First, the American dream in these artistic productions differs from the Jeffersonian pursuit of happiness, meaning that in the novel and the film it was transformed into a pursuit of money. The ideal of money that characterized the culture of 1920s is well represented by the society of Long Island, separated into two: West and East Egg. West Egg, in the person of Jay Gatsby is the embodiment of newly rich, while East Egg stands for the old aristocracy. Without doubt, it was Gatsby who illustrates the pure form of the American dream. We could see his childhood’s aspiration for self improvement, in terms of achieving his dream of gaining material wealth and prosperity. Indubitably, he achieved all his fortune from Dan Cody and not by honest work inspired by perseverance and determination. …show more content…
What the reader and the viewer can deduce is that for Gatsby material possessions have a similar meaning with harmony and happiness. The narrator, Nick Carraway, describes Gatsby’s ornate mansion as “a colossal affair by any standard - it was a factual imitation of some Hotel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beards of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden” (Fitzgerald 11). In all due fairness, it is the appearance that symbolizes Gatsby’s American dream. Moreover, he sees Daisy as a wealth object, saying:” ‘Her voice is full of money’…It was full of money – that was inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals’ song of it…High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden girl…” (Fitzgerald