The Use of Characterization and Symbolism in Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

The American Dream, in essence, is but a faulty perception of the world. It attempts to find felicity in all that is gilt. And guilty is a society that bases happiness on something as worthless as gold; for what does the warm kiss of light on the skin and the taste of water cost man? It is this theme of misconceptions and blindness that recurs through Fitzgerald's work. It stares at us, scrutinizes us, like the gigantic, blue, spectacled and myopic eyes of Dr. Eckleburg. Fitzgerald gives us Dr. Eckleburg to accentuate America's blindness. America is not only blind, but also near-sighted; America lives for today, for pleasure and prodigality. She cannot

For generations many have immigrated to this great nation know, as the United states of America, all seeking for their share of the American dream. The American dream is the philosophy that anyone can become successful through hard work and perseverance. The 1920’s embodies this concept like no other decade in American history. It is also during this time frame that one sees the perversion of this dream. F. Scott Fitzgerald suggests in his novel, The Great Gatsby that there is a right and wrong way to obtain the American dream. Throughout the novel, Gatsby is symbolic for the materialistic nature of the American dream and its corruption in the 20th century.

Qualities like absolute moral perfection are even less attainable than world peace, and they have no place in quality literature. No one relates to the main character that never lets his emotions get the better of him once in a while. Truly powerful characters require at least some degree of moral ambiguity. Jay Gatsby in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby engages in illegal liquor sales and business with the man who rigged the World Series, which combine with his purest of intentions and virtually universal kindness to create some definitely ambiguous morals. Due to that ambiguity, Gatsby’s character remains imperfect and one whom readers can entirely relate to, while promoting the prominent theme in the novel of the American Dream’s

In book, “The Great Gatsby,” F. Scott Fitzgerald depicts how the American was corrupted through wealth. Fitzgerald provides many examples. The most common example shown was Jay Gatsby. Gatsby’s idea that to achieve his American Dream must be to acquire wealth. In order to show this, Fitzgerald uses various literary elements. Two of those being imagery and foreshadowing, these played a critical role in describing the theme, and specific moods to show what was to come and as well as describe the story as a whole. These play a vital role in representing Gatsby’s life and journey to acquiring Daisy, his version of the American Dream.

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.

Oftentimes society gets so caught up in achieving greatness that it is blinded to the obstacles of reality. The American Dream can sometimes be so unachievable yet so alluring that people cannot help but strive after it as if it were their destiny. Fitzgerald highlights this phenomenon in his novel The Great Gatsby through many characters and their pursuit of their own American Dreams. Fitzgerald uses figurative language and contrasting diction to show his cynical attitude about the pursuit of the American Dream and the blindness of those who believe in it.

F. Scott Fitzgerald uses imagery and symbolism to represent bigger ideas in his stories. For his novel The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald was able to do something most authors aren’t. He was able to approve of the cover of his book. The cover selected was a painting of a nightly city, being watched over by celestial eyes. The eyes stand out in juxtaposition of the rest of the dark blue sky due to their sickly yellow color as a teal tear travels down from the left. However, a closer look at the eyes in the cover show that they irises are blue, and inside the eyes are two women. The surreal art piece has as much symbolism in it as the pages it protects, especially the eyes in which the painting is named for. The women within the eyes on the cover

       In F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby, the principle character, Jay Gatsby makes an exhaustive effort in his quest for the American Dream. The novel is Fitzgerald's vessel of commentary and criticism of the American Dream. “Fitzgerald defines this Dream, he depicts its’ beauty and irresistible lure”(Bewley 113). Through Gatsby's downfall, Fitzgerald expresses the futility and agony of the pursuit of the dream.

The main theme throughout Fitzgerald’s novel is that wealth leads to corruption. Several characters in the novel have corrupt aspects, such as Jay Gatsby, Tom Buchanan, Daisy Buchanan, and Myrtle Wilson. This can be seen through the indirect and direct characterization of the characters. Each of the characters corruptness is evident in their perspectives and actions. The motivation of wealth also corrupts an individual. Wealth makes a person act a certain way and do certain things. Fitzgerald uses imagery to embody the personality of Myrtle as being corrupt. Fitzgerald’s use of irony shows that society wants to be with you only if you have money. In order to be with someone you have to be up to their standard.

In the past the American Dream was an inspiration to many, young and old. To live out the American Dream was what once was on the minds of many Americans. In The Great Gatsby, the American Dream was presented as a corrupted version of what used to be a pure and honest ideal way to live. The idea that the American Dream was about the wealth and the possessions one had been ingrained, somehow, into the minds of Americans during the 1920’s. As a result of the distortion of the American Dream, the characters of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel, The Great Gatsby along with many others, lived life fully believing in the American Dream, becoming completely immersed in it and in the end suffered great tragedies.

Fitzgerald uses women as a foundation of the American dream by showing their beauty, status, personality,and power, Beauty in the novel was an important component which was flaunted by women in the 1920’s which was being shown through Daisy, Jordan,and Myrtle. Daisy is a symbol of beauty and sophistication. She is described as a captivating young woman that leads on others with her personality. Daisy builds the American dream by showing the beauty and happiness that the dream is intended to have. Daisy is the male fantasy of woman, which shows why she was shown to act the way she does, she uses her beauty to her advantages, to get away with things and to live the glamorous life that she intends to live. “ her face was sad and lovely with bright things in it, bright eyes,bright passionate mouth” (Fitzgerald,14). This quote from the novel represents how Daisy is a part of the American dream as beauty,how she catches men’s attention with her attitude. She portrays, personality and Beauty. She portrays the American dream as a happy ending. For jordan her beauty is different from Daisy’s, Jordan beauty is her mysterious features that causes others to be intrigued by it, and her ability to fit in with her neutral attitude. She seems

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)

A few symbolisms in novels are as memorable as the green light in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Shining at the end of Daisy’s dock, it is close enough to be seen, but too far away to be reached. Still, Gatsby, an eternal optimist, stares at it at night, as if it showed him that all his far-away dreams were about to come true. The green light in The Great Gatsby is symbolic of hope, a source of inspiration, and a representation of the American Dream to Gatsby and to the novel’s readers.

Although "The Great Gatsby" is filled with multiple themes such as love, money, order, reality, illusion and immorality, no one would probably deny that the predominate one focuses on the American Dream and the downfall of those who attempt to reach its illusionary goals. The attempt to capture the American Dream is the central of this novel. This can be explained by how Gatsby came to get his fortune. By studying the process of how Gatsby tried to achieve his own so-called American Dream, we could have a better understanding of what American dream is all about, in those down-to-earth Americans' point of view. The characterization of Gatsby is a representative figure among Americans as he devoted his whole life to achieve his dream.

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.