《推销员之死》与《伟大的盖茨比》之 美国梦分析 American Dream

10届英语系12010011100 夏理想

“American Dream”

“American dream” is essence of the American aspirations, fairy tales and spirit which has a long-standing history. Puritan has put the liberalism and democracy into the “American dream” for the first time. Opening up virgin soil for almost two centuries has a determined and momentous influence on shaping the national value and spirit. At the early stage, immigrants developed the dream of freedom, equality and democracy to a high way-----adequately promoting the active and positive spirit of “American dream”. As a matter of fact, we know some great people on American history who fulfill their dreams triumphantly by countless labor and sweats. For instance, Franklin, Lincoln, they are all the typical representatives of the “American dream”--- proclaiming to every resident on the earth: Only if you are diligent enough, honesty enough, confident enough, you can achieve success on this great land where it’s full of equal opportunities.

When coming into the 1920s, the economy of American was in a high speed with enormous changes taken place in material life. However, it also brought about a series of mental confusion to people with which they were hard to deal. The “American dream” which once pushed American people ahead was shocked by itself. The torch of freedom, equality, and democracy was dimmed because of the replacement of money worshipping. Both the and manifested the perishing of the “American dream”.

Gatsby dedicated himself to fulfilling his dream which was the combination of wealth and love. In his heart, Daisy was pure like white snow, beautiful like a flower. Her images represented all the virtues of the select society. Five years passed away, Daisy has been a common lady who connected to the high-class community so tightly that she has already possessed vanity and degradation. However, Gatsby’s pursuit would never cease with shrugging off the reality. The writer emphasized on the fragment of the “American dream” by the forward description of Daisy’s behaviors. The illusion of the nature of the “American dream” was revealed by her selfishness and cruelness. The poor guy----Gatsby who couldn’t distinguish what is reality and what is dream. He has been living in a world he created by himself where he worshipped the whole spirits of the select society which has gone long time ago. His death was not only the destruction of his own dream, but also the whole “American dream”.

Whitley is the main character of who was a travel promoter and made great contributions to his company. However, since that day when he was fired, Whitley proved to us that he was a definite loser and he was the living victim of the “American dream”. He was actually a nobody from whom we can witness the contradiction of reality and imagination. Superficially, he devoted most of his life to work, but he couldn’t even afford the house loan. At the respect of education about his two son, he was a loser neither. Even at the moment when he prepared to commit suicide, he was proud of himself exchanging his life with dollars.

Both these two things happened in 1920s or 1930s. The workers couldn’t succeed by efforts unless by some illegal means in that corruptive society. The two men couldn’t adapt to the capitalistic development and eventually were repelled by the cool society.