The Great Gatsby and the Unattainable American Dream
Emily Mielcarek
Ms. Lullo
AP English 11
December 18, 2011
The Unattainable American Dream
The Great Gatsby, a novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is a story of misguided love between a man and a woman. Fitzgerald takes his reader through the turbulence and trials of Jay Gatsby’s life and of his pining for the girl he met five years prior. The main theme of the novel, however, is not solely about the love shared between Daisy Buchanan and Jay Gatsby. The main purpose is to show the decline and decay of the American Dream in the 1920’s. The American Dream is the goal or idea which suggests that all people can succeed through hard work, and that all have the potential to live happy, successful lives. While on the surface, Gatsby looks like he lives a happy, successful life, he truly doesn’t. He spends his life working hard to make money to impress the beautiful and practically unattainable, Daisy Buchanan, the love of his life. He spends his money to throw ostentatious parties in his lavish house and to buy unnecessary materialistic goods. The Great Gatsby is Fitzgerald’s way of criticizing the decade and its lack of depth.
Fitzgerald portrays the 1920s as an era of destroyed social and moral values, which is evidenced in its greed, and pursuit of empty pleasure. Greed and pressure take their form in many different ways in The Great Gatsby. The parties that Gatsby throws every Saturday night result ultimately in the corruption of the American dream, as the desire for money and pleasure surpasses more noble goals. The soiree’s are superfluous and extravagant with “…tables garnished with glistening hors d’oeuvres, spiced baked hams crowded against salads. . . pastry pigs and turkeys…a whole pit [orchestra] full of oboes and trombones and saxophones and viols and cornets and piccolos and low and high drums…” (44). People who have never even met nor spoken to Gatsby come to his lavish house to have a good time (45). Nick Carraway, Gatsby’s new neighbor
Ms. Lullo
AP English 11
December 18, 2011
The Unattainable American Dream
The Great Gatsby, a novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is a story of misguided love between a man and a woman. Fitzgerald takes his reader through the turbulence and trials of Jay Gatsby’s life and of his pining for the girl he met five years prior. The main theme of the novel, however, is not solely about the love shared between Daisy Buchanan and Jay Gatsby. The main purpose is to show the decline and decay of the American Dream in the 1920’s. The American Dream is the goal or idea which suggests that all people can succeed through hard work, and that all have the potential to live happy, successful lives. While on the surface, Gatsby looks like he lives a happy, successful life, he truly doesn’t. He spends his life working hard to make money to impress the beautiful and practically unattainable, Daisy Buchanan, the love of his life. He spends his money to throw ostentatious parties in his lavish house and to buy unnecessary materialistic goods. The Great Gatsby is Fitzgerald’s way of criticizing the decade and its lack of depth.
Fitzgerald portrays the 1920s as an era of destroyed social and moral values, which is evidenced in its greed, and pursuit of empty pleasure. Greed and pressure take their form in many different ways in The Great Gatsby. The parties that Gatsby throws every Saturday night result ultimately in the corruption of the American dream, as the desire for money and pleasure surpasses more noble goals. The soiree’s are superfluous and extravagant with “…tables garnished with glistening hors d’oeuvres, spiced baked hams crowded against salads. . . pastry pigs and turkeys…a whole pit [orchestra] full of oboes and trombones and saxophones and viols and cornets and piccolos and low and high drums…” (44). People who have never even met nor spoken to Gatsby come to his lavish house to have a good time (45). Nick Carraway, Gatsby’s new neighbor