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The Great Gatsby

 

            
            
             Scott Fitzgerald portrays the essence of time, and the value of time, in both the past and present. Fitzgerald makes many references to points of time, throughout the story, as told by the narrator Nick Carroway. While Fitzgerald also uses the character Jay Gatsby to portray the effects of trying to turn back time, to the point of never realizing the changes that time has made in the present and for the future.
             Fitzgerald uses a variety of passages to time. To pinpoint only one of the many symbols that represents time in The Great Gatsby would be an injustice to the story as a whole.
             The first symbolism of time is used to set the mood of the era. It was called the Roaring Twenty's. It was a time when everyone forgot all morality and lived each day to fullest with parties, and trying to either stay wealthy or attain wealth.
             Organized crime and bootlegging became powerful because of prohibition. This is how many men gained their wealth in the twenty's. That is how everyone believed Gatsby attained his wealth though nothing could ever be proven.
             Jay Gatsby lived according to the era by throwing one lavish party after another, sparing no expense to impress the people that attended the parties. Although most were never actually invited, they still attended because it is the thing to do for this era. I believe that on the first night I went to Gatsby's house I was one of the few guests who had actually been invited. People were not invited--they went there. (Gatsby, Page 45). .
             The second symbolism of time is the use of the time frames that Nick uses as he narrates the summer events to you. Nick begins by telling you, "In my younger and more vulnerable years .""(Gatsby, Page 5). Nick is actually remembering the story from two years later, "After two years, I remember the rest of that day .""(Gatsby, Page 171).
             Nick proclaims that he came east in the spring of twenty-two. "And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees--just as things grow in fast movies--I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.


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