English III Honors – period 3
Mrs. Snipes
9/24/10
Exegesis He had come a long way to this blue lawn and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that is was already behind time, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night. 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 – tomorrow 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. (ending paragraphs, Chapter IV)
Fitzgerald’s last words of the novel sum up the ending and clearly convey the idea of human nature yearning for the past. Commenting about Gatsby, color imagery is used to symbolize the American dream in the 1920s. Establishing the theme of the significance of the past and dreams for the future, the “green light” at the end of Daisy’s dock stands as a symbol of Gatsby’s ambitions. The description of the “vast obscurity beyond the city” and the “dark fields of republic” brings about imagery, also symbolizing the deterioration of the dream. The imagination of the future can recede, because it is unattainable and can never move forward in present-day reality. The dark fields represent the past, and the dreams are moving towards that, showing the recession of desires that individuals pursue. Diction also comes into play when Fitzgerald words his statement by calling the green light the “orgastic future”. Orgastic is defined as unrestrained excitement, in this case, the intense anticipation of achieving the dream in the future. This reflects upon the struggle of humans to achieve goals and transform dreams into reality, which are aspirations and drives for the individual to look forward to. Fitzgerald, through his interesting use of diction, states that the uncontrolled excitement for the future is only a dream – one which cannot be accomplished within the bounds of reality. Finally, the personification of the “boats against the current” provides a metaphor that sums up the complete moral of the fallacy of the American dream. The boats “borne back ceaselessly into the past” represent the humans’ inability to move beyond their past. They try to transcend and recreate the past but are ultimately incapable of doing so. Gatsby’s character, however so great, also falls victim to romanticism and the bounds of reality.
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