How The American Dream Is Depicted In The Great Gatsby

The American Dream has been around for many years. This has been the goal for many Americas, as well as immigrants throughout the world. The whole point of the American Dream was to achieve wealth, love, happiness, and power. In order to achieve the American Dream I was through hard work and determination. The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald was made during the 1920, which was a period where there was corruption and crime. The whole point of the novel is to show how the pure characteristic of the American dream was deteriorating. Moral values were declining. This was a time were religion wasn’t the basis of life and people fought in order to achieve their dreams by any means necessary. This novel shows the segregation between the rich and the poor. The West egg versus the Valley of Ashes, and Gatsby verses Buchanan.

Nick Carraway, the narrator of the story is the one who witnesses these observations. “I waited and sure enough, in a moment she looked at me with an absolute smirk on her lovely face as if she had asserted her membership in a rather distinguished secret society to which she and Tom Belonged.” Which meant that no matter what a person gains, if they were not born rich, they would never be treated as one. This is why Gatsby’s attempt of having Daisy failed. She was not going to take a chance at losing everything she has just for love. They had certain sections for people who worked to gain wealth and for people who were born with it. “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy-they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.” Her voice is full of money.” Daisy and Tom thought highly of themselves because they always received money and were brought up with families that are wealthy. Everyone else was considered nothing to the Buchanan. No one was as good as they were because of their status.

The only man Nick respected was Jay Gatsby. He was the only man that almost succeeded in the American Dream. “So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen year old boy would be likely to invent, and to this conception he was faithful to the end.” His love for Daisy gave him the strength and courage to achieve his goals. He told Daisy, “ you always have a green light that burns all night at the end of your dock.” He said this because the green light represents the American Dream to Gatsby, in hopes to have Daisy. He created his life based on the love he had for Daisy. “….And Gatsby was overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves, of the freshness of many clothes and of Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor.” If he were to have Daisy as his love, then he would finally be triumph over poverty. So he sacrificed his principles just so her could get rich by corrupt means necessary. He thinks he can recreates the past because he feels that as long as he could be wealthy and successful she will stay with him.

It seems to Gatsby that she was more of a prize than love. “ It excited him too that many men had already loved Daisy-it increased her value in his eyes.” Gatsby was the only man that followed his dream. That is why Nick stated, “They’re a rotten crowd, you’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.” Which meant that Nick admired Gatsby attempt to achieve the American