Written and set during the 1920s where America was going through a post-world war economic boom, The Great Gatsby written by F.Scott Fitzgerald is a perfect specimen of the fulfillment of the American Dream. Capitalism’s promise of great economic opportunity was desired by every person and many of them even succeeded in the get rich quick schemes. We see the tenor of the times in the feverish abandon of Gatsby’s party guests who were confident that their host’s abundance of food and drink, like the nation’s resources, will never be depleted and in Gatsby himself, whose meteoric rise from being the son of “shiftless and unsuccessful farm people” to the proprietor of a “colossal” Long Island mansion with “a marble swimming pool and over forty acres of lawn and garden” seems to embody the infinite possibility offered by the American dream. However, The Great Gatsby exposes the darkness and the evils of the heady capitalistic culture in the dazzling Jazz Age of America showing us how the American Dream despite provide financial satisfaction has led to the …show more content…
All characters are selfish, materialistic and ignorant like the “bourgeoisie” in Marxist theory. Daisy Buchanan for example, also allows herself be treated like a commodity by accepting the string of pearls knowing what they symbolize. She also treats social class like it is the only important feature that defines her. She would never had had a romance with Gatsby had she known he was “not much the same strata as herself . . . [and] fully able to take care of her” and the moment she realizes that her interest in him quickly disappears. She also believes that people are made for her satisfaction, even Gatsby the man she claimed she loved was just a commodity for her. Thus she easily lets him take the blame for Myrtle’s death showing how little regard she has for people below