How Does Myrtle Wilson Criticize In The Great Gatsby

The American Trio F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Novel “The Great Gatsby” criticizes the American Dream because people who come from nothing wind up run over or with a bullet to the back of the head. Myrtle Wilson, Jay Gatsby, and George Wilson all represent American Dreamers, they came from nothing and tried to pull themselves up and in the end they all die at the hands of the wealthy. Myrtle attempts to pull herself up from nothing by marrying into a higher social class. However, she marries Wilson and then he turns out to be very poor. She comments on the fact that she cried all afternoon when she found out Wilson was poor and that she felt like an idiot for marrying him. Myrtle attempted to raise herself up to a high social standing by entering

Myrtle gains an apartment with Tom and they have a party that attracts some wealthy and important people which contrasts greatly to her home with George in the valley of tears. Myrtle thinks Tom really loves her and someday he might leave Daisy to marry her however Tom uses her for her body just like the wealthy American factory owners use their workers for profit. Myrtle’s delusion that Tom cares for her ultimately causes her demise because when she escapes George she thinks that Tom will stop and sweep her of her feet taking to the promised land fulfilling the American Dream. However, that does not happen Tom’s wife Daisy ends up running her over and kills her on the spot and Myrtle’s body in the aftermath invokes images of the run over American Dream “her left breast was swinging loose like a flap and there was no need to listen for the heart beneath. The mouth was wide open and ripped at the corners as though she had choked a little in giving up the tremendous vitality she had stored so long” (Fitzgerald 137). This represents the American Dream decimated by the wealthy and figuratively lays out the fact that Myrtle, like the American workers, will always be beaten down and have

James Gaz was a westerner that always wanted to make it big and as soon as he could he ran off and recreated himself. Soon he changed his name to Jay Gatsby and was the heir to fortune of Dan Cody but Gatsby was swindled out of the inheritance. This makes an allusion to the American Dreamers that try to make it big but are often cheated. Gatsby then learns from the experience by changing his strategy to bootlegging after the war. Like many poor people Gatsby found the only way for him to climb the ladder was to cheat and do illegal things. By doing this Gatsby soon found himself near the top of American Society. He did not live in the illustrious East Egg but had a great house in the lesser West Egg. Gatsby threw many parties that the East Eggers had no problem enjoying. Gatsby pulled himself up from nothing and did it mainly to win the affection of Daisy. Gatsby and his Dream are doomed from the beginning as he used to be poor and Daisy cannot marry him based on the disparity of their original social standings. Marius Bewley sums this concept up perfectly “The American Dream, stretched between a golden past and a golden future, is always betrayed by a desolate present—a moment of fruit rinds and discarded favors and crushed flowers. Imprisoned in his present, Gatsby