The Power Of Money In The Great Gatsby

1105 Words5 Pages

The Great Gatsby takes place in the 1920s, where society had discovered the real meaning and value of money. Only soon after the Great Depression, people's attention now fell on wealth and success in the financial realm. People were beginning to see the potential in becoming rich without limitations. Wealth turned into the new “prize” in the American Dream that individuals longed and pursued. In The Great Gatsby, money is a risk-taker with the characters connections and intentions but of course they are willing to take the rest because the crave for fortune is inevitable. The Great Gatsby criticizes the perception of achieving financial success by presenting characters that illustrate corruption money leading to a place of materialistic values and the lack of moral values by the division of the West and East Egg. The American dream is shared among numerous individuals with expectations of living a perfect wealthy life. When people are involved in more materialistic things, they will become less happy in the end and realize the amount of hardship they have to deal with. Taking a closer look into The Great …show more content…

The Great Gatsby shows that money can pass the limits through signs of materialistic views and division through the money that is old, where it is inherited wealth through upper-class families or new, which is newly rich. The Great Gatsby presents several of its characters as having this illusion of living the “American dream”, in opposite to what they trust leaving them with a false perception of this lifestyle. This false perception guides them to lose sight of who they are based on their social class and use their money in careless and reckless ways. The dream of believing that the American Dream helps people financially is gone, once people criticize the way to treat money and in consequence are not true to

Open Document