In life, the most crucial point is to realize the ambitions that someone seeks as soon as possible because one never knows if there is to be a tomorrow. No one ever really knows when they are going to die, so they must take the time to contemplate their life, ambitions, hopes, and goals. A person cannot be truly happy without achieving something in their life, so if the person never discerns what they wish to achieve then they will never have the ability to be truly happy. They will be lacking the knowledge to reach their dream, fight for it, and triumph in the end. Every second a person lives, they are a second closer to their death; no one knows when their time will finally run out. Jay Gatsby, in the novel The Great Gatsby, was somewhat …show more content…
He did not allow his meager beginnings to dictate his future, but instead attained what many would consider impossible. Gatsby may not have gained his money legally, but in the end he still achieved one of his goals. He did not allow his moral convictions to hinder his route to wealthiness. Gatsby was thorough about his display of genuine wealth, which was surprising to many at his parties. Owl Eyes who was studying Gatsby’s books, concludes, “Absolutely real -- have pages and everything” (Fitzgerald 45). Gatsby’s money was very real, and many people experienced it at his parties nearly every weekend. His parties were extravagant with music, alcohol, and dancing along with many other activities. According to “An Overview of The Great Gatsby” by Casie E. Hermanson, “Gatsby conforms to an ideal of himself that transforms reality into possibility” (Hermanson 1). He came from less money and managed to establish himself at West Egg with a mansion and the rank to support his love. Gatsby was a man that lived at West Egg, designated only to those who have new money and were not born into luxury. Therefore, he was a man that had realized his dreams and made them reality achieving his ambition of
He was successful very at getting money, but was never truly rich. Gatsby has always had his eyes set on making the most money he could, he never lived in the present. Since Gatsby never lived in the present he did things permanently. When Gatsby was around he never was really popular and didn’t have many friends; he decided to change that for good by making a lot of money.
Gatsby was a poor farmer boy when he was younger. Learn how to get rich and worked to get his money but, he comes from a lower class background. The “old money” really didn’t like the new money because they tried
Gatsby believes that money can buy him whatever his heart desires. Gatsby’s misunderstanding of the way money functions in the society he lives in results in the failure of his attempt to gain both status and the
Throughout the novel, Gatsby displays his riches through his mansion, expensive car, and many other things. Nick even describes how extravagant Gatsby’s house is, saying, “The one on my right was a colossal affair by any standard—it was a factual imitation of some Hôtel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden” (Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby 5). As Nick describes, Gatsby’s house is very large and modern, which shows his affluence. Before he became rich and privileged, Gatsby was James Gatz, a poor Midwestern boy who dreamed of becoming wealthy. This dream led Gatsby to do crazy things in order to make money, but it worked out for him in the end.
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.
Gatsby puts on a facade and tells everyone that he inherited his money, but in reality Gatsby has other means by which he earns his money for the sake of Daisy. He stoops to a level that shows that he has no care for his morals and he will go to any extent if it means making Daisy happy and earning money. He commits multiple crimes including buying “side-street drug-stores in Chicago and [selling] grain alcohol over the counter” (Fitzgerald 133). He doesn’t care about getting in trouble with the law because he is no longer living for himself, and it seems like he is only living for Daisy, who embodies the wealthy lifestyle Gatsby has wanted his whole life. Gatsby got rich out of a sense of “desperation and crazy hopefulness, out of refusing to get over a broken heart and give up the love of his life” (Voegeli).
When one achieves a goal that they have been working towards, it brings a feeling of satisfaction. This satisfaction is due to knowing that the work that was involved paid off. However, what if one doesn’t have to put that much work into getting to where they got? Does that person really feel a sense of accomplishment if they don’t have to work for it? The American Dream is the constant pursuit of goals, but people who stop setting goals for themselves will never achieve the American Dream.
Several people may assume that selfishness is both unhealthy and wrong. A selfish person usually puts his own needs before the needs of other people. Selfish people need to be able to draw the line between when they need to worry about themselves, or when they should be concerned about other people. In The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, in the view of Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby, it is evident that the nature of man is showing selfishness through cruelty, greed, and manipulation. Cruelty is just one way that the nature of man shows selfishness.
The Great Gatsby GEOGRAPHY Throughout the novel, places and settings symbolize the various aspects of the 1920s American society that Fitzgerald depicts. East Egg represents the old aristocracy, West Egg the newly rich, the valley of ashes the moral and social decay of America, and New York City the dissolute, amoral quest for money and pleasure. Additionally, the East is connected to the moral decay and social cynicism of New York, while the West is connected to more traditional social values and ideals. Themes: The American Dream "Whereas the American Dream was once equated with certain principles of freedom, it is now equated with things.
In the 1920’s, social classes were divided with a large gap. The poor wanted nothing to do with the rich, and the rich wanted even less to do with the poor. In the novel “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald, he uses the class structure in the 1920’s to redefine poverty. While the rich people in the novel are material rich, they are still “poor” socially and psychologically. Poverty is shown in a differently in this book than other books being written in this time era, and in doing this, it shows the rich what they are, and how they treat others from a different perspective.
When Gatsby loses everything, we see that wealth not only fails as a means of fulfillment but actively participates in the destruction of this goal. Fitzgerald suggests that wealth cannot lead to happiness, rather it undermines the existing and potential good in life. It should therefore should not be used as means of attaining fulfillment. The first mentions of Gatsby’s character reveal a personality who has sacrificed morality to achieve a
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. The character of Jay Gatsby was a wealthy business man, who the author developed as arrogant and tasteless. Gatsby 's love interest, Daisy Buchanan, was a subdued socialite who was married to the dim witted Tom Buchanan. She is the perfect example of how women of her level of society were supposed to act in her day. The circumstances surrounding Gatsby and Daisy 's relationship kept them eternally apart.
Gatsby was a man who came up from essentially nothing by gaining his money through bootlegging and other illegal acts in order to gain a reputation in society. Gatsby’s constant desire to accomplish more in his life demonstrates the corruption of the American Dream. It is evident that Gatsby has had a thirst for the American dream since a young age, this is shown when Gatsby’s father says: “Jimmy was bound to get ahead. He always had some resolves like this or something. Do you notice what he’s got about improving his mind?
Gatsby thinks of himself as a dream chaser, a person who is working hard through his life to get his beautiful memory back to him. Money is just a tool to bring his beloved girl back. People believed that his money all came from his rich family as Gatsby wants them to, which means that he was born rich. However, Gatsby actually earned the money on his own by taking high risks selling illegal alcohol. Since he knew that Daisy married a rich man, he decided never to live without money.
American novel deals in depth with the theme of Greed as an aspect of human conscience crisis which leads to dilemma, problems, and predicament for human being. Novels such as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth, Henry James’s Washington Square , Joseph Heller’s Catch-22, Michael Crichton’s The Great Train Robbery, and others expose clear image for the theme of Greed and its implications. F. Scott Fitzgerald portrays the human predicament of Americans in 1920s, through his best novel The Great Gatsby . In this novel Fitzgerald deals with the theme of a lust for money and greed .