论了不起的盖茨比中颜色的运用理论

英美文学期末论文

论文题目：The theory of the exquisite design of color in“The great Gatsby”

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The theory of the exquisite design of color in

“The great Gatsby”

Abstract

“The great Gatsby” is regarded as the masterpiece of the famous Fitzgerald,which is regarded as “one of the greatest novels in the 20th century”. When you are reading the “The great Gatsby”, do you have noticed a disti nction of it ,the utilization of various colors,and every color in the novel has its own profound meaning.In this paper,we will appreciate four colors of “The great Gatsby” together. Key words:The great Gatsby Fitzgerald Color Metaphor

“The great Gatsby” is regarded as the masterpiece of the famous Fitzgerald,which is regarded as “one of the greatest novels in the 20th century”,and it is also the most favorite novel of Haruki Murakami ,the famous contemporary Japanese novelist. Its fancinnating plots, picturesque descriptions and profound expose, which all embody Fitzgerald’s transcendental talent, can not content the whole execellence of this great novel——the novel’s splendidness is much more than that.When you are reading the “The great Gatsby”, I do n’t know whether you have noticed a distinction of it ,the utilization of various colors, and the interleaving of colors reveals the leitmotiv of the novel, that the huge gap of the ideal and reality would break the vacuous American dream. In this paper, w e will analyze “The great Gatsby” from the point of view of colors and choose 4 commonly used colors of the it, which include green, white, yellow and blue, to understand the role of colors in this novel.

Green

Green is the color of the vegetation in the natural, which can remind people of the growth of the grass and trees, and it has the meaning of health, energy, hope and ter , the growth of the vegetation is used to describe the growth of people themselves, and green started to be describe the specially youthful spirit of the youngest, however at the same time ,green also has the metaphor meaning of immatureness, naivete, and inexperience. In the novel, the main incarnate of green is the green light ,which is as a symple of the pursuit of Gatsby, and green is dominant tone of Gatsby’s whole life, which implies the immature procession of the protagonist of setting the goal,pursiting the dream and his dream’s disillusionment .

The first apparence of green is in Gatsby’s seventeen years old, and at tha t time

Gatsby is working in the fields wearing a green sweatshirt,who is energetic , vibrant as well as with a better vision for the future and convinced the motto that "pay a return".Therefore during this period green foreshadows Gatsby’s confidence for t he future life.

The other important incarnate of green is the green light in Daisy’s villa, which appeared 3 times in novel.The first is at the end of the chapter 1, when Nick arrives in West Egg merely, unfamiliar with the surroundings.One night, Nick goes out of his room, sees his neighbor gazing into the distance at the seaside,”......he streched out his arms towards the dark water in a curious ,and far as I was from him I could have sworn he was trembling. Involutarily I glanced seaward ——and distingguished nothing expect a single green light ,minite and far away ,that might have been the end of a dock......”, the green light is the right light in the Daisy’s villa.Here green refers to Gatsby’s pursuit and dream,to retrieve Daisy’s love, to live a luxury living. Meanwhile, green hints the dream of Gatsby is naive and unreal, and he even haven’t thought of whether Daisy treasure his love as himself, indeed in Daisy’s heart nothing is important than her splendor, which reflects the tragedy of Gatsby.

The second of appearance the green light is in the chapter 5, Gatsby met Daisy in his villa finally with the help of Nick, and after showing his wealth and achievement, Gatsby says to Daisy “If there is no fog, we can see the green light in your villa.” Here the green light disappears, which hints the failure of Gatsby in the end that al his efforts were in vain.

And the third appearance of the green light is at the end of novel, where Daisy killed Tom's mistress,and Gatsby became Daisy’s scapegoat and is murder red by Wilson.After Gatsby’s death, Nick once said “Gatsby believed in the green light ,the orgastic future that year by year reedes before us ,It eludes us then ,but that no matter—tomorow we will run faster ,stretch our arms farther...... ”.The believer of green light Gatsby dead, and the dream of Gatsby disillusioned. Nevertheless, the beginning of his dream is wrong, and here the green light is an irony of the values that “the gospel of mammon”.

White

As green is the color of Gatsby , white is the color of Daisy. In Western culture,white has the meaning of holiness, naive, fragrant and elegant.And in the novel, Fitzgerald used white to describe Daisy many times.

At the beginning of novel , the authors writes the villa of Tom and Daisy was white,what’s more ,the curtains of theirs is white as well “......A breeze blew through the room ,blew curtains in at one end and out at the other like pale flags......”.When Nick first meet Daisy , she wears a white dress talking with Jordan, and when Daisy goes to meet Gatsby at the first time, she ride the white car, wears a white dress.In addition, in the chapter 6 Nick has sighed “Daisy is a princess living in a white palace, unattainable”. On the surface, white endues holiness, naive, fragrant and elegant with Daisy,as a matter of fact, Fitzgerald intimates that Daisy is greedy, ruthless and selfish, and her emptiness, wanderer and mercilessness in the spirit level.