The Great Gatsby The American Dream Essay, Research Paper

The American Dream

I have just read a novel called “The Great Gatsby” this novel was based in the 1920’s. In this novel there are lots of drinking, and partying. In this essay I’ll be writing about how the novel condemns the belief of “The American Dream”, this belief states that, hard working people are successful and happy lives. And in this novel “The American Dream” was just a mirage.

One of the characters in the novel that represents the American Dream is Wilson he was one of the character that was a hard worker and own his own mechanic shop, he was one of the characters the worked every day and every night to support his family. For all he did for his family he was rewarded by his wife leaving him for another man and for a friend to over power him with words and to get a loved one killed by a car that she was walking toward(”When he came outside again a little after seven he was reminded of the conversation because he heard Mrs. Wilson’s voice, load and scolding, down stairs in the garage “Beat me!” he heard her cry. “Throw me down and beat me, you dirty little coward!” A moment later she rushed out into the dusk, waving her hands and shouting; before he could move from his door the business was over. The “death car” as the newspapers called it, didn’t stop; it came out of the gathering darkness, wavered tragically for a moment and then disappeared around the next bend. Michaelis wasn’t even sure of it’s color—he told the first policeman that it was light green. The other car, the one going toward New York, came to rest a hundred yards beyond, and its driver hurried back to where Myrtle Wilson, her life violently extinguished, knelt in the road and mingled her thick, dark blood with the dust.”Pg.144-145). For all this he got for all his hard work he went to find the killer and he thought the killer was Gatsby but it wasn’t but he still went and killed Gatsby and killed him self(”The chauffeur–he was one of Wolfshiem’s proteges heard the shots–afterward he could only say that he hadn’t thought anything much about them. I drove from the station directly to Gatsby’s house and my rushing anxiously up the front steps was the first thing that alarmed anyone. But they knew then, I firmly believed. With scarcely a word said, four of us, the chauffeur, butler, gardener and I, hurried down to the pool. There was a faint, barely perceptible movement of the water as the fresh flow from one end urged its way toward the drain at the other. With little ripples that were hardly the shadows of waves, the laden mattress moved irregularly down the pool. A small gust of wind that scarcely corrugated the surface was enough to disturb its accidental course with accidental burden. The touch of a compass, a thin red circle in the water. IT was after we started with toward the house that the gardener was Wilson’s body a little way off in the grass, and holocaust was complete”Pg.169-170).

Another character that believed in the American Dream was Jay Gatsby. He was a hard working person who has been working hard since he was a kid he was very organize and he was always on time to do things. The reason for all his hard work was to get back and old love and that was Daisy and old girl friend that left him because he didn’t come back from World War 1 when she wanted him to come back, so she got married to Tom (”I can’t describe to you how surprised I was to find out I lover her, old sport. I even hoped for a while that she’d throw me over, but she was in love with me too”.Pg.157). Many years later he was trying to get her back by throwing lots a parties that had every thing and try to lure her to one of the parties so he could see her again. But for all he has done for Daisy he got close to getting her back but she decided to stay with her cheating husband because she loved him more than Gatsby. That’s not the only thing he gets for all his hard work he got killed because Wilson thought Gatsby killed Myrtle, Wilsons wife.

My Conclusion of this essay is that only some people who work hard will be successful and some will not be but what I believe is that if some work hard enough and all the work comes from the heart, that person can have a happy life and but with all the character that got ripped off, for all hard work that they did, the only thing I can say is that sometimes life is not fair.