Decadence In F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby

The Great Gatsby is a novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald about people living in the town of West Egg which is on the prosperous Long Island. The story concerns the young millionaire Jay Gatsby and his dreamy thoughts for his long lost lover Daisy Buchanan. Extract 2 has shown the decadence society at the Jazz Age filled with an atmosphere of extravagance. It further shows that the people judge each other by how high their social status is, wealth is a way to show that you have power. Furthermore, extract 2 discusses about Nick’s interesting relationship with the Buchanans.

The Great Gatsby’s main theme is the power of wealth therefore he explicitly created an atmosphere of affluence and extravagance on Gatsby to display it out. He has

From extract 2,”My house was at the very tip of the egg, only fifty yards from the Sound, and squeezed between two huge places that rented for twelve or fifteen thousand a season. The one on my right was a colossal affair by any standard — it was a factual imitation of some Hotel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden. It was Gatsby’s mansion.”In this quotation, we can see a very indisputable contrast between Gatsby and Nick’s house. Nick’s house was only fifty yards squeezed between two buildings while Gatsby’s was something close to an awfully opulent house with grand gates and a wondrous swimming pool. The use of the phrase “colossal affair” when describing Gatsby’s house, reflects how hard Gatsby is trying to show off his wealth in a certain kind of way. By calling Gatsby’s colossal mansion “a mansion inhabited by a gentleman of that name,” Nick ‘s opinion towards

The lawn started at the beach and ran toward the front door for a quarter of a mile, jumping over sun-dials and brick walks and burning gardens”. This shows that Nick was not prepared to see how exquisite Tom’s house look like. Besides using Gatsby to show the trend of wealth. Fitzgerald also used the geographical location set in the novel. He compared West Egg and East Egg’s social status and the difference between them, from Extract 2, “I lived at West Egg, the — well, the less fashionable of the two, though this is a most superficial tag to express the bizarre and not a little sinister contrast between them.” The extract tells us Nick is from West Egg which represents new wealth. He described the place as “the less fashionable of the two” signifying that old wealth is better. In other words, being born rich is thought to be better. This is hostile from how the society today thinks when working to earn your money is more venerable than inheriting wealth from your family. Nevertheless, there isn’t really much divergence in West Egg and East Egg other than the way wealth is obtained and how long it has been in their hands. The West Egg get their money through