How Does Fitzgerald Present The American Dream In The Great Gatsby

In the novel The Great Gatsby, author F. Scott Fitzgerald utilizes the character of Jay Gatsby to illustrate the idea that although dreams can represent hopes and aspirations, they can also poison the mind of an individual when mixed up with reality. Throughout the book, Gatsby is constantly trying to obtain his ideal reality: one where he is able to attain the heart of Daisy—the presumed “love of his life”—as well as his perception of the American Dream. To compensate for the fact that he is struggling to do so, Gatsby conjures fantasies in his head where he is able to escape from his reality and pretend as if he has acquired the life he wants. This creates a sheer dichotomy between Gatsby’s real life and the illusions within his mind, a concept

A universe of ineffable gaudiness spun itself out in his brain while the clock ticked on the wash-stand and the moon soaked with the wet light his tangled clothes upon the floor” (105-106) The grotesque and fantastic conceits that he describes here represent Gatsby’s desire to win over Daisy Buchannan and achieve the American Dream. However, he is being held back by both time (represented once again by the clock) and nature (represented by the moon) simultaneously. Fitzgerald’s use of the phrase “spun itself out” could take on a variety of different definitions. He could be referring to the idiom spinning a yarn, which describes a lengthy and fanciful storytelling, similar to how Gatsby is creating an overimaginative fantasy of his life—one where he is rich and still in love with Daisy. However, Fitzgerald could also mean spun out as in spinning out of control, which also applies to Gatsby as he is unable to restrain his thoughts and keep them within bounds of reason. Lastly, the imagery itself in this passage is very vivid and dreamlike, giving the sentence a surreal vibe to it. Fitzgerald purposefully creates this effect to mimic how Gatsby is also lost within his own

It is evident that the reality Gatsby comes up with in his mind is ironically quite unreal and irrational. Fitzgerald’s use of the metaphor “the rock of the world was founded securely on a fairy’s wing” truly shows how delicate his fantasies are. Gatsby tends to fool not only the people around him into thinking he is a different person than he truly is, but also himself into constantly seeing things for not what they truly are. For example, he still believes that he is able to salvage the relationship he used to have with Daisy even though that occurred years ago and, upon reuniting, they had already gone down their separate roads and Daisy had married Tom Buchannan. This does not indicate that Gatsby is “imaginative” or “creative,” but rather that he is downright delusional and was able to convince himself that his illusions fit into the reality of