Gatsby Themes

● The American Dream The American Dream—that hard work can lead one from rags to riches—has been a core facet of American identity since its inception. Settlers came west to America from Europe seeking wealth and freedom. The pioneers headed west for the same reason. The Great Gatsby shows the tide turning east, as hordes flock to New York City seeking stock market fortunes. The Great Gatsby portrays this shift as a symbol of the American Dream's corruption. It's no longer a vision of building a life; it's just about getting rich. Gatsby symbolizes both the corrupted Dream and the original uncorrupted Dream. He sees wealth as the solution to his problems, pursues money via shady schemes, and reinvents himself so much that he becomes hollow, disconnected from his past. Yet Gatsby's corrupt dream of wealth is motivated by an incorruptible love for Daisy. Gatsby's failure does not prove the folly of the American Dream—rather it proves the folly of short-cutting that dream by allowing corruption and materialism to prevail over hard work, integrity, and real love. And the dream of love that remains at Gatsby's core condemns nearly every other character in the novel, all of whom are empty beyond just their lust for money. ●

Past and Future

Nick and Gatsby are continually troubled by time—the past haunts Gatsby and the future weighs down on Nick. When Nick tells Gatsby that you can't repeat the past, Gatsby says "Why of course you can!" Gatsby has dedicated his entire life to recapturing a golden, perfect past with Daisy. Gatsby believes that money can recreate the past. Fitzgerald describes Gatsby as "overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves." But Gatsby mixes up "youth and mystery" with history; he thinks a single glorious month of love with Daisy can compete with the years and experiences she has shared with Tom. Just as "new money" is money without social connection, Gatsby's connection to Daisy exists outside of history. Nick's fear of the future foreshadows the economic bust that plunged the country into depression and ended the Roaring Twenties in 1929. The day Gatsby and Tom argue at the Plaza Hotel, Nick suddenly realizes that it's his thirtieth birthday. He thinks of the new decade before him as a "portentous menacing road," and clearly sees in the struggle between old and new money the end of an era and the destruction of both types of wealth.

The Curse of Being

Fitzgerald was ahead of his time in articulating the defining elements of the 1920s. He recognized that the Jazz Age was rooted in being "outer directed" focus. This condition was one in which individuals lived for external reality and for the expectations of other people. Fitzgerald demonstrates a time period in which there is a noticeable lack of "inner directed" guidance. Nick's words about his father's warning about how he should view other people with a sense of understanding because his position might be different than theirs is one of the few instances where there is some type of inner directed sense of value. For the most part, the Jazz Age is depicted as a monument built upon a firmament of sand. The outer directed nature of the time period ultimately reveals its ultimate emptiness. The world in which the characters live is an empty one. Underneath the glamour and glitz is a crippling hollowness, a vacant nothingness that underscores their existence. Fitzgerald operates as both storyteller and historian in how he is able to detail this aspect of the 1920s. To a great extent, Fitzgerald shows how the excessive "outer directed" condition of being helps to perpetuate unsound economic habits that would inevitably lead to the 1929 Stock Market Crash. It is in this light where Fitzgerald is skilled in developing the curse of living a life that is so "outer directed." Moral Corruption The wealthy class is morally corrupt in The Great Gatsby, and the objective correlative (a term coined by poet and critic T. S. Eliot that refers to an object that takes on greater significance and comes to symbolize the mood and world of a literary work) in this case is the eyes of Dr. Eckleburg, which preside over the valley of ashheaps near Wilson's garage. There are no spiritual values in a place where money reigns: the traditional ideas of God and Religion are dead here, and the American dream is direly corrupted. This is no place for Nick, who is honest. He is the kind of person who says he is one of the few honest people he's ever met, and one who is let down by the world of excess and indulgence. His mark of sanity is to leave the wasteland environment to return home in the West. In a similar manner, T. S. Eliot's renowned poem The Waste Land describes the decline of Western civilization and its lack of spirituality through the objective correlative (defining image) of the wasteland. Appearances and Reality

Since there is no real love between Gatsby and Daisy, in The Great Gatsby, there is no real truth to Gatsby's vision. Hand in hand with this idea is the appearances and reality theme. Fitzgerald displays what critics have termed an ability to see the face behind the mask. Thus, behind the expensive parties, Gatsby is a lonely man. Though hundreds had come to his mansion, hardly anyone came to his funeral. Owl Eyes, Mr. Klipspringer, and the long list of partygoers simply use Gatsby for their pleasures. Gatsby himself is a put-on, with his “Oggsford” accent, fine clothes, and “old boy” routine; behind this facade is a man who is involved in racketeering. Gatsby's greatness lies in his capacity for illusion. Had he seen Daisy for what she was, he could not have loved her with such singleminded devotion. He tries to recapture Daisy, and for a time it looks as though he will succeed. But he must fail because of his inability to separate the ideal from the real. The famous verbal exchange between Nick and Gatsby typifies this: Concerning his behavior with Daisy, Nick tells him he can't repeat the past. “Can't repeat the past,” Gatsby replies, “Why of course you can!”

1. Is Gatsby great? In what way? How might he not be great? Does his greatness evolve over the course of the novel? What is the difference, in this text, between perceived greatness and actual greatness? 2. How does the character of Nick (inside the story, not the voice telling it) change over the course of the novel? What about the narrative voice? Although the entire story is told in retrospect, does the act of telling it create changes in his narrative style? Could it be that both character-Nick and narrator-Nick are changed? 3. In the very last line of Chapter Three, Nick Carraway claims: "I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known." By the end of the book, Jordan Baker decides that this statement itself a lie. Is Nick Carraway honest? Dishonest? How would we know? If one muppet always tells the truth, and one muppet always lies, how do you know which way to go?