A Study On American Dream In The Great Gatsby

Among the modern novelists of America, Francis Scott Fitzgerald once won a high admiration and reputation. He is considered as one of the most influential American writers in twentieth century. Defined by Fitzgerald,〝Jazz Age〞refers to the ten years from 1919 to 1929. This was a period during which economy was booming and the values of people were changing greatly. With the economic prosperity, moral decay has become more and more serious day by day.The Great Gatsby which was published in America in 1925 for the first time opened to much critical acclaim for its profound ideological content and the artistic way the author developed the topic in it. Seeming, it is just a love tragedy happening in that social background. Actually once taking a further understanding on the content of the novel, the readers can realized that various aspects of the society in those years have been described in the novel. The content of this novel is refined with an intelligent structure. One of the roles in the novel Nick Carraway observed everything and every body around him. Nick's feeling and reflection on them seem to make the story a fable which endows the novel with a cautionary significance.In the first chapter the meaning of the〝American Dream〞is defined in detail. The〝American Dream〞has a long history and profound origin. It aims to take a deeper look at its original source, history development, the reach to its golden age and its distortion as well as disillusion. All of that is tightly related to the factors as history, social development and culture which are developed in this chapter. In chapter 2, the description about the〝American Dream〞is more specific. It focused on introduction and analysis of the social and history background of〝Jazz time〞and then the American Dream of each main character in this novel are analyzed. Through this way, the features of those persons are displayed vividly and so does the social morality during those ages. This is also the most important chapter through which on one hand the attractiveness and the disillusion of the American dream for the people in the novel can be understood thoroughly. On the other hand it enables the reader get a deeper understanding about the meaning of American Dream. Chapter 3 is based on the analysis of the relationship among love, wealth power and American Dream. It shows us truly and cruelly that how people worship wealth and the great power brought by wealth. It is an important and serious social problem that if success can equal to wealth and right, can those things be replace of love? In this last but not less important chapter, a conclusion is made .The meaning people learn something is exactly that making it in practice. Readers can learn the history and society in〝Jazz Time〞. The author does the research on the thesis the〝American Dream〞and the aim is to use the experience and reflection to warn people today and to guide people in walking on a right way.