The Great Gatsby vs of Mice and Men - 1818 Words

The American Dream is an idea that many Americans share and have faith in, but it can be used as a false promise of success. This notion is explored through the texts The Great Gatsby and Of Mice and Men written by F.Scott Fitzgerald and John Steinbeck respectively. The Great Gatsby was first published in 1926. The novel is set in the summer of 1922 and follows the life of Jay Gatsby who tries to get the love of his life back, Daisy Buchanan, through his wealth and social status. Of Mice and Men follows the lives of George Milton and Lennie Small who are migrant farm workers. Lennie is mentally incapable but George is there to protect him. They both share a dream of one day owning a farm together. The authors have constructed the setting,†¦show more content†¦This is evident when Tom says ‘Ill be damned if I see how you got within a mile of her unless you brought the groceries to the back door. But all the rest of thats a God damned lie. Daisy loved me when she married me and she loves me now’. Tom’s view on marriage is much different from Gatsby’s. Tom sees love as a possession and marriage as a way of owning another person. Gatsby sees marriage as an expression of love. This is evident when Gatsby responds ‘You loved me too?’ after Daisy had confessed her love to him. West Egg, East Egg and The Valley of Ashes have been used to represent the three different types of classes in society during the 1920s. The construction of the setting has been used to show us the conflict between the people who had old money with the people who had new money and how people with no money were isolated from the high class and overlooked. The conflicts between the classes show us that the pursuing the American Dream may lead to wealth and prosperity, but it certainly does not provide happiness among people. The Great Depression was the result of life during the Roaring Twenties. People heavily valued materialism and hedonism which in-turn made many people try to find a way to gain a large amount of money in a short period of time. As more and more people were intoxicated with greed and selfishness, they became more careless through their actions and made many mistakes. These mistakes led to theShow MoreRelatedAnalysis Of Walt Whitman s I Hear America Poem1314 Words   |  6 Pagespresent–, made infograph, and even a multigenre project. We also can’t forget the books we’ve read in class, like poems from Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, and novels from F. Scott Fitzgerald, and we can’t forget novella like Of Mice and Men or short stories that we read in our English textbook. All of these things have tested my ability to better improve myself or inform me on where I struggle with so I can improve in many categories such as being a speaker, reader, writer, and listenerRead MoreThemes And Styles Of John Steinbeck s The 4033 Words   |  17 Pagesspent the majority of his childhood there and readers learn about his home city and childhood in his works. Steinbeck wrote novels, non-fiction books, short stories, poetry, and plays. Some of his most impactful and recognized works include: Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, The Pearl, The Moon is Down, East of Eden, In Dubious Battle, and Tortilla Flat. He was an investigative journalist who worked for the San Francisco News during his lifetime. He was a very controversial writer whose goalRead More Censorship in the Classroom Essay2774 Words   |  12 PagesPenthouse or Playboy, or even in hard-core porn on the internet. Yet according to Ken Donelson, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings has gotten the second highest number of complaints in the last ten years, with twenty-three. Only Steinbecks Of Mice and Men had more, with twenty-nine (Donelson, 1997). Other complaints against I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings called the novel graphic and said that it raised sexual issues without moral resolu tion (Foerstel, 1994).    This is an example