F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby (1925) greatly defines the American Dream as a crashing down of reality. There are many different definitions of the American Dream and it is interesting to see how F. Scott Fitzgerald has made characters who are very individual to reflect on how there are different views of the American Dream and that is what keeps the dream alive and kicking. The book to me portrays the American Dream as a elusive entity. In general having the American Dream is finalised through the effects of having love and money. Having love and money can make the dream come alive. The Great Gatsby has taken this idealistic view of having love and money to create a desirable lifestyle, but only through a unsuccessful correlation of illusion. The main focal points of the illusion are definitely through love and money. Love is an illusion of wanting and never actually getting and money is illusion of wanting more and more and never stopping at a limit, even if you’ve reached your goal. Both love and money act as separate illusions, but sometimes having one may mean using the other to get what you want.
The goodness in man and nature is all portrayed through he effect of falling in love with someone in the book. However even falling in love falls into a category of falsity. Daisy is incapable of real love and Gatsby is obsessed with Daisy rather than in love with her. It’s her lifestyle and the aspects of the American Dream that she embodies for him that drive him; not genuine love, but aspiration for the attainment of a dream. Gatsby obsession with Daisy is what drives him to throw lavish parties in order for her to finally meet him. Gatsbys parties never end with him finally meeting Daisy but in a sense only cause more speculation about him from the people who he invites, causing once again his dream of falling in love again into a crashing down of reality. Unsuccessful, he manipulates Nick into arranging a meeting between himself and Daisy. Nick has Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby to tea. Subsequently, Gatsby invites them to go for a ride with him. Thereafter, Gatsby tries to drive a wedge between Daisy and Tom, but though she claims to love him, her love is as superficial as the image Gatsby has created with his money. All of Gatsbys actions are all through the effects of illusion, as criticised by Marus Bewley
‘’Gatsby never succeeds in seeing through the sham of his world or his aquatainces very clearly. It is of the essence of his romantic American vision that is should lack seasoned powers of discrimination. But it invests those illusions with its own faith, and thus it projected goodness in the frauds of the cripples world’’ What Marus Bewley is criticising is that the extent to which Gatsby loves Daisy is never ending. Gatsby’s reality only exists through his love for Daisy; Gatsby even fails to recognise that Daisy is discriminating against Gatsby because he is so obsessed with her. Gatsby will never loose faith in having Daisy, even if it means he’s working towards an inequality of his self worth.
The only time Gatsby will ever realise his dream of having Daisy is non – existent is when his dream falls in front of his eyes. Daisy will never be with as his conceptualisation of material things, as they manage to stay with him until the day of his death. Gatsby’s reality was all based upon and driven from an illusion. As John Henry states ‘’ Gatsby was obsessed with the hunger of human life and driven by the search to make that wonder actual’’ Gatsby wonder will always remain a dream and his actual reality will always be the material world around him.
The book has taken this illusion of love and fitted it into the equation of the way in which the American Dream is portrayed. All the characters at some point fall in love, this love is never shared and is always remained as false. Just how in a great sensation wanting the American Dream is never a reality and only adds up to making a illusion exist. Two characters, which I greatly feel, do exemplify American Dream are Jay Gatsby and Tom Buchanan. Tom and Gatsby are both great examples of the American Dream.