American Dream In The Great Gatsby

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Everybody holds a fantasy of their coveted future. They long for the one thing that makes them happy that they don’t have at this moment. In the novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby alongside different characters are enslaved by an American dream, a belief that wealth makes one successful through their hard work; winds up demolishing them. The absence of control over their objectives and dreams leads to their ruin at last. This novel displays the two features of the American Dream which is the enthusiasm of joy, and the quest for material wealth. In this novel, many had sought after the American Dream for material riches and others proved unable. Jay Gatsby, Myrtle Wilson and Daisy Buchanan, desire to achieve…show more content…
To achieve Daisy it would complete Jay Gatsby’s American Dream. The green light represents the American Dream, whom he associates with Daisy he was trembling. She is so close yet so far away, but he doesn’t have her in his grasp yet. This clearly shows that pursuing wealth doesn’t always assure personal happiness and in this case Daisy is Gatsby’s “personal happiness.” Chasing after wealth for personal happiness by pretending to love someone is clearly shown by Myrtle Wilson, Tom Buchanan’s “lover.” Myrtle denies her husband, George Wilson’s love because he is in the lower class. She believes that she can achieve the American Dream by marrying wealth and acting as if she is in a higher social class. By doing so she believes that it will assure personal happiness through her affair with Tom. Tom is her vital resolution to the upper class and she pleads to do anything for him. Myrtle eventually agonises a disastrous end at the hands of her lover’s wife. “The only CRAZY I was, was when I married him. I knew right away I made a mistake. He borrowed somebody’s best suit to get married in and never even told me about it…”…show more content…
Myrtle emphasizes the fact that she made a huge mistake by marrying George and how greedy she is, when she says “the only CRAZY I was, was when I married him.” She is arrogant about the fact that she married such a man, a man who possesses a lower class. George isn’t a rich man with the greatest financial status, which is why Myrtle has gathered so much hatred for her husband. She highlights her husband’s lower class when she says “he borrowed somebody’s best suit to get married in”, this shows that George doesn’t even have enough money to buy a suit for his marriage. This passage states how much Myrtle pursues to become wealthy, so she doesn’t attain personal happiness. Receiving benefits such as money and wealth from her husband, Tom Buchanan, seems to be Daisy Buchanan’s personal happiness. She relishes the benefits from Tom because of the power and wealth that he obligates. Also to brag about her financial status, she attends parties with Tom and spends most of the time with him to show everyone how wealthy she is. She doesn’t cherish Tom because of how poorly he has treated her, so her attention and intention is always on his wealth. Daisy is also jealous of Gatsby because his personal orientation is always better than
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