Here is the synopsis of our sample research paper on Pursuing Empty Dreams in “The Great Gatsby”. Have the paper e-mailed to you 24/7/365.
Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This is a 6 page paper that provides an overview of "The Great Gatsby". The novel's closing passage is explicated to emphasize the book's central theme. Bibliography lists 1 source.
Page Count:
6 pages (~225 words per page)
File: KW60_KFlit040.doc
Buy This Term Paper »
Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
the younger generation having been disillusioned of the Victorian morality that dominated America in previous decades as a result of their experiences with the war, they were now unable to
believe in the same moral values as their parents and grandparents. The result was "the Lost Generation", a generation of Americans who replaced moral and social values with the pursuit
of "the American Dream", a goal typified exclusively by material excess and the pursuit of pleasure. However, the novel is often seen as an indictment or condemnation of this generational
shift. In fact, a close examination of the text reveals that Fitzgerald is actually quite sympathetic towards the experiences of the "Lost Generation", going so far as to suggest that
all human dreams, even those which seem to stem from a moral or social value, are in fact created out of a universal human desire to recapture the past, and
that the "Lost Generation" is thusly not very different from any other generation of humans, past or future. The closing passage of Fitzgeralds work is instrumental in portraying the central
theme that humanity is typified by the pursuit of dreams, but that these dreams are essentially just investments of symbolic value into ultimately empty goals; this is indicated by the
comparison of Gatsbys quest for Daisy with the "American dream" itself, the claim that dreams are fundamentally constructed of the past rather than the future, and the melancholy realization that
all humanity shares this trait of fruitless striving towards a meaningless ideal. Fitzgerald first sets up his central theme by showing that Gatsbys misguided dream to reunite with Daisy
is simply an encapsulated symbol of the "American dream" in general; both are ultimately pursuits of phantasmal values that exist only in the mind of the pursuer. Fitzgerald states that
...