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The Great Gatsby Father Wasteland Analysis

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Father Wasteland
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald contains a vast amount of profound symbolism. From all the distinct colors to the Valley of Ashes. There is the green light, which Gatsby can only come close to grasping. Then there’s the hellish Valley of Ashes where hopes and dreams go to stare into the face of death, and slowly dissipate over time, until there’s nothing left except a lust for more out of life.Then there is a billboard of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg, his eyes forced to view the putrid wasteland.The eyes Dr.T.J. Eckleburg are not merely that of a billboard, but instead the eyes of Hades overlooking the Valley of Ashes or Tartarus of the American Dream.
Dr. T.J. Eckleburg from a literal standpoint is simply a billboard. The billboard is right in front of Wilson’s shop. The eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg are blue eyes viewing over the Valley of Ashes. It as stated in the second chapter, “The eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg are blue and gigantic their retinas are one yard high. They look out of no face, but, instead, from a pair of enormous yellow spectacles…” (Fitzgerald 23). He is simply an overseer of the …show more content…

Eckleburg can be quite profound. He can be perceived as Hades the ruler of a grotesque underworld, and the dead, which in this case would be hopes and dreams. Being that the case his yellow spectacles can symbolize Thanatos the god of death in Greek mythology. The novel can display a relationship between the color yellow and death. The correlation is undeniably there.
There’s more to Doctor T.J. Eckleburg than meets the eye, and his divine eyes looking over a wasteland. There’s many symbolic traits in The Great Gatsby. The time frame the story takes place is in a setting of dark times bogged by the luxuries and parties of the upper class. Similarly Greek Mythology represents stories of wonders during dark, savage times. Time can only tell when the next legend will arrive to set us in yet another Golden

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