The Great Gatsby: Text Connections

Text Connections with the Great Gatsby

     The biggest text connection in “the Great Gatsby,” by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is the connection between one of the greatest symbols in the book and the world around us.  The author uses the green light on Daisy’s dock to symbolize the desires of Gatsby, and society in general has those desires that are lost in the past and are, at this point, unachievable.  At the end of the novel, Fitzgerald writes “He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night. Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter — to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther. . . . And one fine morning—— So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past” (180). In this final gesture, Fitzgerald explains how Gatsby chased after a dream that he had hoped to achieve from his past, and this can be related to all of humanity.  People have a tendency to reach into their past and try and bring back their happiest memories that they regret most, and Fitzgerald masterfully presents this idea through his character of Gatsby.