in order to lure back the women they idealize. In The Great Gatsby and “Winter Dreams” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s constant theme is shown through the

Everybody strives to earn it, those little green things in your wallet. Green is associated with good and happiness; above all, things of desire. Nevertheless, it doesn’t truly make you happy with your life and most importantly, yourself. In the fictitious novel, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the characters who have money at their disposal are constantly looking for something else to fulfill their longing to have a meaningful life. Despite it’s problem-solving reputation, money isn’t what it’s chalked up to be, the characters with excessive money aren’t sincerely happy with their lives. Jay Gatsby, Tom Buchanan, Daisy Buchanan, and Jordan Baker and never satisfied with their m0ney. Fitzgerald’s characters never seem to connect their feeling of never being satisfied with their infinitesimal amount of happiness.

The notion of the ‘American Dream’ is one of the repeated aspects portrayed in this book, since Gatsby’s entire life is dedicated to achieving this. The ‘American Dream’ comprises of grand opulence, social equality, wealth; more specifically, a big house with a big garden, the newest model cars, the most fashionable attire, and a traditional four-peopled ‘happy’ family. To Fitzgerald, the ‘American Dream’ itself is a positive, admirable pursuit. We can see this when Fitzgerald uses personification, “flowers”, to background positive connotations behind the idea of the ‘American Dream’. In regard to Gatsby, he achieves the wealth aspect of this ‘dream’, “he had come a long way to this blue lawn”; however, he was yet to be satisfied because he did not have Daisy. Ever since the very beginning of the story, Gatsby always associated Daisy with magnificent affluence, the white house, and the grand quality of being rich. Gatsby wanted everything ever since he was first introduced to the higher status. But Gatsby felt incomplete and unfulfilled even after getting everything he dreamt of, so he sourced this emptiness as not having Daisy, where in reality, “he neither understood or desired” the motives he thought he once had.

“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”.

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is a novel about the American Dream. In the Great Gatsby, the dream is that one can acquire happiness through wealth and power. To get his happiness Jay attempts to reacquire the love of his lost sweet heart, Daisy. The main problem with Jay's dream is that Daisy is married. Gatsby's personal dream symbolizes the larger American Dream 'The pursuit of happiness'.

F. Scott Fitzgerald was an american author with several breathtaking novels and short stories. Among his most well known pieces of literature is The Great Gatsby which is a about a rich man who is in love with a married woman. “Winter Dreams” is also another piece of literature that Fitzgerald wrote. “Winter Dreams” is about a man's dream of becoming wealthy and dream of marrying the woman he loves. These two pieces of literature are very similar in various aspects that are noticeable as the reader compares the two. The constant mention of the desire of love and the desire for luxury demonstrates that these two things are not always the key to a happy life.

In the short story “Winter Dreams”, F. Scott Fitzgerald expresses that the need for glittery things is the american dream. In the story, Dexter is in pursuit of being in the glittery lifestyle that Judy Jones is in. But at the sight of judy throwing a tantrum, he quits his caddying job. He did this so he won't have to caddy for judy. Here is an example of where he chooses to not be with her.

A State of No Control “If the path is beautiful, let us not ask where it leads.” (Anatole France) A substantial amount people take certain paths and never take a second to contemplate what the consequences will be. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story, Winter Dreams, and novel, The Great Gatsby, are both stories that wrestle with popular culture and issues of the 1920’s through the portrayal of an unsuccessful love story. Because Winter Dreams was a rough draft for The Great Gatsby, there are similarities rooted within both stories.