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Materialism And The Great Gatsby - Paper

Materialism And The Great Gatsby

The acquisition of material has often been equated with happiness in this country. This is true today, and it was true during the 1920's, the setting of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. Fiztgerald shows how Jay Gatsby is a man that believes if he has money, he can attain love and happiness. Jay Gatsby believes that money can recreate the past, can buy him happiness, and can help him achieve prestige in the town of East Egg. The belief by the majority of Americans that wealth and happiness are the same is a result of an economy that encourages consumption and social conditions that lead us to think that we need material possessions to be happy. Money can have many effects on ...

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While this type of economy has given us great opportunities to further our own personal wealth, it has also put many people on the path to making ours a selfish and unhappy society that is never content with it already has. The market society of our country feeds on economic growth, but excess consumption does not really satisfy people in the end. It only leaves you wanting more and once you are caught up in the obsession of materialism it seems like you can never have enough.
The 1920's were also an era of blatant materialism and consumption and the pursuit for private wealth took priority over what was good for society in general. The Depression that followed the 1920’s was an agonizing economic time for the American people but it had the positive effect of forcing people to reexamine their focus on material possessions and personal wealth to what was good for the country as a whole. Jay Gatsby’s idea of the American Dream and his error of thinking that money can buy ...

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Materialism And The Great Gatsby. (2004, October 27). Retrieved January 22, 2025, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Materialism-And-The-Great-Gatsby/16593

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PAPER DETAILS

Added: 10/27/2004 10:22:34 PM
Category: Book Reports
Type: Free Paper
Words: 744
Pages: 3

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