Examples Of Materialism In The Great Gatsby

In book, “The Great Gatsby,” F. Scott Fitzgerald depicts how the American was corrupted through wealth. Fitzgerald provides many examples. The most common example shown was Jay Gatsby. Gatsby’s idea that to achieve his American Dream must be to acquire wealth. In order to show this, Fitzgerald uses various literary elements. Two of those being imagery and foreshadowing, these played a critical role in describing the theme, and specific moods to show what was to come and as well as describe the story as a whole. These play a vital role in representing Gatsby’s life and journey to acquiring Daisy, his version of the American Dream.

The Great Gatsby is considered to be a great American novel full of hope, deceit, wealth, and love. Daisy Buchanan is a beautiful and charming young woman who can steal a man’s attention through a mere glance. Throughout the novel, she is placed on a pedestal, as if her every wish were Gatsby’s command. Her inner beauty and grace are short-lived, however, as Scott Fitzgerald reveals her materialistic character. Her reprehensible activities lead to devastating consequences that affect the lives of every character. I intend to show that Daisy, careless and self-absorbed, was never worthy of Jay Gatsby’s love, for she was the very cause of his death.

In “The Great Gatsby” F. Scott Fitzgerald uses his characters as symbols for the fragility of the American dream and the ultimate dissatisfaction inherent in its pursuit. In doing so, this theme becomes more tangible as represented by living, breathing people who go through things that we can visualize. Daisy has all the outward signs of luxury while achieving no real happiness. As such she epitomizes the disillusionment with the American dream. Tom, her husband, who has a life of luxury and power and uses it in destructive ways represents the negative effects of the mindless pursuit of wealth. And Gatsby, himself, pursues wealth to attract a love from his past. His failure in this represents the fallacy of such a pursuit.

Imagine living in a world where dreams that come to mind are highly reachable and come without a struggle, a place where fantasies come into play. Americans far and beyond believe the American Dream is something as simple as owning a home or starting a family, but for Jay Gatsby, that was simply not enough. As a man with implausible dreams, Gatsby thought differently when compared to others. His American Dream was not a job or a home, but rather a married woman who is known as Daisy Buchanan. As Gatsby placed the sole focus of his life on Daisy, he became obsessed. Through a passage in The Great Gatsby, author F. Scott Fitzgerald employs personification and diction to convey the idea that Gatsby was lost in the unique distortion of his own reality with Daisy.

​Nick Caraway moves from Minnesota to the West Egg neighborhood on Long Island to pursue a career in the bond industry. He lives in a tiny house wedged between large, expansive mansions. His neighbor, Jay Gatsby, is a well todo man with a mysterious past. Everyone in town knows Mr. Gatsby for his huge wild parties, but no one is quite sure where he has acquired his wealth. Across from Gatsby’s mansion, Nick’s cousin Daisy lives with her husband Tom Buchanan. Daisy and Tom have a complex relationship where neither of them are happy, but they will not separate even though both have been unfaithful. Tom has a mistress in the city whom is not unbeknownst to Daisy. Gatsby and Daisy have a romantic history from when Gatsby was in the army. This is the motivation behind Gatsby’s desire to acquire all his wealth. Gatsby throws his parties in an attempt to get Daisy’s attention, but Daisy is completely unaware that he is her neighbor until Nick brings them together. Though Nick is not a considerably wealthy man himself, his relationship to the Buchanans, and now Gatsby, are enough to keep him relevant in the social circles of East Egg and West Egg. Nick’s connection to Daisy also makes him highly attractive to Gatsby as all he wants is some form of an interaction with Daisy and involving himself with Nick is an easy way for Gatsby to make his way into Daisy’s life again. Money is power in the Great Gatsby, as it influences everyone’s status, aspirations,

Gatsby creates an identity for himself as a wealthy man, who lives a glamorous life by throwing huge parties, and is known by the most prestigious figures in New York. What the partygoers don’t realize is that the parties and his wealth is all in the hopes of rekindling with his love from the past, Daisy. In the novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald tells the story of a young man named Jay Gatsby, who came from nothing, and built up to be everything that he had hoped and dreamed of being. However, his one dream did not become a reality due to misfortunate events. All the money in the world couldn’t make Gatsby happy, as he died as his true self, not the identity he created for himself.

     F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is a tragic tale of love distorted by obsession. Finding himself in the city of New York, Jay Gatsby is a loyal and devoted man who is willing to cross oceans and build mansions for his one true love. His belief in realistic ideals and his perseverance greatly influence all the decisions he makes and ultimately direct the course of his life. Gatsby has made a total commitment to a dream, and he does not realize that his dream is hollow. Although his intentions are true, he sometimes has a crude way of getting his point across. When he makes his ideals heard, his actions are wasted on a thoughtless and shallow society. Jay Gatsby effectively embodies a romantic idealism

" We are living in a material world." This famous line in one of Madonna's songs entitled "Material Girl" will never outgrow itself. Ever since the beginnings of monetary means, the main focus of living is getting more money and to be as successful as possible. This became a huge issue during the 1920's. In this era, people made money from the stock market, illegal bootlegging and so forth. With these people hitting the jackpot, this then created a new rank called `new money'. This rank, however, never overpowered `old money' the most wealthiest, well-known and respected class. The possession of material wealth however, can't bring true happiness. Love is an important factor in this equation; when you don't have love, it is hard to say

Scott Fitzgerald explores the idea that materialism can lead to obsession shown through Gatsby’s fixation for Daisy, his past lover. Gatsby obsessively does anything in his power to attract Daisy through his possessions, such as his lavish parties and loud music playing from his house all throughout the summer (41). The coincidence - or not so much - of Gatsby’s attractions is that Gatsby “bought that house so that Daisy would be just across the bay” (83) from him so that he can one day be with her. Gatsby’s obsession increases when a friend of Gatsby’s asks Nick, the narrator, to invite Daisy over to Nick’s house so he could meet her again after five years, to which he thinks, “He had waited five years and bought a mansion where he dispensed starlight to casual moths - so that he could ‘come over’ some afternoon to a stranger’s garden” (83). Since Gatsby has not seen Daisy for five years, he is in love with the idea of her, and obsessed with it since he says, “I’m going to fix everything, just the way it was before… She’ll see” (117), which shows his thirst and hunger to have Daisy again, therefore he is willing to fix ultimately anything to be with Daisy again. Gatsby is so madly in love with the idea of Daisy, he equates the minute, green light at the end of her dock as if it is her, but he also attaches the green light to the hope that he will see her and somehow be with her. Through these examples, Fitzgerald shows that Gatsby’s obsession can be caused

History in the 1920s had a huge impact on the lifestyles of the characters and the events in The Great Gatsby. The Great Gatsby was affected because in the 1920s people were very materialistic, America was experiencing a huge economic boom, and America was isolationist.

Scott F. Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, depicts the difficulties in achieving the American Dream, and what some of the morally questionable actions one would do to achieve it are. The novel focuses on a very rich man, named Jay Gatsby, and the strange obsession he has with Daisy Buchanan, a married woman who he had a relationship with in the past, before she got married. The book also talks about Gatsby’s perseverance to make Daisy fall in love with him, using his extreme wealth as well as power. The author uses money, extravagancy and almost fictional parties to show that the American dream is impossible to obtain. Money is the main reason that ignites the actions of the main characters in the book.

Upon recently moving to the West Egg, Nick Carraway receives an invitation to an extravagant party hosted by his ominous neighbor. However Nick’s relationship with his neighbor, Jay Gatsby, does not end there. Nick is tossed into the whirlwind of Gatsby’s life-- his relationships, work, and mysterious past.

Frances Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby explores the concepts of the struggle of achieving the American Dream, how the pains of the past can affect the present, and how one can become consumed by it through the characters of Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan. Daisy, who represents the appeal of the American Dream for financial and cultural success, becomes Gatsby’s motivation for everything that he does throughout the novel. Gatsby feels drawn to hear through her charming one of a kind voice. Gatsby, who Fitzgerald utilizes to represent the average American, while striving to win Daisy’s hand in marriage, loses sight of himself thus giving up the control he had over his life.

“Money Changes Everything” by Cyndi Lauper illustrates the way people center their desires on material things such as money. The speaker in the song leaves the poor man, solely because he does not have money, for the affluent one: “I’m leaving you tonight…There was one thing we weren’t really thinking of and that’s money” (Lauper 1, 6-7). Like Cyndi Lauper, F. Scott Fitzgerald demonstrates the way people often center their desires on material things such as money in The Great Gatsby. Daisy falls in love with Gatsby, who is a poor man at the time, and when Gatsby leaves for the war, Daisy marries Tom Buchanan, who is a rich man, because he is “old money,” meaning he will always have the money and status to support Daisy. When Gatsby returns

     America has been labeled "The land of opportunity," a place where it is possible to accomplish anything and everything. This state of mind is known as "The American Dream." The American Dream provides a sense of hope and faith that looks forward to the fulfillment of human wishes and desires. This dream, however, originates from a desire for spiritual and material improvement. Unfortunately, the acquisition of material has been tied together with happiness in America. Although "The American Dream" can be thought of as a positive motivation, it often causes people to strive for material perfection, rather than a spiritual one. This has