Indulgence And Indignation

Francis Scott Fitzgerald has long been considered one of the most famous writers in the Golden Age, with his masterpiece The Great Gatsby widely acknowledged as an important literary achievement in the American history. In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald has expressed either explicitly or implicitly his paradoxical perceptions of social wealth, which are originally derived from his particular life experiences. Through his spokesman Nick in the novel, the money complex incorporated with indulgence and indignation in Fitzgerald has been comprehensively exposed, which indicates his philosophical viewpoint that money can and can not bring people happiness, so the conflicts between materialism and spiritualism have been and will be a thorny problem for human when the atmosphere of business transactions strengthens. As money-worships have become a social phenomenon, human values have been transformed and sentiments been commercialized, which causes the imbalances between material desires and spiritual pursuits that make social disorders and psychological problems inevitable. To a certain extent, it is the dual effects of money that have created Gatsby's tragedy, which symbolizes the failure of the American dream in a society where people's life has been mostly taken up by the temptations of money. Generally, the complicated relationships between the problem of social wealth and human values is an eternal theme that needs constant pondering, as it has long been and will still be influencing the development of social civilization. Therefore, Fitzgerald's paradoxical perceptions of social wealth in The Great Gatsby have certain universal and realistic meanings.