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Social Breakdown In The Great Gatsby

591 Words3 Pages

As World War I drew to a close, the modern world swung into a new era of societal breakdown and reconstruction. Examples of this are evident throughout modernist literature, both now and especially then. One of the most famous modernist literary works that came from the beginning of this movement is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby. Throughout his novel, Fitzgerald includes a variety of situations that display some common ways that society can split apart, Divorce rates hit their peak during this time period, making the destruction of marriages Fitzgerald 's first example of social breakdown. This theme is included multiple times throughout his writing. The first marriage that is broken apart is between Daisy and Tom Buchanan. In the first …show more content…

Throughout the novel, Gatsby insists that his educational level matched that of his social status. Regardless, Tom Buchanan reveals that Gatsby was never educated in Oxford, England as he led others to believe, but rather in Oxford, New Mexico (130).This created divisions between Gatsby and his friends because he had lied to them about his past. Gatsby also misleads them about his profession and where his money came from. When asked directly by Nick Cathaway, Gatsby informs him that the money is from a relative, however, he actually gained his wealth through bootlegging (143). Fitzgerald focuses on this alienation between friends and the lengths reached to mend the discord to convey his thoughts on the embellishment of people in the 1920’s. Gatsby believed that his status and wealth were the most important aspects of his friendships, therefore, he ignored the emotional affiliation the relationship encompassed . Gatsby lied to his friends from the beginning the novel. By the end, this caused division between, reflecting on the social disintegration between people during this

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