Many people believe that hard work can lead one to success and wealth. As James Truslow Adams address “The American Dream is that dream of a land where life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement”. Once they have achieved this their life will be complete and they will finally be satisfied, sounds like a dream? F. Scott Fitzgerald conveys this idea throughout the novel The Great Gatsby, where the 20’s society was segregated but the wealth and status of each individual. It was thought to be that if you work hard enough you will reach and live the American Dream and you will feel complete, but Fitzgerald critiques and challenges this idea because society looks at the idea all wrong, making everyone live a life of illusion. The book explores the idea of an action-packed summer filled with parties, affairs, lies and unexpected deaths. The book reveals 3 main settings where the corruption of the American Dream lies and how life can actually be one big illusion.

“This is a valley of ashes—a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke…”. The Valley Of Ashes is situated between the glittering excitement of New York and the stately mansions of East Egg and West Egg leaving valley the lost city in between. This is the outcome and realistic life of many people during the 1920s. As World War 1 came to an end many people were excited and curious to see what this new era could bring, this was the making of the idealist American Dream. While the dream is conveyed to us as the result of hard work and dedication the people of the valley were left promising for a dream that will never happen. The Valley of Ashes is described as a “Fantastic farm”, contextilly meaning striking or out of the ordinary this is conveying that the valley of ashes is different and not like other farms that are lushes and green. “Where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens” Fitzgerald is using figurative language to describe how the landscape looks, he is conveying that ashes grow like crops, meaning that the land is so polluted and grey that this “farm” is producing ashes like their crops. This town is full will of grime that coats any sign of prosper and every sign of life. No matter how hard these people work they will never produce crops and make money because all they can produce is ash. Poverty lingers over the town and the ash and soot suffocate it, concealing any potential for growth, making it a failure of the American Dream. As we come to the end of the novel, George Wilson starts to see how no matter how hard he works living in a town like the Valley of Ashes will leave him with nothing but a promise he is still trying to hold on to. His efforts were noted but were not successful and his attempts of trying to pursue and fulfil happiness were failed and lost., leaving an illustration of the failed American Dream.

Situated 83 km east of New York lies the quiet suburb of East Egg filled with the wealthiest, people of society. F. Scott Fitzgerald uses The East Egg of Long Island to represents the upper-class society, who is also known as the elite old money association. These people have inherited their money and never had to work an hour for something that satisfied them, more or less it was given to them on a golden platter. They live in the biggest and most beautiful houses and drive nothing but the best cars, “Across the courtesy bay, the white palaces of fashionable East Egg glittered along the water.” their lives are one big dream. The people of the East egg know this, such as Tom Buchanan who lives comfortably and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.  “ Oh I’ll stay in the east, don’t you worry,’ he said glancing at daisy then back at me as if he was alert for something more. ‘ I’d be a god-damned fool to live anywhere else”. By the people of East Egg thinking this they automatically become the Kings and Queens of society, this gives them a right to make the idea of society up to them. This is how East Egg became the idealist of the American dream because they made themselves the dream, they believe that having money, status and living glamorous life is a better measure than the pursuit of happiness. The idea of the East egg is conveyed to us as the idealists for the American Dream, making them look like the result of hard work and dedication but for a matter of fact, that’s not how society sees them and its presented to us as one big illusion. Society sees the American Dream from a different perspective because it shows that they accept people who have done nothing to earn their superior lives over people who are working immensely and focusing their lives hoping for a breakthrough, although they know there will never be one. As we come to the end of the book we see how F. Scott Fitzgerald challenges the idea more, when we see how characters start to really see how malicious, fake and unrealistic the lives these people are living are. In the last scene of Nick and Gatsby, Nick shouts across the lawn as he is leaving “They’re a rotten crowd…You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together”? This conveys the message to us that as the summer went on, Nick saw more and more how fake these people’s lives are and how they are not actually really living the American Dream. When he first came to Long Island being invited over to West Egg was a privilege, but he soon releases how is this place different to anywhere else?

“The city seen from Queensboro bridge is always the city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and beauty in the world.” New York is the place where dreams are made and new beginnings are formed, a place where everyone one is accepted no matter the race or religion at least that is how it appears. The city is first conveyed to us as a magical, exciting new place where you can find yourself, a place where the American Dream truly lies. However, the city is being conveyed like a scam (presenting itself as someone’s it’s not). The illusion of the American Dream lures people to the exciting new city to promise nothing but great things but instead, these people are being rewarded with a dream that is unrealistic and fake. One character that has fallen into this illusion in the Great Gatsby is Myrtle Wilson. She is trying to live her ideal lifestyle in New York instead of being back with her husband George Wilson in the Valley Of Ashes. It’s where Tom and Myrtle have their secret love affair, and where they can both come to become another person, a place where “anything can happen”. Myrtle presents the idea to us that her life in New York is perfect, and she’s living her life just like a dream but in reality, the reader starts to see how her life really isn’t perfect and how this second life of hers is fake and will never be a reality. Another character who represents the illusion of the dream is Nick Carraway. Nick describes new york when he first sees it as the “first wild promise of all the mystery and beauty in the world.” Just like many other characters in the novel, Nick looks at New York to be different from the rest, he looks at it being full of “Mystery and beauty”. Later on, in the book, Nick soon is haunted by misconception the city. “At the enchanted metropolitan twilight, I felt a fainting loneliness sometimes and felt it in others- poor young clerks who loitered. In front of windows waiting until it was time for a Solitary restaurant dinner- young clerks in the dusk wasting the most poignant moments of nightlife.” At this moment he starts to see the illusion of the city through F. Scott Fitzgerald’s eyes, where people aren’t really pursuing the happiness that the City promises. He mentioned the young clerks who appear loitered and lost, this is symbolizing how these young ladies have come to New York to pursue this dream but are left lost and unsatisfied not knowing where to go next.

F. Scott Fitzgerald presents the idea of the American Dream in the Great Gatsby as a myth and an illusion. He really critiques the dream through three settings the Valley of Ashes, East Egg and New York City. He uses these settings to truly show the reader how corrupt and fake this “Dream” really is. Fitzgerald really tries to convey through the novel that those who pursue the American Dream can never actually be satisfied, and the American Dream entails always striving for something more than what we already have, this is where the true illusion lies. In today’s world, it is so easy to get caught up on what society expects and we are always trying to chase and control a corrupt “American Dream” that in the end does not promise anything. Are you trying to pursue societies dream or your own?