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Description
Flashcards by samanthaball.x, updated more than 1 year ago
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Created by samanthaball.x
over 9 years ago
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| Question | Answer |
| The Decline of the American Dream in the 1920s (Themes) | - Symbolic meditation on 1920s America as a whole the American dream in an era of unprecedented prosperity and material excess - |
| The Hollowness of the Upper Class (Themes) | - West Egg and its denizens represent the newly rich, while East Egg and its denizens - Newly rich are vulgar, gaudy, ostentatious, lack social graces and taste - Old aristocracy possesses grace, taste, subtlety, and elegance |
| Geography (Motifs) | - Places and settings epitomize the various aspects of the 1920s American society - East Egg represents the old aristocracy - West Egg the newly rich - The valley of ashes the moral and social decay of America - New York City the uninhibited, amoral quest for money and pleasure - East is connected to the moral decay and social cynicism of New York - West (including Midwestern and northern areas such as Minnesota) is connected to more traditional social values and ideals |
| Weather (Motifs) | - The weather matches the emotional and narrative tone of the story - Gatsby and Daisy’s reunion begins amid a pouring rain, proving awkward and melancholy - Their love reawakens just as the sun begins to come out - Gatsby’s climactic confrontation with Tom occurs on the hottest day of the summer - Wilson kills Gatsby on the first day of autumn, as Gatsby floats in his pool despite a palpable chill in the air |
| The Green Light (Symbols) | - Represents Gatsby’s hopes and dreams for the future - Gatsby associates it with Daisy; in Chapter 1 he reaches toward it in the darkness as a guiding light to lead him to his goal - "the american dream" |
| The Valley of Ashes (Symbols) | - A long stretch of desolate land created by the dumping of industrial ashes - Represents moral and social decay that results from uninhibited pursuit of wealth, as rich indulge with regard for nothing but their own pleasure. - Symbolises plight of the poor, like George Wilson, who live among the dirty ashes and lose their vitality as a result |
| Fitzgerald and Meanings | - Instead, throughout the novel, suggests that symbols only have meaning because characters instill them with meaning |
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