Desire In The Great Gatsby

Gatsby in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is “great” because of his ability to dream. This ability to dream contributes to a few things about Gatsby’s character: his gift, his tragic flaw, and his archetype as the hero.

Society and literature have presented constant concepts throughout all texts, notably, individual desire has been a universal standard through which love and social expectation can be explored. However, whilst this is a universal theme, differing contexts can produce new explorations and perceptions of classical beliefs, reinforcing distinctive qualities within texts. Notably, Elizabeth Barret Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese challenged literary and societal standards of the Victorian era, whilst Scott. F. Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby similarly challenges the extravagance and cultural devaluation of the ‘roaring 20s’. Yet both texts explore individual desire in different manners, using distinctive form, language, tone and techniques, which is the result of differing perspectives and their respective historical, social and

Gatsby’s entire life is centered on obtaining Daisy’s love and having her for himself. Gatsby is willing to do whatever it takes to get Daisy’s affection. He buys a huge mansion to be close to her and to get her attention, he earns an enormous amount of money

According to ENotes The Great Gatsby seems an “exploration” of different classes in America. In the novel, you can notice how the “American Dream” of self-improvement worked in the Jazz Age (What was). In the novel, The Great Gatsby, Francis Fitzgerald purpose in the book is to show how wealth and money weren’t as great and easy as everyone thinks it is. Francis Fitzgerald sets a tone of “disillusionment” for putting out the reality that wealth is not as great as everyone thinks it is. On the other hand, The Great Gatsby also shows “hope” in the novel. According to Enotes, it shows “self-presentation” of Jay Gatsby. Author Francis Fitzgerald wrote The Great Gatsby for his readers to learn about the Roaring Twenties/ Jazz Age and had no intention of making it be controversial or harmful for children or other groups. Many readers would say that The Great Gatsby is an opportunity to learn about a beautiful chapter of history with a bit of story and

Gatsby’s dreams and aspirations in life are rather interesting and amazing as he goes about his life in the book. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald helps highlight the social, moral, and political issue that were very present during the 1920’s and today. Gatsby is the focus of the book as before the book began, he was an ex-soldier who came to wealth by some rather illegal ways. Daisy a married woman is his person of interest, who was his ex-lover 5 years before the book started. Gatsby’s actions, and words demonstrate a clear obsession with Daisy that seems to have no end.

In a book about a tragic love story, one would not expect to find a deeper meaning behind the dangers of jealousy or peril of lust. However, in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, there is a deeper meaning beyond jealousy and love. In The Great Gatsby, the author uses an empathetic storyline as a symbol to unwittingly give a complex depiction of the nuisance that people create that not only destroy our world but our society and gives warning to what will occur if we continue the path of destruction. With this intention, the brilliant opinionated writer, expressed his opinion through symbols such as the characters he uses, the setting the story takes place in, and the objects he uses in the book.

In the novel “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald, what Jay Gatsby feels for Daisy Buchanan is obsession. Gatsby revolves and rearranges his entire life in order to gain her affections. Gatsby’s obsession with Daisy resulted in him buying a mansion across the lake from her, throwing huge parties, and spending years of his life trying to become rich.

“I have an idea that Gatsby himself didn’t believe it would come and perhaps he no longer cared. If that was true he must have felt that he had lost the old warm world, paid a high price for living too long with a single dream” ( Chapter 8).

The temptation of wealth and love drives him to chase unrealistic and misguided dreams: “He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night” (Fitzgerald 180). The more Gatsby tries to recapture his past, the further he is taken away from what is real. Throughout The Great Gatsby he moves further into this dreamland he has created of his perfect life with Daisy, trying to escape the social class he was born to that once separated them. There is also irony in that Gatsby continuously tries to distance himself from his past and the lower class lifestyle, yet he spends the entirety of his life trying to rewrite his past with Daisy until he sees that she isn’t someone truly worth his love.

Myrtle and Daisy had chased both love and money, at different point in their life. For both of them, it is their ambition and dreams that they seek to fulfill themselves with. Regardless of their backgrounds, they remain the same in their wants towards something they don’t have, or in Daisy’s case, choosing what they want over everything else, regardless of how much they already have of it. Myrtle had married Wilson, not for the money he had owned, as he did not own any, but simply because she “thought that he was a gentleman”. However, Myrtle’s ambition was money, because when Wilson neither produced riches nor at the very least, gave her the love initially wanted, she turned to Tom to receive them both. Myrtle was a “gold-digger”, but she also believed that he would genuinely love her and pick her over Daisy, even though Tom gave no indication of doing so. Like Daisy, breathed out wealth, Myrtle had breathed out vitality and sensuality, hoping for Tom to chose her as his love and for him to give her riches and luxury.

Society has been setting unrealistic standards for individuals for several years. During the 1920’s, when F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote his novel, The Great Gatsby, society had specific social classes and standards. Social classes still exist today, but in a more obscure way than in Fitzgerald’s era. Social classes today are more based upon where an individual lives, but also include how much money that person earns. One thing that is shared between now and the era of Fitzgerald’s novel is that individuals are often judged by the size and glamour of the house the live in, and what area the house is located in. In modern times, society has a large effect on every choice a person makes and that is also true in the case of Gatsby. Individuals do things to satisfy what society says is “normal” for a fear of rejection. The things that are affecting individuals most harshly today,

Throughout the Great Gatsby, the theme of idolatry has shown itself in the book as one of the central ideas in the story. As the characters in the book are introduced, we are also introduced to their idols which are shown by the character’s actions. One example is Jay Gatsby, the protagonist of the book.

There is a fine line between love and lust. If love is only a will to possess, it is not love. To love someone is to hold them dear to one 's heart. In The Great Gatsby, the characters, Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan are said to be in love, but in reality, this seems to be a misconception. In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald portrays the themes of love, lust and obsession, through the character of Jay Gatsby, who confuses lust and obsession with love.

Even though “The Great Gatsby” was written nearly a century ago, many of the themes it has can still be seen in today’s society. During the time the book was written, the economy was in a condition of prosperity because the war ended which lead to technological advances and large profits for businesses. As a result, the dynamics of society changed also. The main focus of the media were on people with fame and wealth. This shows the interests and values of what most people had in the U.S. back then.

The Great Gatsby is written by Francis Scott Fitzgerald who is the most famous chronicler of America in 1920s, an era that he dubbed “the Jazz Age.” The book reveals the disillusion of American dream through the love story between Gatsby and Daisy. In this book, what Gatsby cared about was only Daisy, and even he died for Daisy. It seems that Gatsby loves Daisy very much. However, does Gatsby really love Daisy or just love the image that Daisy stands for? This paper focuses on the question by analyzing the image of Gatsby and Daisy deeply and finally gets an answer that Gatsby only cared about his dream and Daisy was a part of his dream, that’s why he cared about Daisy so much.