Use Of Color In The Great Gatsby

Colors subconsciously create their own impressions on situations because we have associated them with different feelings. F. Scott Fitzgerald uses this in his novel The Great Gatsby to improve the story by adding to the atmosphere of the imagery aspect of the story. Gatsby is a man who was not born into wealth, but acquired it. He fell in love with Daisy, a girl who caused him to seek out this American Dream that he achieved five years later. Fitzgerald uses the colors white, yellow, gray, blue, and green to enhance this story of prosperity and longing. White was used in multiple instances throughout the book, but it was mainly used to represent innocence and a desire for wealth. Gatsby and Daisy met and fell in love five years prior to the events described in the book. When they were first seeing each other, they kissed at a spot where “the sidewalk was white with moonlight.” (Fitzgerald 110) The use of white in this instance shows the innocence of young love. It shows how happy the two were before they became contaminated with the need for wealth. This light and pure color is used to describe Daisy many times in the book. When the reader first meets Daisy she is wearing white, and so are the windows in her house. The color also represents Daisy’s heart before she married, as it “was pure and unburdened with …show more content…
Fitzgerald has done a brilliant job integrating color symbolism into almost every aspect of the story, whether it is darkening the atmosphere of the scene, lightening a character’s personality, or creating a theme throughout the entirety of the book. This type of symbolism still occurs in everyday life; a gray and rainy day will put you in a bad mood, and a bright blue sky will make you happy. Color themes are a very important way to symbolize moods and feelings, whether it is in a book, daily life, or anything and everything in