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Analysis Of The Great Gatsby By F. Scott Fitzgerald And Only Yesterday

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Analysis Of The Great Gatsby By F. Scott Fitzgerald And Only Yesterday
The famed American novels, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald and Only Yesterday, by Frederick Lewis Allen are great representations on how America was in the nineteen-twenties. During this time, the very first world war had just come to an end, leaving many people with the feeling of disillusionment. The result of this feeling led people into thinking that money was all that mattered at the end of the day. In this era, people put business before God, resulting in a huge rise of new money for young and old people. Fitzgerald expresses these traits with fictional characters, as to where Allen uses historical facts. In this decade after World War I, Americans felt disillusioned. This feeling can be described as a loss of faith in one’s …show more content…
Gatsby is a great example of one of the millionaires that rose because he states, “It took me just three years to earn the money that bought it” (Doc D), “it” meaning his multi-million dollar mansion in West Egg. Fitzgerald portrays Gatsby as someone that wants to be known as “old money” instead of new, which is what real Americans also wanted to be known as. If it wasn’t to be known as old money, then it was to at least be accepted into a certain class and get the same respect. Allen shows this as he gives facts about the “epidemic of outlines of knowledge and books of etiquette for those who had got rich quick and wanted to get cultured quick and become socially at ease” (Doc C). Certain ways Gatsby portrayed this certain act was him calling people “old sport” and his library. His library plays a huge part in this act because people of new money would get fake books in their library, but Gatsby had filled his library with books that were “absolutely real--have pages and everything” (Doc D). Gatsby buying all those books showed how badly he wanted to be accepted as old money, just like most new money people at the time. The novel Only Yesterday gave facts on how Americans were like during the nineteen twenties, and the novel The Great Gatsby uses it’s characters to mirror their

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