【标题】《了不起的盖茨比》中美国梦的幻灭 【作者】王 鹏
【关键词】菲茨杰拉德；了不起的盖茨比；美国梦；幻灭 【指导老师】段 庆 艳 【专业】英语
【正文】
I. Introduction
The introduction summarizes the biographical background of Fitzgerald and the historical context. As the novel has been considered as a
semi-autobiographical one, it is important to explore the author’s biography from the social point of view and emphasize the connection between the author’s biography and the novel.
In the first chapter, the writer of the thesis tries to illustrate the negative effect and corruption of the American dream in the modern society, and explore the essence of Gatsby’s dream. Also it shows the negative effects of the American dream on morality and humanity. The second chapter analyzes self-destruction in Gatsby’s dream. The analysis includes two aspects: the pursuit for the unworthy love, naivety and innocence in Gatsby’s character. Gatsby believes the possibility of repeating the past and regain Daisy after he succeeds in material wealth, but has never come to see that he is never to be accepted into the exclusive club of the wealthy to which Daisy and Tom belong. Gatsby is eventually destroyed by himself. The third chapter explores the unequal social position in the cruel society. It is also one of the important reasons to push Gatsby towards the failure. On the surface, Gatsby’s reunion with Daisy is glorious, but in fact, it is the beginning of Gatsby’s end. The conflict between Tom and Gatsby is virtually a conflict between the two classes: the new rich and the established rich. The result of the conflict is Gatsby’s death. A.Biographical Background
In the history of American literature, there is probably no writer who is more identified within a decade than Scott Fitzgerald in the 1920’s. He so vividly captured the mood and manners of his age and successfully drew a portrait of the American twenties through his works that he is always remembered as the spokes-man and laureate of the Jazz Age. An important reason is that he lived the era and was an integral part of it. And he wrote into stories and novels his very experiences or his keen observations of the Jazz Age America.
The story of the legendary Fitzgerald of the twenties usually begins with
the picture of the newly married, handsome Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald dancing around or jumping into the fountain of the Plaza Hotel. This pastoral scene may be useful in reminding us that the Fitzgeralds were not native new Yorkers. Hhe was from the deep south, from Montgomery, Alabama. He was a Midwesterner.1 Edmund Wilson, one of Fitzgerald’s closest literary friends, insisted on the important influence of St. Paul, Minnesota in determining the direction of his art and the growth of his sensibility. It is clear that many of his basic attitudes were defined by the upper middleclass financial and social position that he inherited. B. Social and Historical Context
The decade of 1920’s, particularly in America, had a sharply defined uniqueness than most recognized periods. World War I had left all European belligerents weary and numbed spiritually. America, however, not having been involved in the war for long, remained just as powerful as before. An economic boom marked the first few post-war years, and as people began receiving higher wages, there was a rash of spending on conveniences which advertisements stated people could not live without. Materialism spread rapidly throughout the country, and people became more greedy and
self-obsessed. A flow of consumerism seemed to have swept away the pain and the shadow caused by the war. The American dream turned to be the dream of money, and wealth became the symbol of success. Yet the gap between the wealthy and the poor in society was still painfully obvious. Prosperous in economy as it was, many changes in spiritual and social values were taking.The attitude place in the 1920s, which seriously affected the younger. Young people turned their backs to the values against the experience of the time was also a backlash of their parents. Girl’s casualty and freedom in their relationships with man, which would be impossible for their Victorian mothers to imagine. A “revolution” took place in
people’s attitudes towards moral and sex, which seemed to be encouraged by the popularity of the Freudian psychology by 1920. The pursuit for material fulfillment and sensual enjoyment became the dominance of young people’s life while they remained spiritually bankrupt. This kind of hedonism and “seize-the-day philosophy”2 is well illustrated in both This Side of Paradise (1920) and The Great Gatsby (1925). Fitzgerald summarizes the characteristics of the Jazz Age precisely in This Side of Paradise: “a generation grown up to find all gods dead, all wars fought and all faith in man shaken.”3 And Tom and Daisy in The Great Gatsby portray perfectly the carefree, self-absorbed attitude of the time. Ⅱ. The disillusionment of the American Dream A. The illusion of the American Dream
The American Dream began in the early part of the seventeenth century, when some English settled down in America. They tried to restore the lost paradise in the wilderness and build a new Garden of Eden in the virgin land. In the land of opportunity and great possibility, every man is equal and is entitled
to pursue his happiness and self-fulfillment. In this way, The American dream can also be understood as an attitude of hope and faith that pursues for the fulfillment of human wishes and desires. And this finds voice in Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence of 1776.
The pursuit of happiness relates to a new life of freedom and a promise of both spiritual and material happiness and success. For the first settlers of the new continent, material prosperity and development keep pace with spiritual and religious fulfillment, since both the Puritans and the Quakers approve of industry and material advancement. In their opinion, physical pleasures are evil, while hard work and achievements are regarded as indication of inner goodness. Material achievements are a reward for virtues. Therefore, inner goodness and virtues are the goal and ends, while material achievements and the comfort of life are their accompanying results. In short, in this initial American context, the pursuit of happiness is bound up with individual responsibility for democracy. B. The Corruption of the American Dream in the Modern Society
As we pass through the remarkable entrepreneurial and industrial success of the 19’ century, and there is a sudden and sustained increase in the national wealth and material prosperity. The American Dream, however, originally relates to a desire for spiritual and material improvement. What happens is that, from one point of view, the material aspect of the dream is too easily and too quickly achieved, while the early spiritual ideals are soon outpaced and even obliterated. The result is that a state of material well-being emerges but spiritual life or purpose is greatly lacking. The uninhibited pursuit of wealth results in moral and social decay. The energy that might have gone into the pursuit of noble goals has been channeled into the pursuit of power and pleasure, which becomes a very showy, but fundamentally empty form of success. The Great Gatsby is a novel about what happens to the American Dream in the 1920s, a period when the old values that give substance to the dream have been corrupted by the vulgar pursuit of wealth. In the novel, Fitzgerald laments the decline of America through a picture of materialism and moral degeneration.
C. Negative Effect of the American Dream on Morality and Humanity in the Novel
The American Dream is corrupted and degenerated by materialism, and America has been reduced into “a valley of ashes”4. The once “fresh, green breast of the new world”5 has been reduced to a valley of ashes, which is used by Fitzgerald to symbolize the modern civilization of America. The modern civilization of America is far more than what the American dream promises---“the orgiastic future”6 in the eye of the Holland seaman and the ideal man Gatsby. “The America had produced an idealism so impalpable that it had lost touch with reality (Gatsby) and materialism so heavy that it was inhuman (Tom Buchanan). The novel as a whole is another turn of the screw on this legend, with the impossible idealism trying to realize itself,
了不起的盖茨比中美国梦的幻灭---毕业论文 精品
