C.+Gatsby+Essay

Megan McClenny November 17, 2010 1A

In the novel, //The Great Gatsby// the American Dream is to live in nice homes, drive nice cars, wear nice clothes, and have parties. The only thing that they care about is their money. In this novel if someone is not rich then the person is not worthy. There was also competition between old money and new money. There was a difference between their dreams new people wanted you to know that they had money and old people were to be more conservative. In the end their dream was the same which is to be rich.

In the article, “What Happened to the American Dream in a Recession” the American Dream resembles the book. Americans always have the opportunity to be what they make of themselves as said in the article, “Americans have always believed in possibilities. And they have consistently said over time that they can start poor in this country and become rich” (Seelye 3). This really connects with the book because Gatsby used to be dirt poor. Gatsby changed though, he decided to make something of himself. Gatsby didn’t care how he became rich, he just knew that was what he wanted. He changed his name from Jay Gatz to Gatsby to get rid of his family reputation, and got into the mafia and earned dirty money. Gatsby reach his dream by doing whatever he had to do I order to get there.

Gatsby also had another dream and that was to be with Daisy again. He believed he could make that happen as he said “ I’m going to fix everything just the way it was before,” he said, nodding determinedly. “She’ll see” (Fitzgerald 110). All Gatsby really wanted was for Daisy to leave Tom and marry him. Daisy is another reason for Gatsby’ determination to be rich because he knew she knew wouldn’t want to be with him if he was poor. In which this novel and article connect because the real American Dream is to do better that what you had in the first place.