Examples Of Pessimism In The Great Gatsby

The 1920s was a period of extravagance. Jazz music was viral, parties went on for days and the prohibition was not stopping anyone. But in Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, depicts the Roaring Twenties as a world of deceit, affairs, and dishonesty. Scott Fitzgerald wrote this novel to demonstrate the social flaws and the social attitudes in the 1920's and 30's. In The Great Gatsby, Scott Fitzgerald comments on a variety of themes. Power, greed, betrayal, but none is more obvious than that of the corruption of the American dream. The Great Gatsby is a great piece of social commentary, offering a look into american life in the 20’s. Fitzgerald presents us with a vivid picture of society and their common thirst for wealth.

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 F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald uses the colors green, red, and white throughout the novel to show symbolism that relates to the theme of the novel, the American Dream. The use of the colors are significant because each color symbolizes something different.

The Great Gatsby is an American novel written by Scott Fitzgerald. On the surface, the book revolves around the concept of romance, the love between two individuals. However, the novel incorporates less of a romantic scope and rather focuses on the theme of the American Dream in the 1920s. Fitzgerald depicts the 1920’s as an era of decline in moral values. The strong desire for luxurious pleasure and money ultimately corrupts the American dream which was originally about individualism. As a result, S. Fitzgerald portrays the corruption during this era by creating a novel infused with lies and deception.

The 1920’s was a very interesting time in United States history. After all World War I had ended and many Americans did not realize that the Great Depression was in the near future, so the 1920’s fell between these two dramatic events. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby teaches many morals, but none more important than the duality of the 1920’s. Duality is evident in Gatsby's dreams, his death, his lover Daisy, his wealth, and his parties, which all reflect the duality of the 1920’s. Throughout the novel, Fitzgerald makes the concept of achieving the American dream seem improbable. Gatsby has the American Dream of being successful and wanting to marry the girl of his dreams. However, Fitzgerald argues that The American Dream is a paradox because dreams aren’t supposed to be achieved, and are better off to remain in one’s imagination. For example, Gatsby wants to marry the love of his life, Daisy Buchanan. Sadly Gatsby sets such a high standard for her that she will never be able to live up to. Gatsby envisions Daisy as the golden girl, and once he put his plan into action, he realizes

The characters in the novel pretend that they have their lives all figured out, but through their successes their downfalls and emptiness can be seen, to prove that money cannot buy happiness. Jay Gatsby is the newest and upcoming star in New York during the 1920’s. Through his business and inheritance he is one of the richest men of his time. One may think that his abundance of wealth would lead him to be eternally happy, but he is the opposite. Gatsby longs for his love of Daisy, which is his personal American Dream. Gatsby knows that Daisy is a high-class individual who cares very much about status and wealth, so his entire life has been dedicated to being the best so that she will notice him. When Daisy, Gatsby’s one desire, and Nick, Gatsby’s

Everyone is always chasing a dream they have, hoping one day that they will get it or it will come true. Sometimes this might not be the best case because if someone 's dream comes true, then what is next? In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald portrays a man, Jay Gatsby, who will never attain his dream to be with a girl, Daisy. Fitzgerald shows that unrealistic dreams will not be achieved; they are supposed to be practical and attainable because if the dreams are unrealistic, then they will never be reached and will cloud reality.

Set in motion from the moment he saw her, Gatsby’s illusions are centered on the idea of winning Daisy’s heart. The power of Gatsby’s idolatry of Daisy is clear when he meets with her again, and the two become passionate towards one another: “He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God” (Fitzgerald 110). Clearly, Gatsby has a strong desire to be with Daisy. However, Gatsby knew that in order to join himself with Daisy, he would have to pursue her way of life as well (Rowe). This begins Gatsby’s obsessive illusions, one of which focuses on the green light on the dock outside Daisy’s mansion. To the Buchanan’s, the only meaning of this light is to allow boats to see at night, but to Gatsby, the green light is there to symbolize his distance from Daisy and his jealousy of her husband and their old money (Fitzgerald 93). Gatsby is the only person who perceives the light in this way, and because of this it is clear that “his dream of Daisy and the life she represents...is an absurd and vulgar illusion” (Way). The delusions, however, go even further than that; Gatsby convinces himself for certain that Daisy will end her marriage with Tom Buchanan to be with him, and even persuades himself into believing that she never loved her husband, but has always loved only him

Gatsby does not see things as they really are and expects them to play out exactly as he thinks they will. When Nick tells Gatsby that he can't repeat the past, Gatsby responds, "'Can't repeat the past? Why of course you can!'" (110). This delusion blinds Gatsby to what is going on right in front of him. His disregard for reality is how he formulates his dream to rewrite the past and reunite with Daisy, according to his belief that sufficient wealth can allow him to control his fate. He establishes an immense fortune to impress Daisy, who can only be won over with evidence of material success. As Gatsby attempts to make his ideal a reality, things do not run as smoothly as he plans because Daisy can never live up to his dream. When Nick is reflecting on Gatsby's idea of Daisy he notes, "He wanted nothing less of Daisy than that she should go to Tom and say: 'I never loved you'" (105). Gatsby’s ideal life is not a realistic expectation because Daisy is already married and has a family to take care of. Furthermore, her religion prevents her from getting a divorce and marrying Gatsby even if she wanted to. These obvious factors block Gatsby from obtaining his dream and marrying Daisy, but he seems to be blind to

The Great Gatsby, like the Great Houdini, is an illusionist. Similar to the Great Houdini, the Great Gatsby has a tremendous rise to fame and an outrageous reputation. Jay Gatsby's tragic flaw does not seem horrendous at first when compared to Willy Loman, Macbeth, and other tragic characters in literature, but his love for Daisy shows that the power of love outranks all other flaws. During Gatsby's youth, he met a girl named Daisy, who he immediately fell for. Unfortunately, he had to leave Daisy to go to war. After the war, he was determined to find Daisy but five years later, his feelings are not reciprocated; Daisy toys with him, uses Gatsby to make her husband jealous, and allows Gatsby to take the blame for the murder of her husband’s mistress. The most tragic of the three protagonists studied is Jay Gatsby because he demoralizes himself in a futile attempt at expired love, he has few genuine companions, and he cannot let go of the past.

Arguably one of the most complex works of American Literature, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald displays a satirical United States taking place in the early twenties in New York. The roaring twenties often portrayed a happy time immediately following World War 1 however, it gave off a false feeling of joy and many people were truly unhappy. Even though Nick Carraway shows a realistic image of himself, The Great Gatsby encompasses an illusion created in this time period and portrays this image through the atmosphere surrounding the actions of its characters; it ultimately shows a conflict against reality, identical to that to the early 20th century.

Daisy however, very heartbroken and anxious to start a family, failed to wait for Gatsby while he was at war and she vulnerably fell in love with Tom and his money. Throughout the time Gatsby was away she grew and developed mentally, leaving him to love someone that no longer existed. When Gatsby says “Can’t repeat the past? Why of course you can!”(Fitzgerald 110)it shows how his imagination has affected his sense of reality. He became lost in the idea that he could get Daisy back and things would automatically return to how they were before he went away. Beginning with becoming rich and buying the house across the Bay he developed an obsession with her. Unable to live his life, searching the papers everyday hoping to catch just a glimpse of her name to see what she was up to, Gatsby was setting himself up for failure. He never opened up to the idea that things could change and that Daisy could love someone else. Daisy pushed Gatsby away in the end because of the person Tom had made him out to be. She saw Gatsby as damaged which only damaged him more, leaving him to feel unloved by the person he loved

In Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, the perceptions and actions of people were altered because of events from one of the rowdiest periods in American history. The time period in which this novel was written was in the 1920s, which revealed the time of bad manners, new riches , and poverty for the lower classes. The reasons for this change in the younger generation is the fact that World War one recently ended and created a time of opportunity to go from rags to riches such as the case of Gatsby. Yet, this wasn't the story for everyone as seen in the characters Myrtle and Wilson. Therefore, The Great Gatsby turns America from the 1920s into a novel that reflects the altered economic and social positions.

The 1920s were affected by WWII in several ways, which are shown in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The 1920s was a time period of a great change in people’s behavior and social class. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s famed novel The Great Gatsby reflects on the 1920s can help summarize the 1920s into three main characteristics, Disillusionment, the Rise in New Money, and Business Replacing Religion.

The Great Gatsby is possibly F. Scott Fitzgerald 's greatest work. It is a book that provides insightful views of the American social climbers in the 1920s. The Great Gatsby is an American classic and a wonderfully haunting work.