F. Scott Fitzgerald published The Great Gatsby in 1925, at the start of the American century. What does this loved novel of the ‘Roaring Twenties’ reveal about the cultural sources of American power in today’s world?
Great article. I always saw the book as a critique of the American dream in that the elite WASPs, who are clearly painted as total nutcases by Fitzgerald, will never accept any one outside of their own into their club, no matter how rich or refined they are. For all its bombast as the new free world, the US is just a mirrored class system of England and its founding fathers. Nick, the narrator is an outsider too, like Fitzgerald, and as an Irish American, Fitzgerald was well aware of how the English elites had taken over the US. Great book.
Great article. I always saw the book as a critique of the American dream in that the elite WASPs, who are clearly painted as total nutcases by Fitzgerald, will never accept any one outside of their own into their club, no matter how rich or refined they are. For all its bombast as the new free world, the US is just a mirrored class system of England and its founding fathers. Nick, the narrator is an outsider too, like Fitzgerald, and as an Irish American, Fitzgerald was well aware of how the English elites had taken over the US. Great book.