The American Dream (The Great Gatsby) 12/6/19

 The American Dream is not what it seems and not the best to follow; people who follow, fall to the “pit of doom”. It is known as, “[The] valley of ashes—a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.” This is where a man, Gatsby stood, stood in the ashes stinking down deeper and deeper throughout the story, hoping and trying to claim Daisy’s love for him as he did for her. Gatsby had been stuck in living a dream of a ‘real’ American so he went, and found a way to get to the top not knowing any consequences. In the hardship of all this mess, there was one person watching over it all; Doctor Eckleburg. “...[H]is eyes, dimmed a little by many paintless days under the sun and rain, brood on over the solemn dumping ground.” Doctor Eckleburg was always watching, he watched throughout the day and night knew the hardship of what everyone was going through, with a bunch of drama.

When Gatsby and Nick were friends, until the day Gatsby died, Gatsby only had one wish throughout his time. All Gatsby wanted was to be with his one true love, Daisy (the green light), the green light shows the foundation of how far Gatsby had come just to be with one person. When Nick first saw Gatsby, “[Gatsby] stretched out his arms toward the dark water. . . . [Nick] . . . distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away. . . . When [Nick] looked once more for Gatsby he had vanished. . . .” Gatsby’s strong connection with Daisy had been there with a single light, which meant Gatsby yearning for Daisy. But, the one thing that was hiding and changing was the real story of Gatsby, he had told Nick about his phony side of the story. He wanted people to know that “ ‘Anything can happen now that we’ve slid over this bridge,’ [Nick] thought; ‘anything at all. . . .’ Even Gatsby could happen, without any particular wonder.” Gatsby had convinced Nick about his phony story, which had gained Nick’s trust towards Gatsby of how Gatsby had used to be like and how he had lived life. One thing to know is, people can’t trust something that is a dream, it always ends up being a disaster and a waste of time in the end.

American dream(s) are full of trickery and hallucination, a place that is covered up in the midst of the ashes of failure and misery. The valley is never-ending and is hard to stop because it is the sin of man, instead of building people up it tears us to the ground, dreams are torn to shreds by reality and society. The story of Nick had been a complete mess from the start, but he started to acknowledge the fact that a Westerner is who he is and who he will always be during Nick’s college years. Nick always knew that it will be different from being an Easterner when Nick and his friends as he was going to Chicago. But, “as [Nick] walked back . . . through the cold vestibules, unutterably aware of [his] identity with this country for one strange hour, before [he] melted indistinguishably into it again.”  People on the Western side had a harder time getting to the top because they worked for what they wanted which was their way of living and having a nice estate. Eastern side, people that live there didn’t have to work because the money they had was called ‘old money’. On the other side everything, since Nick was cousins with Daisy it was a big difference in measures, Daisy lived on the Eastside with Tom by an arranged marriage, while Nick lived on the Westside his whole life working to where he is today. The only conflict between Nick and Tom was that Tom was very intimidating which these two different sides kinda mixed up two different kinds of American dreams.  “[Nick] felt that Tom would drift on forever seeking, a little wistfully, for the dramatic turbulence of some irrecoverable football game.” All the characters in the story were judgemental from the start, but overall the group had failed their American dream at the end of the story, either from dying, killing someone, or running away. The damage that was written against them changed everyone’s perspective on what the American dream is. What is the American dream? A place, full of defeat, misery, and a dash of mixed emotions.