Anne O’Hare McCormick has said “The foundations of the world will be shaky until the moral props are restored.” This quote is ironic, considering the theme of The Great Gatsby is a moral wasteland. The Great Gatsby in its entirety is one great big amalgamation of a moral wasteland. The story follows Nick Carraway, living in his tiny cottage next to the elusive Gatsby in West Egg, New York. Throughout the story, there are many different forms of immorality shown in different characters.
The novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is told through the eyes of Nick Carraway, who comes to 1920's New York to fulfill the American dream. Instead, he realizes the hollowness behind industrial wealth driven ideals. After Nick gets settled in West Egg, he finds himself in the company of millionaires Daisy, Tom, and Jay Gatsby; all of whom demonstrate either an inability or unwillingness to acting with consideration to those around them. Even Nick, who is meant to be reflective and unbiased, ended up being a morally ambiguous character at best. The one thing contrasting the stories ubiquitous impropriety, is the billboard of T.J. Eckelberg's bespectacled eyes.
The novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald illustrates a morally ambiguous character that can’t be defined as strictly good or evil. Moral ambiguity is the driving force towards Gatsby’s actions. The character Gatsby demonstrates morally ambiguous qualities that initiate plot throughout the whole novel. Morally ambiguous choices can be viewed towards Gatsby’s character throughout the novel. The first glimpse of Gatsby is introduced in the first chapter while Nick is “exempting him from his reaction” of a “uniform and at a sort of moral attention forever” already placing Gatsby in a position of moral ambiguity (Fitzgerald 2).
The Great Gatsby reveals the truths of the 1920s about corruption, class, society and wealth. Fitzgerald shows the greed of the characters for money and power, especially the character of Daisy Buchanan, a woman who chose money over her love. The protagonist Jay Gatsby rises from poverty to opulence to win his love Daisy back. Nick Carraway, a man who witnesses the life of the pathetic man, Jay Gatsby. Through the characterization of Nick Carraway, Fitzgerald reveals that wealth can pull one in the trap of corruption, dishonesty and one’s loss of self.
Although organized crime altered the American Dream’s initial image, much of society glamorized this reckless and exuberant adaptation, as several men gained their wealth through fraudulent methods. Thus, organized crime characterized the overall careless and wealth-seeking attitude in the twenties that is ever-present in The Great Gatsby. This mindset can be seen in most all of the novel’s party scenes, as well as in Fitzgerald's characterization of the Buchanan’s and Jay Gatsby, who is distinguished by his mysterious affiliation with the bootlegging industry. Throughout the novel, Fitzgerald alludes to Gatsby’s role in organized crime being the source of his wealth. However, during Gatsby and Tom’s altercation, Fitzgerald discernibly accredits organized crime to Gatsby’s exuberant lifestyle, “‘I found out what your 'drug-stores' were.’
Renowned musician Bob Marley once said, “The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively” (BrainyQuote). The book The Great Gatsby by Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald is about a man named Nick Carraway, and his experiences with his neighbor, Jay Gatsby, as Nick makes his new life in New York City. While moving out east to pursue a career in selling bonds, Nick moves into a small house in a wealthy neighborhood. His next-door neighbor is Mr. Gatsby, a very rich man with a shady past. Mr. Gatsby grew up as a poor man with another name.
The belief that wealth and luxurious materialistic possessions can capture true happiness is yet again disproven in this tragic love story revolving around Jay Gatsby and his ambitious pursuit of happiness. Jay Gatsby, arguably the central character in the novel, perseveres and overcomes his poverty-stricken life. He eventually rises to the upper elite class made thanks to the illegal bootlegging of alcohol, allowing him to acquire immense amount of wealth and expensive residences such as his grand mansion. Fitzgerald intertwines Gatsby's mansion along with the residences of the other major characters, with the intentional use of symbolism, to reveal more about their individual identities. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel, The Great Gatsby,
Throughout the course of American history, the notoriously famous novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald has been believed to be a prominent novel encompassing the concept of morality. As the events of the novel transpire, many immoral actions that take place among the main characters. These immoral actions are identified and clearly classified by the foundational ideologies of the time period. However, it is important to recognize and identify the significant “nonjudgmental lens” through which Nick witnesses the immoral actions. Due to the fact that Nick attempts to inform the audience unbiased, it formulates a viewpoint that does not condemn nor call to action the immoral actions upon the characters of the novel, such as Gatsby and
Imagine that George Clooney was your next door neighbor, threw extravagant parties every weekend, yet kept quietly to himself during the day; this describes the life of Jay Gatsby. While he appears to be the nation’s most mysterious, wealthy bachelor, his wealth is built on the illegal business of bootlegging. However, despite all the rumors against him, the allure of Gatsby’s character is based off of the slanted view of the narrator and the improbable way that he obtained his massive amount of wealth.
Characters throughout The Great Gatsby present themselves with mysterious and questionable morals. Affairs, dishonest morals, criminal professions, weak boundaries and hypocritical views are all examples of immorality portrayed in The Great Gatsby. In F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, lies and mischief fill the lives of many and significantly damage numerous relationships. First, Jay Gatsby's whole life is consumed into a massive lie. His personality traits set him apart from others and the attention he accumulates motivates him to falsely portray his life.
The Illusion of Gatsby: A Study of Naivete and Corruption in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby Although Jay Gatsby is understood to be “great” in the title of the novel, he ultimately represents this in an ironic sense, as he portrays a deceitful image and is tainted by his own naivete. Gatsby is a man who strives for the great American Dream, often associated with the notion that money equals happiness, however, to attain this wealth and image, he puts on a facade of greatness. There is an image surrounding Gatsby, as people claim that he has “killed a man,” or that he was “a German spy during the war” (Fitzgerald 44). Gatsby’s trail of deceit begins with these rumours, as he seems uninterested in resolving the rumours surrounding him.
Jay Gatsby, one of the main characters in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, is a wealthy man with dubious sources of money; Gatsby is renowned in New York due to the lavish parties he holds every friday in his mansion. These are spectacles that fully embody the wealth and glamour of the roaring twenties, and are narrated through the eyes of another character Nick Carraway, an ambitious 29 year old man that recently moved back to a corrupt new york in a cramped cottage next to Gatsby’s palace. After admiring the careless behaviour of the parties from a distance, Nick gets a personal invitation to Gatsby’s next party, he promptly becomes infatuated by the extravagant and frivolous lifestyle the parties portray, along with the superficial
The novel “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald focuses on the short period of time where the books protagonist, “Nick Carraway” meets the Great American character “James Gatz.” James is a self made millionaire, and bootlegger as pointed out in the end of the novel. The character also tries to buy Nick’s cousin, but with a currency he does not have, leading to tragedy, heartbreak, and the end for James’ indulgence of the “world’s most expensive orgy.” The story given within Fitzgerald’s masterpiece is only possible with the time and setting it took place. For the Great War was over, and successes with new found riches gives way to one of America’s most successful pieces of literature.
The Great Gatsby, written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, tells the story of the highs and lows of high-society America in the 1920’s and the drama that goes with the wealth and elegance. The story is told from the perspective of character Nick Carraway, which Fitzgerald brilliantly assigns as the eyes and ears of all of the major characters within the novel and allows the reader to form their opinions of them. In positioning Carraway as the mild-mannered yet unreliable narrator, I believe that Fitzgerald uses Carraway to comment of his view on the absurdity and danger of wealth and class in America in the 1920’s. Fitzgerald sets the stage for Carraway as a simple mid-western boy, raised properly by good people, thus allowing him to pass judgment on the immorality of the New York elite.
One 's moral foundation is often questioned or tested when faced with a difficult decision, Whether it is a large decision to make regarding a new chapter in one 's life, or simply a difficult choice between which restaurant to attend, humanity is constantly questioning morals and actions that reflect their own personal values and standards. This includes whom one socializes with. Over the past century The United States of America has underwent a roller coaster with regard to social values. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott. Fitzgerald exemplifies the era of the roaring twenties and that period in time where the moral injustices that plagued the party going generation.
