Great Gatsby Symbols Essay Research Paper The

Great Gatsby Symbols Essay, Research Paper

The Great Gatsby is considered a masterpiece full of controversy about the

1920’s life style. Fitzgerald uses symbolism to express in a more detailed way

this life style of carelessness and corruption. These symbols are shown through

out the characters’ actions and thoughts as well as in the setting created by

the author’s imagination to stress a point to be caught by the reader’s

attention. These symbols are used to elaborate the themes in The Great Gatsby.

Social status, one of Fitzgerald’s themes is represented by the separate

settings of the novel. The new rich or "the less fashionable" people

like Gatsby and Nick lived in West Egg. Nick lived in "an eye-sore" of

a house between two mansions letting us know that he was between the rich but he

wasn’t rich. Gatsby had a colossal mansion with a swimming pool and a tower

"spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy". They were both outsiders

from the world of the rich. On the other hand, the Buchanans lived across the

bay in the East Egg where the old rich, the people who had money all their life

and had never worked for it, lived. The Buchanans own " a cheerful red and

white Georgian Colonial mansion overlooking the bay". The difference

between the houses and the place they lived symbolizes their social position.

The old wealthy, new wealthy and not even wealthy were part of the theme of

social status. The "green light" at the end of Daisy’s dock is another

symbol used by Fitzgerald to express definite possibilities. The green light has

true feeling for Gatsby because it represents his hopes and dreams of Daisy

Buchanan. At night, Nick sees Gatsby looking at the sea, stretching his arms

towards the light and trembling. But for Nick that light was just a solitary

green light, it had no meaning. The moment that Daisy becomes his, that green

light cease to exist because she has become his and Gatsby feels that he has

accomplished his dream. Gatsby states that the green light gives him a warm

feeling inside of himself, therefore we can say that the green light also

symbolizes Gatsby’s life on "go". In the valley of ashes, where the

Wilson’s lived, represented death because of the saying "ashes to ashes,

dust to dust". Everything was covered in ashes. There we can see the eyes

of Dr. T.J. Echleburg. They were "blue and gigantic, their retinas are one

yard high, they look out of no face but instead, from a pair of enormous yellow

spectacles which pass over a nonexistent nose". The eyes of Dr. T.J.

Echleburg represent God’s eyes. When Myrtle went off with Tom, he saw. When

Myrtle was killed by Daisy, he saw. When something happened he saw. He knew all,

he saw all.