The Great Gatsby
Pavina Bumphenboon
Period 6 English CP
Miss. Herring
Corruption of the “American Dream” and the negative power of money.
The “American Dream” portrays a life that everyone wants to have, becoming successful with a great job, home, and a family. This dream embodies The Great Gatsby who is trying to pursue the American Dream through his life. Gatsby’s dream however was corrupted because of his pursuit of wealth and the negative power of money. In Fact Gatsby is blind to know that his money cannot buy him his happiness or his love for Daisy. Most importantly it would only bring him hardship in the end. The corruption of the American Dream in The Great Gatsby is how Gatsby made his money and achieved his wealth. In the book Gatsby is extending his arms toward a green light at the end of a dock, which symbolizes his yearning for power and money also showing his desire for Daisy. In addition Gatsby portrays “new money”; he made this money by participating in boot-legging work selling illegal alcohol over the counter. On the other hand Gatsby uses his wealth to win his love for Daisy who is the girl he’s always dreamed about being with, but he only wants her too because she symbolizes wealth. Everything that Gatsby owned was just to impress Daisy; he bought a mansion, threw lavish parties and bought expensive things because of his need for something greater. Indeed later on he does pursue her at first and they have an affair until Tom her husband finds out. As of fact however to this day in this world we people always want more, we want to have the perfect life possible; dreaming that money or happiness would come to us. Despite this idea, money doesn’t just come to us when we want it and it doesn’t make us happy, to be happy we need to be satisfied with ourselves and what we have.
We need to know that there are times in our lives when we can’t always have what we want. For example there are people who think that winning the lottery would make their
Period 6 English CP
Miss. Herring
Corruption of the “American Dream” and the negative power of money.
The “American Dream” portrays a life that everyone wants to have, becoming successful with a great job, home, and a family. This dream embodies The Great Gatsby who is trying to pursue the American Dream through his life. Gatsby’s dream however was corrupted because of his pursuit of wealth and the negative power of money. In Fact Gatsby is blind to know that his money cannot buy him his happiness or his love for Daisy. Most importantly it would only bring him hardship in the end. The corruption of the American Dream in The Great Gatsby is how Gatsby made his money and achieved his wealth. In the book Gatsby is extending his arms toward a green light at the end of a dock, which symbolizes his yearning for power and money also showing his desire for Daisy. In addition Gatsby portrays “new money”; he made this money by participating in boot-legging work selling illegal alcohol over the counter. On the other hand Gatsby uses his wealth to win his love for Daisy who is the girl he’s always dreamed about being with, but he only wants her too because she symbolizes wealth. Everything that Gatsby owned was just to impress Daisy; he bought a mansion, threw lavish parties and bought expensive things because of his need for something greater. Indeed later on he does pursue her at first and they have an affair until Tom her husband finds out. As of fact however to this day in this world we people always want more, we want to have the perfect life possible; dreaming that money or happiness would come to us. Despite this idea, money doesn’t just come to us when we want it and it doesn’t make us happy, to be happy we need to be satisfied with ourselves and what we have.
We need to know that there are times in our lives when we can’t always have what we want. For example there are people who think that winning the lottery would make their
Cited: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1925 "Effects of Greed in the World Today?" HubPages. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Mar. 2013 .