The Great Gatsby
The American Dream: dead or alive?
In Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, the theme can be separated into two major aspects. First, love versus money- criticizing the corruption of the American dream, and second, “sight and insight”-the perception that there is no all seeing presence (higher accountability) in the modern world. The American Dream is not dead it is, however, very corrupted.
First, the issue of love versus money, the criticizing of the corruption of the American dream, to show this corruption, the following is the old and new definitions of the American dream. A belief in self-reliance and hard work versus what Nick Caraway would call “the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty”, respectively. Also they can be described as the pursuit of noble goals (old) and the pursuit of power and pleasure, a very fundamentally empty form of success (new). It is easy to see the vast differences between the old, heavily valued version of the American dream and its new, zero value, self-centric counterpart. These vast differences justify the criticism of the newer more material oriented version of the American dream. Fitzgerald does a good job of illustrating this point by dividing one setting into three: East Egg, West Egg, and the Valley of Ashes. The value systems change from location to location. In East Egg, as proven by Tom when he interrupts Daisy or hits Myrtle, the value system is the modern version, however, in West Egg and the Valley of Ashes, as proven by Nick and Gatsby by their manners and etiquette, and enforced by Dr. Eckleburg’s symbolic existence of all seeing eyes, there is that perception as there was in the value systems of the past. Thus, the detailed and complex writing style of Fitzgerald does help to get his theme across. Second, the issue of “sight and insight”- the perception that there is no all seeing presence (higher accountability) in the modern world, is an issue that needs to be dealt with. Only Owleyes
In Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, the theme can be separated into two major aspects. First, love versus money- criticizing the corruption of the American dream, and second, “sight and insight”-the perception that there is no all seeing presence (higher accountability) in the modern world. The American Dream is not dead it is, however, very corrupted.
First, the issue of love versus money, the criticizing of the corruption of the American dream, to show this corruption, the following is the old and new definitions of the American dream. A belief in self-reliance and hard work versus what Nick Caraway would call “the service of a vast, vulgar, and meretricious beauty”, respectively. Also they can be described as the pursuit of noble goals (old) and the pursuit of power and pleasure, a very fundamentally empty form of success (new). It is easy to see the vast differences between the old, heavily valued version of the American dream and its new, zero value, self-centric counterpart. These vast differences justify the criticism of the newer more material oriented version of the American dream. Fitzgerald does a good job of illustrating this point by dividing one setting into three: East Egg, West Egg, and the Valley of Ashes. The value systems change from location to location. In East Egg, as proven by Tom when he interrupts Daisy or hits Myrtle, the value system is the modern version, however, in West Egg and the Valley of Ashes, as proven by Nick and Gatsby by their manners and etiquette, and enforced by Dr. Eckleburg’s symbolic existence of all seeing eyes, there is that perception as there was in the value systems of the past. Thus, the detailed and complex writing style of Fitzgerald does help to get his theme across. Second, the issue of “sight and insight”- the perception that there is no all seeing presence (higher accountability) in the modern world, is an issue that needs to be dealt with. Only Owleyes