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Examples Of The American Dream In The Great Gatsby

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As we grow up as kids, we all dream about having a lot of money, living in a big house, driving fast cars and living with the love of your dreams. Pretty much, all of us dream of the perfect life, with a perfect family. Predominantly, this dream is known as the American Dream. This view is if people work hard, that people will become wealthy. The American Dream can be found throughout The Great Gatsby, best example of this is Jay Gatsby. Gatsby lives in a huge mansion with fancy cars and has a lot of money. His dream is to make a lot of money by working hard and get the love of his life, Daisy Buchanan. In this modern era, the American Dream pretty much doesn’t happen and makes the person unhappy. With Gatsby’s dream of catching Daisy, it leads to his death. The failures of …show more content…

Scott Fitzgerald. James Gatz, as we know of as Jay Gatsby, was never going to or was a great man. Jay grew up in a poor family that were farmers and didn’t seem to have a bright future. Jay Gatbsy, did not let his background or childhood bring him down. He decided he would live the life, of the American Dream. His dreams and hopes came true in the book, but through some shady business. During this time period, alcohol was prohibited, but Gatsby wondered off into the ilegal businnesses. This happens in the book when Daisy’s husband, Tom Buchanan embarasses Jay when he says, “ He and this Wolfsheim bought up a lot of side-street drug-stores here and in Chicago and sold grain alcohol over the counter” (Fitzgerald 133). Jay Gatsby’s self confidence, dignity, and potential all deminish very quickly. A quote from the book that Gatsby said to Nick is “ Can’t repeat the past? Why of course you can!” (Fitzgerald 110). The quote is telling and acknowledging the

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Mr. Gatsby always longs for the past, when Tom was not in the picture. Gatsby said to Nick, “Can’t repeat the past? Why of course you can!” (Fitzgerald 116). One may say that his devotion towards Daisy is peculiar, but it shows the magnitude of his love for

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Chloe Holstad Mrs. Arvay English 3 16 May 2023 Jay Gatsby’s American Dream In a world where success and wealth are often equated with happiness and fulfillment, Jay Gatsby’s story serves as a as a cautionary tale about the dangers of the American Dream. Throughout the Great Gatsby, his pursuit of wealth and success is closely tied to his desire for Daisy. His parties and extravagant lifestyle are all a part of his attempt to win her back.

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842 Words | 4 Pages

Gatsby's illicit activities are revealed to Nick and Daisy by Tom in Chapter 7, who claims, “‘He and this Wolfsheim bought up a lot of side-street drug-stores here and in Chicago and sold grain alcohol over the counter. That’s one of his little stunts. I picked him for a bootlegger the first time I saw him, and I wasn’t far wrong”(133). The colloquialism provided connotes the illicit nature of Gatsby’s activities, revealing the dark underbelly of his quest for power and fortune. This colloquialism makes the reader feel uneasy as they witness the moral ramifications of Gatsby’s pursuit of wealth and status.

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768 Words | 4 Pages

Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby illustrates reaching the American Dream through Jay Gatsby. Gatsby is born to unsuccessful farmers as James “Jimmy” Gatz. One day, the teenager decides to create an alter ego that is wealthy and successful in life. As he grew older, he reaches his goal and the future that he had always planned for. The pattern of Gatsby’s transition from poor to wealthy demonstrates the theme that changes are necessary to reach the American Dream.

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907 Words | 4 Pages

Gatsby’s only goal was to become equal with Daisy, albeit he had chances to do other activities and get involved in other tasks. He desired to recreate the past and his affair with Daisy, forgetting that his money could not help him achieve his goal to change his dream into reality. The American dream now became just an idea unachievable without becoming corrupt or

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1923 Words | 8 Pages

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is a great American novel, which criticizes wealth in the American dream. Nick Carraway is the narrator who observes characters such as Gatsby, Daisy, and Tom primarily. Jay Gatsby wants the perfect American dream. He has worked most of his life to get the fame and wealth that will impress Daisy Buchanan. Daisy is his love.

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Often times people think that you can get anything you want by working hard and staying true to yourself, but what if getting what you want means changing your name and becoming wealthy by illegal business. This is what Gatsby did, but died without ever making his dream a reality. The American dream is a happy way of living that is thought of by many Americans as something that can be achieved by anyone in the US, especially by working hard and becoming successful. In The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald Nick Carraway narrates how he and Jay Gatsby met and the times that they were together.

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The American Dream is a true reality and can happen to anyone as long as they work for it and have their priorities set for what they want. Jay Gatsby is a great example of the American Dream from the book The Great Gatsby because he started from nothing to living in a lavish mansion in New York. Getting to the American dream is hard to get to, but it is achievable as long as they work hard for it and have their mind set on this goal. The American dream has to be worked for in order to become a reality. Wealth is the main goal when talking about achieving the American Dream and Gatsby is an example of how you can live a lavish life.

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Gatsby had the incessant feeling of needing to repeat his past which went against his new beginning. He thought once he had Daisy they could relive the early days of their relationship. Nick knows Daisy well and he warned Gatsby not to push her into anything; he did not want either of them to get hurt by each other. Nick said “I wouldn’t ask too much of her, you can’t repeat the past” to which Gatsby replied “Can’t repeat the past?

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In the novel, Gatsby spends his whole chasing after the American Dream and Daisy Buchanan, a combination that ultimately leads to his destruction. The Great Gatsby is a novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald that takes place during the 1920s—a time when the American Dream is declining—and focuses in on the effects of wealth and social class on the American Dream. The novel accurately shows the condition of the American Dream in the 1920s by effectively exploring the idea of America and exploiting the corruption of wealth. The American Dream should be the honest pursuit of happiness, success, and a higher social class, but in his novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald shows the readers the twisted reality of the American Dream during the 1920s, a time of jazz music and parties where a person’s ancestry determines their future.

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683 Words | 3 Pages

We love to believe that we live in the land of opportunity. We believe anyone can become content, and successful through hard work. In truth, the majority of us will never be satisfied in life; we wont achieve the American dream. In his novel, The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald depicts the reality of American satisfaction, and of the false hope that is the American dream.

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1245 Words | 5 Pages

In our favorite childhood stories, there is always a superficial, happy ending. Nine times out of ten, the prince marries the princess, and they run off into the sunset to live happily ever after in a beautiful castle, in a land far, far away. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby provides an alternative ending to this classic tale. Jay Gatsby’s surge in wealth and popularity but subsequent defeat from the aristocratic branch of society represents how the American Dream is an ideal that cannot be reached realistically.

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937 Words | 4 Pages

The American Dream, something so profound, yet seemingly so shallow. All have thought about working towards it, but only some attempt. Risking it all, they will throw all on the line to find fame, happiness and wealth. But only a few succeed. In the novel The Great Gatsby, Nick Carraway tells the tragic love story of Gatsby, a man driven to find and marry his love, Daisy.

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688 Words | 3 Pages

The American dream in the Great Gatsby: The great Gatsby shows how the American dream can never be fulfilled, no matter how hard the dreamer tried, and can lead the dreamer to destruction and even the loss of the self by death. Nick Carraway had a dream before he was introduced to Gatsby and before he see the ruthless and the carelessness of the upper classes, he dreamt of being a successful man in the bond business, “Instead of being the warm centre of the world, the Middle West now seemed like ragged edge of the universe- so I decided to go East and learn bond business”. (Fitzgerald 2).

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1726 Words | 7 Pages

Extended Essay: American dream in the USA of the 1920’s, as depicted by “The Great Gatsby” by F. S. Fitzgerald Introduction The modern American literature is a topic as broad as it can be; there is, however, one novel which often appears as the one called “the greatest American novel of all times”. The novel in question is “The great Gatsby”, written by Francis Scott Fitzgerald and published in April of 1925. [1] There are a number of reasons for why it is deemed so special, with its’ current position in modern pop culture and status of a classic, compulsory for every reader. One of the major causes is the layered meaning, which leaves whole lot of room for interpretation.

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