People have lost their own ability to determine what they want and have succumbed to society’s great pressure that money is the answer to everything. As a result, citizens became willing to do anything to chase wealth. Gatsby chases the same dream for too long, becoming an illegal bootlegger who hides behind a façade along the way, while similarly, the general public fails to realize a whole life of hard work does not guarantee wealth and happiness. The corrupt American Dream is just an illusion that the people of the 1920s are victims of because it is impossible to achieve. In the end, both Gatsby and the American people of the 1920s wear themselves out pursuing false hopes that they thought were
Gatsby feels the need to be successful and wealthy, and his participation in a bootlegging operation allows him to acquire the wealth and social status needed to attract Daisy. In his narration, Nick focuses on Gatsby’s fixation of Daisy and how he longs for her presence in his life. Gatsby’s greatness comes from his power to dream, his competence in turning dreams into reality, and his absolute love for Daisy. In The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby uses his dreams as motivation for his existence. Fitzgerald uses wealth and social status to define Gatsby’s character, which is exemplified by his lavish parties and the dignitaries who attend them.
Schulberg’s Hollywood is an industry driven by the hard-working, honest, talented man, and then exploited by an amoral few. Schulberg criticizes this Hollywood as an industry where success comes only at the price of one’s own moral constitution. Schulberg uses the relationship between the frighteningly ambitious Sammy Glick and the blindly trusting Julian Blumberg as a microcosm of Hollywood. Sammy continually exploits Julian’s talent and naïveté in order to rise to the top of the Hollywood ladder. Despite the fact that Julian writes the screenplay, Sammy’s name gets the credit title for original screenplay.
The American Dream Ruined The American dream was originally supposed to be prosperity, success, having a family, and being able to provide for that family without worry. Money was acquired through hard work and honesty, but The Great Gatsby presents an entirely different perspective on this dream. One example from the book is the way Gatsby gets his money--through bootlegging. He steped completely out of the guidelines of the American Dream. The American Dream was not meant to be corrupt, but during the 1920s, people like Gatsby used organized crime and other immorally wrong ways to gain their wealth.
The main character, Walter Lee, manifests this, as he sacrifices almost all he has for his dream of becoming a successful businessman. This obsession destroys all that is important in his life: his marriage, his relationship with his sister and mother, and his pride. He is helplessly at the mercy of his unattainable dream; although at heart, he is a loving father, husband, son, and brother, his infatuation with money and his American Dream gets the best of him and nearly destroys his marriage and his relationship with his mother and sister. Walter Lee’s dream for monetary success takes over almost all aspects of
The means to reach such condition can be the wealth, as in The Jew of Malta, an earthly crown, as in Tamburlaine the Great, or the knowledge without limits, as in Doctor Faustus. The condition of ‘superman‘ is always deceptive because, after reaching it, Faustus realizes he has been deceived. He eventually realizes the vanity of his power; he is prey to terror, he is desperate and implores the pity of God. The man who wanted to be a superman, after reaching that condition, tries vainly to return to his human condition. Everything is useless; the parable of his life has run its entire course: a man he was raised to a superman, a superman he falls into a sub-human condition.
We see examples of this pull of money in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s book The Great Gatsby, through Nick’s eyes. It is through the narrator's dealings with high society that readers are shown how modern values have transformed the American Dream's pure ideals into a scheme for materialistic power and further, how the world of high society lacks any sense of morals or consequence. Fitzgerald shows the influence of money in decision making and motivation for people in every character of the book; money pushes Gatsby to get what he has lost, it leads Daisy to marry a man who she does not love, and money influences the actions of Gatsby’s friends after he dies. Gatsby, the protagonist of the book is attracted to Daisy, her social standing, and wealth, but he realizes that he did not had the influential charm of money or power that could create a similar pull in Daisy’s heart for him. Gatsby puts away every other aspect Samra 2 of American Dream and focuses on earning enough money to get his Daisy to him.
The American Dream is defined as an American ideal of a happy and successful life to which all may aspire, and that everyone in the United States has the chance to achieve success and prosperity. Gatsby's dream was to be with Daisy and to do this he knew he had to impress her materialistically. Daisy is a material-girl, who was with Jay Gatsby before the war, however during the war she married to a wealthy man whose wealth is "old money". Old money is the term, that is used to describe the inherited wealth of established upper-class families. Gatsby makes his money through the underworld and his dealings with Meyer Wolfshiem.
The significance of this scene is the fact that now there are no lies and his children and wife can see for themselves, how weighed down he really was by the American Dream. The American dream offered people a chance to achieve riches even if they had started penniless. Becoming wealthy in all aspects required characteristics of charisma, masculinity and competitiveness, having these meant you were on the right road to success. This could be an indication to the audience, showing us that these are the main reasons why Willy pressurizes his sons to be more successful with their personalities than their education as this is his way of living, and his way of learning how to grow up to be successful forces Willy to live his façade. “Because the man who makes an appearance in the business world, the man who creates personal interest, is the man who gets ahead.
It also belongs to the common man—in this case the “low man,” as in Willy Loman. Willy’s tragic flaw stems from the fact that he has misinterpreted the American Dream, the belief that one can rise from rags to riches. For Willy, the success of that dream hinges on appearance rather than on substance, on wearing a white collar rather than a blue one. It is this snobbery, combined with a lack of practical knowledge, that leads to his downfall. Indeed, much of the lasting popularity of Death of a Salesman both in the world of the theater and in the canon of English literature, lies in its treatment of multiple themes.