The Signiflcance Of Wealth As Seenin The Great Gatsby

Considered the finest achievement of Fitzgerald's literary career. The Great Gatsby is widely recognized as a classic of American literature for this novel examines the Jazz--Age generation 's search for the elusive and corrupted American dream of wealth and power. It also scrutinizes the consequences of that generation's adherence to false values-----the energy that might have been gone into the pursuit of noble goals has been channeled into the pursuit of power and pleasure. Fitzgerald attributes the depravity of the modern dream to wealth and privilege.Everyone is made up of a cluster of appurtenances. It's impossible for people to throw off the cluster of appurtenances and invent themselves again. One's clothes, the book one reads, the company one keeps.... are all expressive . Because of the clothes Gatsby wears, Tom Buchanan is able to undermine him as a competitor for Daisy. The single most important object by which to declare one's status is the house. In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald masterfully discriminates between Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby, the rivals for Daisy's love, on the basis of the very different homes they occupy on Long Island. He has a lot of possessions and shows it to the public. What Gatsby does represents his attempt to establish as Somebody , or at least not Nobody. The trouble is that these possessions, which Gatsby shows off like a peacock in his plumage, only proclaim him as an arriviste. Money and love are closely connected. Tom regards women as objects to be played and fondled. Traditionally, the male plutocrat slides down the social scale to carry on his affairs, for such relationships require no long---term commitment and can easily be broken off. In this novel , the writer also wants to show one truism that money can not buy you love or at least the tainted money.Marx's critique of capitalism is deeply assimilated into Gatsby's imaginative life. Two ideas are pervasive in the novel: the overall process of reification and its consequent expression in commodity fetishism. Under capitalism, not only workers but everything was transformed into a commercial commodity.In an industrial society, accumulated property is a sign of potency . In order to establish his worth and earn the esteem of others , one has to achieve economic success ---and shows it . As the novel demonstrates, this development subverts the foundation of the Protestant ethic, replacing the values of hard work and thrifty abstinence with a show of luxury and idleness. The outcome of modern industrial development has been to intensify the emulation and the jealousy that goes with emulation.