Greed in The Great Gatsby - Literature review Example

The Great Gatsby and Greed The Great Gatsby and Greed The Great Gatsby set in the glistening and glittering world of wealth and glamourof the 1920s Jazz Age in America. However, the story of the poor boy who tried to fulfill the American Dream of living a richer and fuller life ends in Gatsby’s demise. One of the reasons for the tragedy is the corrupting influence of greed on Gatsby. As soon as Gatsby starts to see money as a means of transforming his fantasy of winning Daisy’s love into reality, his dream turns into illusion. However, other characters of the novel are also affected by greed. On closer, inspection it turns out that almost every individual in the novel is covetous of something other people have. In this view, the meaning of greed in the novel may be varied. Greed is universally seen as a desire for material things. However, in recent studies the definition of “greed” has come to include sexual greed and greed as idolatry, understood as fascination with a deity or a certain image (Rosner 2007, p. 7). The extended definition of greed provides a valuable framework for research on The Great Gatsby because the objects of characters’ desires can be material, such as money and possessions, or less tangible, such as love or relationship. The concept of greed, which was previously centered on consumption, is currently associated with material accumulation and seen as a self-conscious material vice (Robertson 2001, p. 76). Further analysis singles out several types of greed for money and possessions: greed as service and obedience to wealth, greed as love and devotion to wealth, greed as trusting in wealth (Rosner 2007, p. 11). The characters of The Great Gatsby portray all of the aforementioned types of greed. For instance, early in the story Gatsby becomes aware of “the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves, of the freshness of many clothes and of Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor” (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 160). As soon as Gatsby sees the pursuit of money as the only way to win Daisy’s love, his American Dream turns into self-justification of greed, namely greed as trusting in wealth (Malkmes 2011, p. 77). Later in the story in order to conquer Daisy Gatsby does everything he can to accumulate money, his greed takes the form of service and obedience to wealth. Upon achieving his goal, he goes to great lengths to impress people with parties and luxury lifestyle even though he does not seem to like or enjoy it. In this view Gatsby’s ‘obedient’ to his wealth in order not to lose everything he has worked for. The example of Gatsby’s love for wealth given by the elaborate parties can be interpreted as a metaphor for material excess and corruption. The parties are attended by the nouveau riche guests who define Gatsby’s own personality through love of money (Hobby & Bloom 2009, p. 74). Even though initially Gatsby’s greed for money is not the goal in itself and he trusts in wealth as the only means to win Daisy, his association with the individuals like Meyer Wolfsheim help to sustain his new identity of a greedy person. Meyer Wolfsheim’s greed takes the form of love and devotion to wealth and surprises the narrator by the boldness of the actions it inspires: “It never occurred to me that one man could start to play with the faith of fifty million people with the single-mindedness of a burglar blowing a safe” (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 79). Another example of this type of greed can be found in the character of Myrtle Wilson. Even though she is abused by Tom Buchanan she holds on to this affair hoping to be admitted to the world of the rich and glamorous. Myrtle understands the way to the world of the wealthy aristocrats as accumulation of material possessions. As soon as she goes to her New York love nest with Tom she starts buying everything she sees including magazine, cold cream, perfume and even a dog. In this respect Myrtle displays insatiable and vulgar greed. For her greed is also similar to the worship of god “Mammon”. Myrtle is ready to sacrifice her self-respect and forgive Tom when he breaks her nose in order to become the ‘priestess’ of the god of wealth. Tom Buchanan displays a slightly different attitude to greed, for him it means trusting in wealth. This type of greed implies that a person places confidence in his or her possessions rather than in God or authorities (Rosner 2007, p.32). Since Tom’s “family were enormously wealthy - even in college his freedom with money was a matter for reproach”, he is not eager for acquisition or gain (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 8). For him, money symbolizes social status, wealth insulates him from the consequences of his actions. He answers to no one, even his wife does not question his behavior, money he has is enough to justify all his actions for the society and he is aware of this. Even the way he talks underlines his superiority: “There was a touch of paternal contempt in it, even toward people he liked and there were men at New Haven who had hated his guts” (Fitzgerald 2004, p.8). His greed takes the form of trusting in wealth when he confronts Gatsby and feels sure that his wife Daisy would not leave him “for a common swindler who’d have to steal the ring he put on her finger’ (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 142). Daisy, whose voice is “full of money”, also impersonates the concept of greed as trust in wealth (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 128). In this view, wealth can be defined as a deity on which Daisy chooses to depend and from which she expects to obtain comfort and support (Posner 2007, p. 33). That reasoning lies behind her decision to marry Tom not for love, but for the luxury and comfort he offers. Thus, even the affluent characters of the novel are affected by greed for money. Sexual greed, in its turn, is displayed only by a limited array of characters. This type of greed can refer to the instances when a person assumes that the others exist for his or her own gratification (Rosner 2007, p. 104). If gratification is understood broadly, this type of greed can be found in the people who pay no attention to the feelings and even existence of others as soon as they can pursue their pleasures or way of life. One of such examples in the novel can be Tom and Daisy Buchanan. They are referred to as “careless people, Tom and Daisy - they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made” ((Fitzgerald 2004, p. 191). In the narrow meaning of the term sexual greed is closely connected with covetousness and possessiveness seen as insatiable longing to lay hands on another person’s property, even his wife (Rosner 2007, p. 104). This type of greed is continuously displayed by Tom. Even though he is married to beautiful Daisy he does not hesitate to have affairs with other women even if they are socially inferior to him. During his honeymoon Tom starts an affair with a chambermaid; during the time period described in the novel he is involved with Mrs. Wilson. Tom’s affair with Myrtle Wilson is also illustrates the man’s greed for life itself. It is obvious that neither Mrs. Wilson’s looks, nor her behavior can possibly attract Tom. He is drawn by the “Intense vitality” the woman possesses: “She was in the middle thirties, and faintly stout, but she carried her surplus flesh sensuously as some women can. Her face, above a spotted dress of dark blue crepe-de-chine, contained no facet or gleam of beauty, but there was an immediately perceptible vitality about her as if the nerves of her body were continually smouldering” (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 28). In this view, Tom is greedy for Myrtle’e energy, her vivaciousness and eventually her life. The most complicated type of greed, greed as idolatry, can be found in Gatsby and his attitude to his “silver idol” Daisy. Scholars stress that a person affected by this type of greed subjects himself to an external creature not in an act of a cult, but because he desires this creature for his own” (Rosner 2005, p. 25). This type of attitude is evident in the relations between Gatsby and Daisy. When Gatsby manages to almost win her over and she declares her love he does not stop, but needs proof that he would have Daisy all to himself. He wants Daisy to leave Tom and she exclaims: “Oh, you want too much! I love you now - isn’t that enough? I can’t help what’s past” (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 141). As the quotation implies, Gatsby is greedy for other intangible things apart from Daisy’s love. In particular, he is greedy about the time of his youth and sees winning Daisy’s affection as a chance to bring back his younger self and reclaim the time he lost. Gatsby “wanted to recover something, some idea of himself, perhaps, that had gone into loving Daisy. His life had been confused and disordered since then, but if he could once return to a certain starting place and go over it all slowly, he could find” (Fitzgerald 2004, p. 118). Having devoted many years to this dream the character fails to recognize that his only motivation all along was greed so his dream never comes true. The Great Gatsby shows the readers that people can be greedy about almost anything: material possessions, love, relations, energy, time, memories. What tells greed from other desires is not the object or item the person wants to acquire. It is the intensity of the desire and the part of the item or object that a person covets that define greed. The characters of the novel wanted to have absolute power and control over money, material possessions, other people and their feelings. The characters fail to recognize that the true reason for many of their actions is greed and it leads to their moral corruption. References Fitzgerald, F. S. (2004). The Great Gatsby. Scribner; Reissue edition. Hobby, B. & Bloom, H. (Eds.). (2009). The American Dream (Bloom’s Literary Themes). Blooms Literary Criticism. Malkmes, J. (2011). American Consumer Culture and Its Society: From F. Scott Fitzgeralds 1920s Modernism to Bret Easton Ellis 1980s Blank Fiction. Diplomica Verlag GmbH.  Robertson, A. F. (2001). Greed: Gut Feelings, Growth, and History. Polity.  Rosner, B.S. (2007). Greed as Idolatry: The Origin and Meaning of a Pauline Metaphor. Eerdmans Pub Co.   Read More