Unttainable American Dream In The Great Gatsby Essay

Through critiquing the enduring nature of the unattainable American dream in his novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald is able to design a set of filthy-rich, "careless" and wholly dislikeable characters in The Great Gatsby - all except for Gatsby. A variety of different literary devices utilised throughout the novel further assist in fabricating the "American dream", revealing that it is not realistically attainable for anyone due to it being materialistically corrupted and superficial. Hence, Fitzgerald is able to represent the negative aspects of the “American dream” through characters such as Tom, and especially Daisy which exposes their true, unappealing persona, whilst also revealing the only truly admirable, likeable character: Gatsby.

With the support of the theme of the unattainable American dream, Fitzgerald is able to use literary devices of metaphors and personification to develop the careless and insensitive nature of both Tom, and especially Daisy. For example, the metaphor “Her voice is full of money” paired with the personification of “[She had] the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again…”, emphasises that even by listening to Daisy speak, that one could sense her wealth and status. Furthermore, her voice is “an arrangement of notes…” meaning that her voice is able to engage her listeners through the “musicality” of her speech, and hence influence her audience. This ultimately points out her ability to influence others, as well as her ability to be careless, hide behind her wealth and not take accountability for her actions, such as when she killed Myrtle and let Gatsby take responsibility for the incident. Similarly, Tom is able to be insensitively racist and misogynistic, whilst having the luxury to conceal himself amongst his wealth. This is especially prevalent through the metaphor “the fact that he “had some woman in New York”...as if his sturdy physical egotism no longer nourished his peremptory heart” compares Tom’s obsession with the white-supremacist book “The Rise of the Colored Empires” with that of “stale bread” that Tom is using to feed his sense of entitlement. 

Contrary to these wholly unlikeable side characters, Fitzgerald is able to curate the main character of his novel, Gatsby, to be the most likeable and admirable character through the novel’s unreliable narration and his determination to achieve the “American dream”. Nick, the narrator, as previously mentioned, is not omniscient but rather is an unreliable narrator who admires Gatsby, which inevitably only give the audience this point of view. For example, Nick initially describes Gatsby as a man “who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn” and yet has an "extraordinary gift for hope", not formally introducing his character until chapter 3. Furthermore, Nick only reveals Gatsby’s true rise to success in chapter 6, after already praising Gatsby for being better than the “rotten crowd” of upper-class people and complementing his “smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it”, suggesting to the audience that the character that Gatsby has built, outweighs the single mention of his past. Additionally, Gatsby’s determination to achieve his “American dream” - to be with Daisy - arouses a sense of empathy towards Gatsby. As the novel progresses, he seems to have developed into an illusionist who has an obsession with the idolised version of Daisy fueled by his elaborate dreams, by which Nick understands that “he talked a lot about the past...his life had been confused and disordered since then…” Although Gatsby thinks that he is able to “repeat the past” and achieve his “American dream” with Daisy, his fatal flaw is revealed throughout the novel and also demonstrates the issue with the American dream itself - that it is not realistically attainable. It is, therefore, difficult to dislike Gatsby for this reason as Fitzgerald by evoking a sense of empathy towards Gatsby and utilising the device of unreliable narration, which ultimately only provides the audience with the judgements made by a single perspective.

In conclusion, F. Scott Fitzgerald is able to use a number of literary devices and the ongoing theme of the “American dream” to design a set of filthy-rich, "careless" and wholly dislikeable characters in his novel The Great Gatsby - all except for Gatsby. Ultimately, Fitzgerald is able to associate all the fundamental flaws behind the American Dream - that is it superficial and materialistically corrupted - to highlight the careless nature of Daisy as well as the misogynistic and racist behaviour of Tom. Yet, Fitzgerald is able to contrast this to the only admirable character of the novel, Gatsby, through evoking a sense of empathy towards the character for wanting to achieve the unattainable American dream.