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Literary Analysis Essay On The Great Gatsby

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Joshua Goulding Period 6 Ms. Coleman English III The Great Gatsby Literary Analysis Essay In the novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald the characters live lavish lifestyles in New York City in the 1920s. Money plays a large and important role in the novel, throughout the novel the difference of “old money” and “new money” are made. Fitzgerald is making the point that at its core old and new money are the same. The only difference between the two is the status that comes with them. Money in the novel can buy many things, a mansion, custom Rolls Royce, and the social status that comes with being wealthy. Money buys Gatsby a huge mansion in West Egg, the land of new money. The novels narrator Nick describes Gatsby's mansion as “it …show more content…

This old money is the same as new money but it comes with a different status. If you have old money you are seen as higher up and better than the people with new money. Tom feels superior to Gatsby because he feels that he his better than him and his new money. During chapter 7 the characters go to a hotel to cool off from the heat, during this a fight breaks out between Tom and Gatsby. Tom exclaims, ““I suppose the latest thing is to sit back and let Mr. Nobody from Nowhere make love to your wife. Well, if that’s the idea you can count me out” Tom feels that he is better than Gatsby because Gatsby earned his money and came from nowhere. Tom also says this “I know I’m not very popular. I don’t give big parties. I suppose you’ve got to make your house into a pigsty in order to have any friends — in the modern world.” Tom admits he's not as popular as Gatsby but he still feels as if he is better than him. There is no difference between the two forms of wealth other than the fact that one is earned and one is …show more content…

The people in New York are living lavish lifestyles, partying and drinking their lives away while the people in the Valley of Ashes live lives in squalor and disrepair. Nick recalls the living conditions of the Valley while riding the train through it, “This is a valley of ashes — a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air. Occasionally a line of gray cars crawls along an invisible track, gives out a ghastly creak, and comes to rest, and immediately the ash-gray men swarm up with leaden spades and stir up an impenetrable cloud, which screens their obscure operations from your sight.” The valley of ashes is a desolate and filthy place in between the wealthy of East and West Egg and the city of New

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