Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
North American Literature, emphasis on appearance, pursuit of wealth,…
North American Literature
The Great Gatsby
Context:
"The Roaring Twenties"
increased consumer spending, industrial growth, widespread availability of new commodities
expansion of mass production + credit systems - people could buy things beyond their immediate means - identity _ success express through material means
cultural logic reflected in novel's emphasis on wealth/spectacle/performance of identity
technological advancements - proliferation of radio/film/print media contributed to formation of a shared national culture
Flapper - new form of female independence - changes in fashion/behaviour/attitudes in sexuality
expansion of women's rights - suffrage + workplace roles challenged traditional gender roles - generated anxiety + resistance
income unevenly distributed - imbalance between production + consumption with speculative investment practices contributed to economic collapse 1929 + Great Depression
Nativist sentiments led to restrictive immigration laws - fears of cultural change + economic competition
racial tensions - segregation, discrimination, KKK - modernity of decade coexisted with deeply entrenched forms of exclusion
The Scopes Trial - clashw/ modernist + fundamentalist perspectives - science + religion
prohibition + Ban of alcohol attempt to regulate social behaviour in response to moral decline - contributed to growth of illegal activities
decade defined by convergence + contradiction - coexistence of innovation + resistance, prosperity + inequality, liberation + control
novel critiques of modern life - individual desires shaped + constrained by larger economic + social forces
Critique of American Dream
exposing gap between ideological promise and its social reality
traditionally understood as possibility of upward mobility through effort + determination - Lincoln eg
narrative obscures structural inequalities that shape access to opportunity + recognition
Jay Gatsby
initially confirms the validity of the Dream - modest beginnings to immense wealth, self-making + ambition
despite financial success, remains excluded from social world he seeks to enter - new vs old money barrier that wealth alone cannot overcome, class not solely economic but cultural + hereditary
exclusion seen in relationship w/ Daisy Buchanan - earlier romance shaped by economic disparity, but acquiring wealth does not translate into social legitimacy
Daisy chooses stability and status w/ Tom, class boundaries persist even in a society that claims to value mobility, structural pressures to maintain elite status
Gatsby's belief in the Dream shaped by success=wealth, he now believes that achievement=status + wealth, not fulfillment
his failure is not only personal but systemic - Dream has inherent limits that can't be overcome w/ individual effort, his belief that past can be recreated = vision of success unattainable + disconnected
Class stratification
Buchanans - inherited wealth + social dominance, w/ carelessness + lack of accountability
Gatsby - aspirational wealth, effort but lacking legitimacy
George + Myrtle Wilson occupy marginal position, constrained by economic hardship + limited mobility - promise of upward movement unevenly distributed + inaccessible to those at the bottom
American Dream shifted over time - earlier was about survival, independence but 1920 becomes material accumulation - rise of consumer culture + success=wealth
narrative shows that material success doesn't produce meaningful connection/personal satisfaction
Gatsby - hold immense parties, but doesn't get social acceptance or genuine connections - he becomes a spectacle, emptiness of the system that prioritizes appearance over substance
Dream promises fulfillment but produces isolation + disillusionment
exclusionary - success relies on marginalisation of those who don't fit dominant model - women + poor, like Daisy + Myrtle, gender intersecting with class to shape access to agency
Myrtle attempts to ascend w/ fling w/ Tom - fatal + precarious, Daisy's choices constrained by expectations placed upon her within elite society
novel shows American Dream as corrupted, doesn't enable genuine mobility, but becomes a mechanism for sustaining existing hierarchies while offering illusion of possibility
Nick Carraway:
at the end, he is striving forward while being pulled back by the past - tension of the Dream, aspiration persists but continually undermined by structural constrains + historical forces
a never-ending cycle where people pursue ideals that remain out of reach - enduring power + fragility of the American Dream
unreliable narrator - morally corrupt as no one can achieve the American Dream
acts as a criticism of American moral authority
emphasis on appearance, pursuit of wealth, belief in self-reinvention