Throughout Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, there is a ubiquitous theme of motion, whether that is portrayed through the symbolism of cars, boats, or people. This motion is essential to explaining the spirit of American culture. The most significant motion is that of the characters, who move from Midwestern America to Eastern America, and continue onward. This movement is motivated by a plethora of causes, whether that is for money, love, or whatever else one’s dream may be. However, this motion may be pointless, as shown by both Nick Carraway and Jay Gatsby, when neither of their dreams are wholly fulfilled by their Eastward movements. Overall, the motif of movement across America is representative of the American Dream, and the ever-present …show more content…
Nick moves East in order to sell bonds as well as to escape an engagement. However, he only does this in order to fit in with his associates, as he shows by stating “everybody [he] knew was in the bond business” (3). This concern over his character is further displayed by Nick’s assertion that “the fact that gossip had published the banns was one of the reasons I had come East” (19). Nick Carraway is greatly concerned about how he is thought of, and moves to the East from the Midwest in order to rebuild his character. When contemplating his move East, Nick again says the East has a sense of “superiority” and a “quality of distortion” (176), which gives power to the fact that the East is where he, and other Americans, can go to pursue a dream. Jay Gatsby also moves East to strive for his dream, which is to be in a relationship again with Daisy, his former lover. He tries to reach Daisy by throwing elaborate parties in his ostentatious home, and Daisy’s friend Jordan …show more content…
The West historically represents freedom and expansion, especially via Westward Migration. To most, the West is “the warm centre of the world,” (3) unless it becomes too disconnected from the rest of the world as Nick believes the Midwest to be. West Egg is also the antithesis of East Egg, and is “the less fashionable of the two” (5). However, West Egg is what Nick remembers and though it was less exciting, it “still figures in [his] more fantastic dreams” (176). The West is where all the characters started and is how they all became wealthy. Nick states near the end of his story that “this has been a story of the West after all- Tom and Gatsby, Daisy and Jordan and I, were all Westerners, and perhaps we possessed some deficiency in common which made us unadaptable to Eastern life” (176). These characters all come from well-off families who had money, but were not entirely preoccupied with the concept of money as they needed to be to thrive in the East, at least according to Nick. The Carraway family truly was able to exhibit the American dream as they came from Ireland during hard times and were able to become “well-to-do people in this Middle Western City...who… started [a] wholesale hardware business” (3). The West is not glamorized, but still has enchanting qualities which Nick lists with a sense of excitement, shown by the polysyndeton
The Great Gatsby is a symbol itself. The Great Gatsby was written to represent the rise and fall of the American Dream. The author places the rich and wealthy lifestyle on a high pedestal while he shows the dramatic consequences of moral and social decay amongst the characters. As each turning point is revealed, the American Dream slowly crumbles in the selfish hands of those who remain ignorant to anything else in the world. The significance of the many symbolic elements in The Great Gatsby plays a role in revealing the underlying themes of the American Dream, the ongoing clash between love and wealth and social and moral destruction.
In The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald a multitude of colors represent symbols and characters throughout the novel. The color blue normally can represent a large range of emotions and feelings, such as depression, sadness, abuse, royalty, cold and calmness. Furthermore, blue relates to many objects in life, which includes water and the sky. However, Fitzgerald uses the motif blue to express the symbols of foreshadowing, Gatsby’s royalty, which is shown in his house and parties, and a representation of how Tom acts as a barrier in between Gatsby and Daisy.
People in America love to have a great deal of money. In the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby always wants to have money, and he finally gets it. Gatsby has parties to try to get Daisy to come to his house. Gatsby tell Nick to tell Daisy to come to Nick’s house without her husband. Gatsby finallys shows his big house off to Daisy and thinks he will win her love back again just because he has money. Gatsby’s plan do not work out. Fitzgerald uses symbols in The Great Gatsby to show how things are going wrong in America.
The author Fitzgerald wrote The Great Gatsby as a novel that talks about and covers American issues in the 1920s. He shows in the novel the carelessness and selfishness of everybody at the same time by portraying all of them in the location of west and east egg. Fitzgerald talks about a couple different topics throughout the novel. One of those is," the Attainment of a dream may be less satisfying than the pursuit of it" and the second one is"the American Dream is corrupted by the desire for wealth". He uses those themes to show how americans lived at a different time.
F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote The Gatsby with a great deal of symbolism and for good reason. Symbolism in writing adds more meaning and depth to a story and helps the reader think about underlying themes. It can show what is really going on under the surface of the plot. Several issues exemplified through The Great Gatsby were that wealth and power corrupt, people aren’t what they seem, you can’t go back to the past, actions have consequences, and that the idealistic American dream has been replaced by materialism and greed.
ideas or concepts. For example, a dove is usually used to represent peace. In the novel The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Fitzgerald uses a lot of symbolism to connect the characters with each other or to other objects. Fitzgerald’s use of symbolism helps advance his thematic interest in his novel of The Great Gatsby. In the Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses various colors, objects, and gestures as symbols to portray the lack of moral and spiritual values of people and the different aspects of society in the 1920's.
The East Egg and West Egg are symbolic of the effects of wealth and the corruption of values. The West Egg is the home of the newly rich, like Gatsby, and those like him who have made huge fortunes, but lack the traditions associated with old wealthy families. The West Egg made up of families like the Buchanans, have a tradition of money, have grown up with money and have never had to work for anything
Gatsby is not misleading, and cares and hopes for the best to every one of the characters he meets. Gatsby progressed in a multitude of ways, such as how he talked and thought of certain people such as Daisy. The way F. Scott Fitzgerald described Gatsby as a character and how he progressed Gatsby couldn't be more fitting as a caring and more respectful kind of guy. How Gatsby relates to society is that he threw parties and how a lot of rich people went to his parties. He may even be able to challenge societal norms because of how he brought himself up to be a kind of character who looks like a rich guy who is just like everyone else, normal, but really he had so much inside of him that Nick Carraway(friend and Narrator) can for some reason only see. Through this journey, some may feel that Fitzgerald wanted to that there is always some sort of light around, maybe you will have to look hard for it but there will always be light, in Gatsby’s case, there was a green light, and how he looked at the light made it seem as it was his hope, but not for loss. As Gatsby says "single green light" and how it was "unattainable dream," the "dream [that] must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it”. This is one of Gatsby’s quotes that he used with a reference to the green light.
In life everyone strives to get rich, but is having an abundance of money always good? Sometimes people use money for personal benefits, sometimes it's for the benefit of others, but at times people with money use it to create their social status. In The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the idea of wealth is seen throughout. Jay Gatsby, who lives next door to Nick Carraway; the Narrator of the story, wants to be with his dream girl Daisy. Gatsby is wealthy and throws parties to impress Daisy. Daisy however, is married to another man Tom Buchanan. Throughout the story the people with money use it to create their social status. In The Great Gatsby F.Scott Fitzgerald uses symbolism to convey, wealth causes people to assert
“‘Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone,’ he told me, ‘just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.” (Fitzgerald 1). If you had the advantage to dream, how far would you dream? Dreams do not become a reality unless you set them as a goal and acquire it. Former basketball player, Lebron James and Jay Gatsby a character from the novel
In the Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Fitzgerald includes multiple colors to describe the characters and the places. Not only does he uses the colors just for appearance, or to add detail, but to symbolize emotion and ideas. For example, the color blue represents tranquility, the ocean, weakness, fantasy, loneliness, or royalty. When we first meet George Wilson he was seen as this old men with very little amount of hope. To quote, “When he saw us, a damp gleam of hope sprang into his light blue eyes” (Fitzgerald 25).
Love is a complex feeling but has the question ever been answered; do we seek the journey of love or the result of love? Scott Fitzgerald, author of The Great Gatsby, relates these ideas of love to the American dream. The American dream is the idea of equal opportunity and a chance at fulfilling an everlasting desire through determination and resilience in the American culture (Talk about anyone from anywhere). Mr. Gatsby, the main character, symbolizes the American Dream as a story that shows him moving from rags to riches during a time where money evoked social status. In this story, Fitzgerald aims to depict the results of the American Dream using symbols throughout New York City and West Egg to depict the hope and desire for the American
Everyone has dreams of being successful in life. When the word American comes to mind one often thinks of the land of opportunity. This dream was apparent with the first settlers, and it is apparent in today’s society. In F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (1925), he illustrates the challenges and tragedies associated with the American dream. By examining Jay Gatsby, Tom Buchanan, and Myrtle Wilson through the narrator Nick Carraway, I understand the complex nature of the American dream. Jay Gatsby represents the cost complex of them all.
Americans carry the freedom of opportunity and social mobility, allowing any individual to prosper, depending on their tenacity to succeed. Explicitly, Gatsby’s character differentiates between the four types of people present in this world, “the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired” (79). An instrumental facet of Gatsby’s character is his aspirations to pursue his goals, with a tenacious attitude to overcome any challenges that he may face. The passion that Gatsby contains is indefinable, his constant motivation to achieve his perfect utopian world allows him to reach out for a single “green light, minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock” (21). Peculiarly, the green light at the end of Daisy’s East Egg dock is barely visible from Gatsby’s West Egg lawn. Daisy resides along the East Egg depicting the moral decay and social cynicism of the old aristocracy, whereas Gatsby is settled along the West Egg, illustrating the newly rich of New York. The City of New York is a place for hope, a location often present in the quest to gain excessive wealth and a place full of pleasure. Moreover, the green light symbolizes Gatsby’s hope and misfortunate end with “his dream [seeming] so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him…” (180).
Happiness can only truly be acquired through the fantastical idea of dreams, and it is well known that money cannot. But in the 1920s, this idea changed as it became into a desire for wealth by whatever means; mistaken that money will bring happiness in one’s life. This conception leads to the end of true morality and turned a person into someone very selfish. F.Scott Fitzgerald demonstrates this notion through the use of a variety of symbols and themes.One of the dominant ideas within this novel is wealth which is supported through the symbol: eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg.The eyes symbolize the loss of spiritual values and growing commercialism in America. In the novel, The Great Gatsby, the theme wealth creates a pathway to the corruption of morals is evident through the decisions and thoughts of the Buchanans and Gatsby who are indirectly influenced by the symbol Eye of T.J Eckleburg.