Pursuit Of Happiness And Gatsby

In the book “The Great Gatsby”, Nick has a front row seat to a horrific love circle. Tom and Nick are different in many ways. Tom is portrayed in the story as an antagonist, while Nick is a protagonist. Both of these characters have encounters with Gatsby’s lover Daisy. The story of a distressed lovers drags a newcomer of the city into their feuds.

Love and Money as Presented in the Novels Pride and Prejudice and The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is told from the perspective of one of the main characters, Nick Carraway. Nick tells the story of a man named Jay Gatsby, who is his neighbor in the West Egg. Fitzgerald portrays Gatsby as a man who everyone wants to know and copy but deep down are very envious of him. Gatsby trusts few people and those whom he trusts know his life story. To everyone else, he is a mystery. Everyone seems obsessed with Jay Gatsby. For this reason the novel revolves about rumors of Gatsby rather than the truth.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby focuses on the excitement and adventure of the roaring twenties, a time filled with great economic success and parties said to last the whole decade. New to Long Island and New York, aspiring bond man Nick Carraway becomes infatuated with the lifestyle of his rich peers living the “American dream”. He gains interest in his mysterious neighbor Jay Gatsby, who lives in an incredible mansion and has a vast amount of wealth. Gatsby uses his money to try and steal his love, Daisy Buchanan from her unfaithful husband, Tom. Characters in The Great Gatsby are unhappy and unfulfilled with their lives due to greed manipulating their view of The American Dream. This skewed perception also affects their unreasonable life expectations and their narcissistic thoughts create a larger potential for failure, such as Gatsby’s extravagant plan to steal Daisy Buchanan.

​Nick Caraway moves from Minnesota to the West Egg neighborhood on Long Island to pursue a career in the bond industry. He lives in a tiny house wedged between large, expansive mansions. His neighbor, Jay Gatsby, is a well todo man with a mysterious past. Everyone in town knows Mr. Gatsby for his huge wild parties, but no one is quite sure where he has acquired his wealth. Across from Gatsby’s mansion, Nick’s cousin Daisy lives with her husband Tom Buchanan. Daisy and Tom have a complex relationship where neither of them are happy, but they will not separate even though both have been unfaithful. Tom has a mistress in the city whom is not unbeknownst to Daisy. Gatsby and Daisy have a romantic history from when Gatsby was in the army. This is the motivation behind Gatsby’s desire to acquire all his wealth. Gatsby throws his parties in an attempt to get Daisy’s attention, but Daisy is completely unaware that he is her neighbor until Nick brings them together. Though Nick is not a considerably wealthy man himself, his relationship to the Buchanans, and now Gatsby, are enough to keep him relevant in the social circles of East Egg and West Egg. Nick’s connection to Daisy also makes him highly attractive to Gatsby as all he wants is some form of an interaction with Daisy and involving himself with Nick is an easy way for Gatsby to make his way into Daisy’s life again. Money is power in the Great Gatsby, as it influences everyone’s status, aspirations,

“the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired”(Fitzgerald). From this Nick puts Gatsby as a pursuer and Daisy as the pursued. Nick is essentially stereotyping people with four niche stereotypes that are accurate for very few people. Nick tells gatsby “You’re acting like a little boy” and that Gatsby was being rude. Nick rarely tells people what he thinks of them and their actions. It was a rather condescending statement towards Gatsby, who was already embarrassed.(Fitzgerald 88). One of the few times Nick tells people how he feels about something it’s negative. Throughout the story Nick never tells Daisy about Tom’s affair and Never tells Tom about Daisy’s. Nick also could have told Mr.Wilson from being surprised. If either Tom or Daisy knew they would have divorced ending horribly dishonest relationship. This would have benefited everyone. Mr.Wilson knew that if he did not go west his wife would leave him, but if he knew before he could have either ended the affair or his marriage. If he had told anyone instead of standing by and doing

The Great Gatsby is too concerned with conveying a picture of 1920s American society to have relevance to modern readers.

These characters live in the age of the “Hollow Men,” and are portrayed as empty and absent-minded people. In fact, Nick voices his grievances with this at the end of the story; after Nick meets Tom Buchanan a couple months following Gatsby’s death, he takes time to reflect, pondering, “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness” (179). Shaking Tom’s hand, he states that he feels like he “were talking to a child” (179). Nick feels a personal disdain for the carelessness of the characters in the book. Gatsby, however, acts with real thoughtfulness, as he exhibits his authenticity multiple times in the novel. Reflecting on Gatsby’s life, Nick proclaims that Gatsby’s heart “was in a constant, turbulent riot” (99). He then tells that “the most grotesque and fantastic conceits haunted [Gatsby] in his bed at night” (99). These examples help validate that Gatsby, unlike the other characters, was genuine enough to feel passionate and convey emotion. While the readers dislike Tom and Daisy’s emptiness, they favor Gatsby’s compassionate and sincere personality, as they can relate to his

The difference in the interactions Nick and Gatsby have with Tom Buchanan show the difference in their perspectives on wealth. Nick is a friend of Tom. He visits Tom and Daisy at their home, and Tom trusts him enough to invite him to the small, intimate, gathering with only his mistress and the McKees. Nick doesn’t like to spend time with Tom; he says as they drive through the city “Hold on… I have to leave you here” (28). He didn’t have any particular reason to go, but he simply could not stand being with Tom in that car for any longer. His reaction to the party in Tom’s apartment is similar. He “wanted to get out” (35), but something restrained him. He wants to leave, but he is “within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled” (35) but Tom’s party. Gatsby’s reaction however, is different. He doesn’t entertain Tom or even try to engage with him. Nick speaks briefly to Tom then looks over to Gatsby and he’s simply “no longer there” (74). Gatsby and Tom are superficially similar. They both

Gatsby realizes that life of the high-class demands wealth to become priority; wealth becomes his superficial goal overshadowing his quest for love. He establishes his necessity to acquire wealth, which allows him to be with Daisy. The social elite of Gatsby?s time sacrifice morality in order to attain wealth. Tom Buchanan, a man from an enormously wealthy family, ?seems to Nick to have lost all sense of being kind.?(Lehan, pg.60) Nick describes Tom?s physical attributes as a metaphor for his true character when remarking that Tom had a ?hard mouth and a supercilious manner?arrogant eyes has established dominance over his face?always leaning aggressively forward?a cruel body?his speaking voice?added to the impression of fractiousness he conveyed? (Lehan, p.61)

Throughout his novel, The Great Gatsby, Frances Scott Fitzgerald illuminates the true struggles of the 1920’s. People amassed fortunes overnight from merchandising illegal alcohol. Jealousy was a killer in a time where people just wanted to have fun. The parties were elaborate and eternal. However, this lifestyle was empty. Fitzgerald portrays the quest for happiness and self-fulfillment vicariously through his characters Nick Carraway, Daisy Buchanan, Jordan Baker, and Jay Gatsby.

Ambition. It is a vital characteristic required for an individual wanting achieve their goals. Being ambitious alone is crucial to success as it is the drive that propels one toward it. It is and always will be a human trait. Perhaps that is why the theme of ambition has been so prevalent in literature. It is the dominant theme in The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald, William Shakespeare 's Macbeth, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller and The Wolf of Wall Street by Jordan Belfort. In this essay, I will discuss the two ways over ambition can cause an individual 's downfall. The first is setting unattainable goals which we can see in The Great Gatsby and Death of a Salesman. The second is trying to achieve your goals unethically, seen in Macbeth and in The Wolf of Wall Street . The idea of ambition and striving for achievement is highly valued by our society today. However, many people forget that too much of anything can be catastrophic.

The Great Gatsby, first published in 1925, echoes its era, and predicts its tragic end. In the novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald “revealed the negative side of the period’s gaiety and freedom, portraying wealthy and attractive people leading imperiled lives in gilded surroundings” (Danzer 656).It illustrate “the dying American Dream and the corruption of historical values”(Bewley 23). The wealthy characters in the book are careless, materialistic and empty, showing the corrupt side of the American Dream, but Gatsby is different. In the novel, Nick describes him as having “an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such I have never found in any other person and which is not likely I shall ever find again” (Fitzgerald 2).He kept believing and fighting for his dreams to the very end, even after it became clear that Daisy would not leave Tom to stay with him.

In the novel ‘The Great Gatsby’ and ‘Of Mice and Men’ F Scott Fitzgerald and John Steinbeck respectively explore the complex perspective of the true outcome of the American Dream. Although set within different eras of American society, the extensive failure of dreams throughout both texts shows how the American Dream is destined for annihilation despite the intention of hope and happiness. In its original form the American Dream encapsulated the ideal that ‘equality of opportunity is available to any American allowing the highest aspirations and goals to be achieved’. ’The Great Gatsby’ follows its protagonist Jay Gatsby who sets his life around his desire of reuniting Daisy Buchanan, the lost love of his life, through the eyes of Nick

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby, the reader sees a common theme of corruption of the American Dream. In the 1920’s, the times are changing in America and morals are becoming looser and the lifestyle of the wealthy is more careless. New fashion, attitude, and music is what nicknamed this era the “Jazz Age,” greatly influencing Fitzgerald’s writing. He created similarities between many things in pop culture and the journey his characters Gatsby, Daisy, Tom, and Myrtle are taking to achieve the American dream. Through the use of the lively, yet scandalous, jazz music from the 1920’s, Fitzgerald reflects the attitudes of the characters in The Great Gatsby at the end of innocence and prevalence of