The American dream is to live in comfort, to have a family and enough money to not have to worry, knowing that dedication pays off in the end. When a person allows their desire for wealth to overpower everything else in their life, the idea behind the American dream diminishes. Americans are then no longer represented as hard workers who can manage success despite their history or status, but as people who only value material wealth. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald represents this best with its characters who have reached high levels of success but still aren't satisfied with life. During the 20s, Americans were fixated with success and tended to pursue materialism over idealism. The great Gatsby shows how the obsession with wealth
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Myrtle was able to raise her status and enjoy her small wealth, but was never able to escape her past life. She pretended that she reached success by treating people who were lower class like her as if they were inferior such as when she said, "I told that boy about the ice." Myrtle raised her eyebrows in despair at the shiftlessness of the lower orders. "These people! You have to keep after them all the time" (pg.69) Enraptured by the idea of getting away from her old life she disregards people who in reality aren't much different from herself. To add to this, her husband George Wilson was a simple man who had a kind heart, but no money, prompting Myrtle to act as if she was above her husband. Nick Carraway ,the narrator, expands on this in his description …show more content…
Even after the birth of her daughter she responds in a way showing this, she says “She told me it was a girl, and so I turned my head away and wept. 'All right,' I said, 'I'm glad it's a girl. And I hope she'll be a fool—that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.'"(pg.) She in a way wants her daughter to be like her, believing that having money and ignoring your surroundings is the easiest way to live a fulfilling life. Having grown up with money, daisy in turn is superficial both from having everything she could want to expecting things to be that way. Even Jay gatsby who is madly in love with daisy acknowledges this when talking to Nick he says, "Her voice is full of money," he said suddenly. That was it. I'd never understood before. It was full of money—that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals' song of it. “(pg.) Money is such an integrated part of Daisy's life that she speaks like someone who only knows money. Finally, daisy relies heavily on money and this is elaborated by her cousin Nick Carraway who says,”They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people
Myrtle was able to raise her status and enjoy her small wealth, but was never able to escape her past life. She pretended that she reached success by treating people who were lower class like her as if they were inferior such as when she said, "I told that boy about the ice." Myrtle raised her eyebrows in despair at the shiftlessness of the lower orders. "These people! You have to keep after them all the time" (pg.69) Enraptured by the idea of getting away from her old life she disregards people who in reality aren't much different from herself. To add to this, her husband George Wilson was a simple man who had a kind heart, but no money, prompting Myrtle to act as if she was above her husband. Nick Carraway ,the narrator, expands on this in his description …show more content…
Even after the birth of her daughter she responds in a way showing this, she says “She told me it was a girl, and so I turned my head away and wept. 'All right,' I said, 'I'm glad it's a girl. And I hope she'll be a fool—that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.'"(pg.) She in a way wants her daughter to be like her, believing that having money and ignoring your surroundings is the easiest way to live a fulfilling life. Having grown up with money, daisy in turn is superficial both from having everything she could want to expecting things to be that way. Even Jay gatsby who is madly in love with daisy acknowledges this when talking to Nick he says, "Her voice is full of money," he said suddenly. That was it. I'd never understood before. It was full of money—that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals' song of it. “(pg.) Money is such an integrated part of Daisy's life that she speaks like someone who only knows money. Finally, daisy relies heavily on money and this is elaborated by her cousin Nick Carraway who says,”They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people