How Is Gatsby And The American Dream

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, it is hard to miss the fact that the novel is related to the American dream. Fitzgerald made a connection to Gatsby’s dream, who was Daisy Buchanan, and the American dream itself. Critic John A. Pidgeon states in his essay “The Great Gatsby,” that the novels theme “is the withering of the American Dream.” In Kimberly Hearne’s “Fitzgerald’s rendering of a Dream,” she said that “Fitzgerald attempts to correct Americas misconceptions about the American dream” through Gatsby. Adam Meehan’s “Repetition, Race, and Desire in The Great Gatsby” states that Gatsby is seen “as a figure for America” rather than the American dream itself. These three critics all have similar views on how Jay Gatsby represent …show more content…
To her the American dream “is ambiguous, contradictory, romantic in nature an undeniably beautiful while at the same time grotesquely flawed.” Hearne believes that the American dream has been corrupted. Because Americans see the American dream as a promise of freedom to advance and achieve success (Hearne). That although Americans “speak of equality and unlimited possibilities” both end up just being illusions. No matter what image of America one has, the truth about it cannot be hidden. That no matter what opportunities someone has, no one is actually equal, someone is always struggling while one rises to the top. Through Gatsby the corrupt and misguided ways of achieving happiness are shown, because he puts his hope of happiness in Daisy (Hearne). She says that “We [Americans], like Gatsby, can be blinded by our own ambition and miss the truth (the reality) that lies before us.” He says that this dream is a contradiction to and a distortion of reality. It makes one want to keep moving forward even as one is being held up with the past. Like Gatsby who kept wanting to re-create his past with Daisy, but “he is ultimately ruined by his own romantic idealism” (Hearne). He says that just like Gatsby, Americans are “getting deeper in love” with this dream, and illusion, because this seems to be the greatest dream of all the possible …show more content…
Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby and wrote about their different views on the American dream. Both Hearne and Pidgeon believe the American dream to be flawed in different ways. Pidgeon believes that although America is a place where anyone is “free to pursue whatever goal they [wish],” Gatsby soon realizes that his goal could not be achieved (Pidgeon). He shows that as the novel is ending, the American dream starts to fade away. Hearne says that the American dream seems like a beautiful dream but the truth is that it actually is an illusion. That just like Gatsby, Americans can also be blinded by that illusion, and it corrupts what the American dream should be because the pursuit of life and happiness will not be the same. However, author Meehan believed Gatsby is representing America, or better yet a higher class in America because he went from a family of farmers to living in a mansion. In The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby can be seen to represent the American dream of America in different ways, like the views on these critics Kimberly Hearne, John A. Pidgeon, and Adam