Great Gatsby Color Symbolism Essay

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel, The Great Gatsby, exposes the corruption and greed of the Roaring Twenties. Fitzgerald is able to captivate readers' attentions through his employment of color symbolism. Fitzgerald portrays important messages in the novel by his symbolic use of colors. Colors play an important role in Fitzgerald’s descriptions of the lives of Jay Gatsby, Nick Carraway and many of the other characters in the novel. Fitzgerald uses the colors white, yellow, and green to express certain sentiments to the reader, commenting what is going on in the story. Fitzgerald uses the color white to symbolize purity and innocence, while yellow is used to symbolize moral decay, and death. Green is used to represent hope and

    The color green can both symbolize envy and money.  However, the most reasonable meaning would have to be one of future hope, especially in Gatsby’s case.  In the first chapter, Nick Carraway sees Gatsby and his arms stretched out towards Daisy’s dock.  This is a very powerful scene of the novel.  The reader sees Gatsby staring off into the darkness, concentrating on one small, green, blinking light.  This is a wonderful and appropriate symbol of Gatsby’s life.  Gatsby is living alone in a world of "darkness", trying to seize one small thing to bring him happiness.  His life has had many shortcomings and many troubles through his younger years.  He finally receives some breaks and is able make a name for himself.  The longing in his heart is to have Daisy, but more importantly to have a new hope in his life.  He has always kept the idea in his heart that he could be reunited with Daisy.

Green is one of the best examples of deception in the novel. Green represents all of the things that Gatsby desires like hope, happiness, money, and Daisy, but is all covered by green envy instead. One of the most crucial parts of the novel is when Gatsby reaches out from the dock at his house towards the green light at the end of Daisy’s. Gatsby sees a

The green colour represents Gatsby’s obsession over Daisy, who embodies his TAD as well as his devotion to love. He makes it his life goal to become prosperous and wealthy so he can impress Daisy’s expensive needs and in turn win or buy back her affection. All throughout the story, he gets involved with bootlegging, crime and extravagant parties hoping Daisy will take notice. Gatsby dream eventually comes to a halt when Daisy runs over and kills Myrtle with his car and Gatsby is left to take responsibility. The green colour of the light is replaced with corruption, as Fitzgerald compares it to “a fresh, green breast of the new world” ( pg

In The Great Gatsby, being with Daisy is Gatsby’s goal. A daisy is a white flower, and this places the color white as a color that represents Daisy. This is ironic, as although Daisy is pure in Gatsby’s, she is in fact tainted by he marriage with Tom Buchanan. Furthermore, flowers are ephemeral, which suggests that the affair that Gatsby and Daisy have will be brief, and will eventually die. In Miss Julie, flowers represent sexuality and courtship. Lilacs are present on the set of this play, and symbolise youthful love. Lilacs bring Jean and Miss Julie together. However, just like daisies, lilacs are ephemeral and eventually die. This symbolises the death of Jean’s opportunity to climb the “slippery trunk” through Miss Julie. Gatsby and Jean’s dreams are destined to die from the very

Colors are an essential part of the world around us. They can convey messages, expressing that which words do not. Gentle blue tones can calm a person and bright yellows can lift the spirits. If an artist is trying to express sorrow or death he often uses blacks blues, and grays basically he uses dreary colors. Without one word, a driver approaching a red traffic light knows to stop. Colors are representative of many things. In his novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses color symbolism throughout as a major device in thematic and character development. He uses colors to symbolize the many different intangible ideas in the book. Throughout the book characters, places, and objects are given "life" by colors, especially the more

Yellow represents money and greed but it peculiarly represents death as well. The color yellow can be seen at two of the deaths in the book. The yellow Rolls-Royce owned by Gatsby that killed Myrtle, it is discernible that yellow was involved with the death of Myrtle. Another way yellow is shown through death is when Gatsby walked past the yellowing trees that were on the way to his pool before he was killed by George Wilson. “Gatsby shouldered the mattress and headed for the pool. Once he stopped and shifted it a little and the chauffeur asked him if he needed any help, but he shook his head and in a moment disappeared among the yellowing trees.” (Fitzgerald p.169). This shows the color yellow playing a role in death once again. At the parties you can tell that yellow is apparent. The “yellow cocktail music” and the “girls in yellow dresses” are too ways that show that Gatsby tries to fit in with “old money.” Yellow or gold deals with the real money, gold of course, while green would be considered new money. It is also humorous that Daisy which is a yellow flower is also the most impure character in the book.

Everyone has heard about the green light at the end of Daisy's dock—a symbol of the crude future, the immeasurable promise of the dream that Gatsby desires despite its tragic end. Another familiar symbol is that of yellow and gold—representing money, the tactless greediness that taints the dream and eventually leads to its destruction. Such symbols and their purposes, at every stage in the novel, help provide substance to the main conflict.

     F. Scott Fitzgerald, author of The Great Gatsby, uses symbolism throughout the novel to create the characters and events of the post World War I period. Colors are one way symbolism was used to develop the characters’ personalities and set up events. This is shown by colors like the green at the end of Daisy Buchannan’s dock, the color of Jay Gatsby’s car and how Myrtle and Jordan surrounded themselves by white. Other symbolisms used to set up events are the difference in the people of the West Egg and East Egg and the sign in the “valley of ashes”.

The color white is associated with purity and innocence. Gatsby and Nick, the main male characters in the story, can be affiliated with this

The helpful acronym “ROY G. BIV” is used to aid in the remembering the order that the colors appear in the rainbow. Colors are everywhere: the flowers that grow along the sidewalk, the shirts that we wear, the cars on the road, and the environment around us. Colors even have the ability to relay information to us, for example, whether it will rain or not based on the color of the sky and clouds, no to touch a snake if certain colors touch, or even is someone is angry based on the color of their face. Colors are a main focus point in The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, and are used to express emotions and events of specific characters.

One of the first symbols the reader sees in the book is the color white. The color white first appears in chapter one when Nick sees Daisy and Jordan, dressed in white, at Tom's house. In her youth, Daisy often wears white, it symbolizes her innocence, but as time passes, the reader learns the white no longer symbolizes purity, it becomes a symbol of her corruption. Fitzgerald purposely places white throughout the novel, so the reader may understand that white, an innocent color, is being placed beside her flaky persona. Nick learns about Daisy's past from Jordan when she says, "She dressed in white, and has a little white roadster, and all day long officers from Camp Taylor demanded the privilege of monopolizing her that night." (74) Not only does white represents corruption but it also symbolizes one's social stature. Nick explains this when he says," Dressed up in white flannels I went over to his lawn a little after seven." (41) From these examples, the audience should understand that Daisy and Gatsby were hiding their true personas under a mask. This signifies how they may behave under the same motives but are socially separated because of their wealth. The color white is a very important symbol in the story because it plays a part in showing the reader how the American Dream corrupts those who want to achieve

I'd never understood before. It was full of money – that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals' song of it… high in a white palace the king's daughter, the golden girl”(Ch7.pt.2) Golden used again to represent the greed, luxury and money Daisy is used to having. Apart from meaning materialism, wealth, and luxury yellow also means death. Myrtle, Tom's mistress is killed by Gatsby Yellow car, “It was a yellow car,” he said, “big yellow car. New.”(Ch.7,pt.5). Yellow/ Gold isn't the only color that is representative of “The Great Gatsby”. Green plays a significant role, representing Gatsby's dream. “Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us.”(Ch.9, pt.3) Gatsby’s dream is an ungraspable dream, that is represented by the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. “Possibly it had occurred to him that the colossal significance of that light had now vanished forever. Compared to the great distance that had separated him from Daisy it had seemed very near to her, almost touching her. It had seemed as close as a star to the moon. Now it was again a green light on a dock. His count of enchanted objects had

Colors are everywhere. They are used as a form of identity, as an influential tool, and even to communicate mood. In the book “The Great Gatsby”, Fitzgerald expresses the feelings of each character differently through the use of colors. They help the reader understand and analyze the various situations throughout the book. One character to which many colors are connected is Jay Gatsby, a wealthy mansion owner living in West Egg of Long Island. While in the process of trying to win back a girl he had known in years past, Gatsby gets himself caught up in everything and eventually gets himself killed. Although, without the use of colors it would have made the story bland and less exotic. The colors yellow, white, and blue all closely relate to Gatsby and his feelings towards many of the characters in “The Great Gatsby”.

Gold and Yellow represent money and high social position. This color is the most common color with Gatsby along with yellow. The author is trying to show the outer self of Gatsby with the color gold by doing this he is showing us how wealthy Gatsby actually is. Throughout the novel the color yellow and gold get used alot in Gatsby's attempts to impress Daisy for example he bought Daisy a yellow car so she knows who rich gatsby is. He even has a golden tie, golden toilet even food is gold at his parties”Turkeys bewitched to a dark gold”(fitzgerald p. 40). Even T.J Eckleburg big glasses are yellow. But at the end his wealth kills him because the yellow car that killed Myrtle also got Gatsby killed because Mr. Wilson thought Gatsby was driving the car then he went to kill him. In this novel the color yellow represents wealth.