The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby

  • Submitted By: hahahalol
  • Date Submitted: 01/05/2015 6:28 PM
  • Category: English
  • Words: 705
  • Page: 3
  • Views: 1

On the surface, The Great Gatsby written by F. Scott Fitzgerald may appear to merely be a novel about the failed relationship between Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan. However, the major theme of the novel has much less to do with love than with the shattered American Dream. In the Great Gatsby, the reckless jubilance that led to decadent parties ultimately resulted in the corruption of the American Dream, as the unrestrained pleasure surpasses more noble goals, such as morality and humanity. Also, people were not recognized for who they were but rather their classes and their wealth. Lastly, Fitzgerald uses many symbolic figures to introduce the failure of American Dream in his writing.
In the Great Gatsby, the decadent parties are a symbol of the prosperous twenties. However, it resulted in the failure of the American Dream because the desire for pleasure surpassed the sense of morality and humanity. An example of immorality is Gatsby using illegal practices and underground connections to make money. “He’s a bootlegger, (Fitzgerald 61)” said the ladies that went to Gatsby’s parties. An example of dehumanization is when Nick Carraway runs into Tom Buchanan and confronts him for Gatsby’s murder and Tom replies, “I told him the truth...What if I did tell him? That fellow had it coming to him. (Fitzgerald 178)” Although Tom admits to the fact that he is responsible for Gatsby’s murder and Wilson’s suicide, he continues to claim innocence because he has never known guilt or shame as a member of the established elite. The upper class people are shown to be made up of heartless citizens who achieved success at the cost of dehumanization and the selling of their souls. Clearly, the desire for wealth and pleasure surpassed the true meaning of the American Dream in the 1920s.
Also, people were not recognized for who they are but their classes and their wealth. Gatsby had to reinvent himself in order to become one of the upper class. “James Gatz—that was really, or at...

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