How Did F Scott Fitzgerald Use Materialism In The Great Gatsby

F. Scott Fitzgerald would be opposed to the redevelopment of Willets Point due to his belief that classism and the pursuit of the American Dream hurts those who are not apart of that affluence. In The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Myrtle is a woman married to Mr. Wilson who is the owner of an auto shop in the valley of ashes which is a very poor industrial area in the book. Myrtle marries Mr. Wilson believing he was a well off business owner who would be able to support her, however, she finds out otherwise: “I married him because I thought he was a gentleman… I thought he knew something about breeding, but he wasn’t fit to lick my shoes” (Fitzgerald 34). In Myrtle’s hasty pursuit of the American Dream she marries Mr. Wilson to use him to achieve the

Myrtle cheating on Mr. Wilson shows Fitzgerald characterizing her as a money hungry classist individual whose only care is gaining a large amount of wealth to achieve the American Dream, not caring about those who it hurts such as Mr. Wilson who represents the lower socioeconomic class in the book. In a similar way, the redevelopment of Willets Point is an example of how the American Dream and classism affects those who are not affluent enough to fight back. Urban redevelopment like this only usually helps those who are already wealthy while hurting those who do not have anything to gain from it. For example, in an article by Kenneth Jackson he writes “[destroying] working-class neighborhoods to luxury apartments, breathtaking medical and cultural centers” (Robert Moses and the Rise of New York). In this situation, the people in the working-class neighborhoods have their homes decimated to make more suitable living conditions for those who are above that working socioeconomic class and who can afford to spend the large amount of money required to live