An Important Quote from the Great Gatsby

“This isn’t just an epigram–life is much more successfully looked at from a single window, after all.” (Fitzgerald 4).
This Novel is like an exceptionally elongated poem. Poems are usually meant to be taken apart and analyzed because there are many ways to view it. The Great Gatsby is a fine example of this. There are many symbols and representations of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s view of the 1920’s as a whole. He demonstrates his view towards the current affairs in the US through the characters and objects. Nick is the most rational of all the characters, which allows readers to connect with him the most. I believe that this quote is the most important line because it is foreshadowing what to anticipate in the approaching chapters and represents one of the major symbols. The simplest and most efficient way to understand what Nick, as a character, and Fitzgerald as the creator of the character, means by this quote would be to break it into pieces. Epigram can be defined as a witty saying tersely expressed.

They are used to sum up something and are often used in the wrong situation, but in Nick’s case it is exactly what needs to be said. The idea of looking through a single window is one of morality and uncomplicatedness. Your actions and thoughts would go to whomever they are needed to go, and wouldn’t get mistranslated or end up with the wrong person. I think what Nick is trying to say is that it is easier to uncover the unknown when you are the one looking in at it with only one opinion. Life is more productive when lies aren’t discovered by the person being lied to. As if questions that were mean to be asked weren’t. The Great Gatsby is a tale of love affairs and materialism, but is meant to teach America a lesson. The American Dream can be seen as pursuing ones goals and ambitions to ultimately make money and survive in this society, and of course many loose what is exceedingly more important along the way, determining what is good from evil and morals.

Most of the characters in the Great Gatsby are the ones who took the American Dream and shaped it into a disfigured and unjust, washed up scheme. When lies have to be told to keep everyday life from chaos; that is when something has gone wrong. Throughout the book many coverts are known by the reader and eventually found out by certain characters. Tom Buchanan and Myrtle Wilson’s affair is an example of false secrecy. In the beginning of the novel when Nick Carraway visits Tom’s house in East Egg, he learns of Myrtle through Jordan Baker. Jordan tells him to be quiet while she listened in on Daisy and Tom. He had no idea what was going on, which led her to say, “You mean to say you don’t know?” she asked honestly surprised, “I thought everybody knew.” (Fitzgerald 15).

Everyone knows this marriage of Tom and Daisy’s is broken by his affair and no one says anything, as if there is still something to be hidden. The eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg symbolize the all seeing eyes of God. When George Wilson locks Myrtle in the closet he tells her “you cannot hide your sins from the eyes of God”. As he says that, he makes her looks out the window only to see the immense blue eyes of Eckleburg on a billboard outside. The eyes are religiously affiliated and another way of looking at it is that God is replaced with capitalism in this world of prolific materialism, instead of actual religion; God is shown in an advertisement. The doctor’s eyes show that even when looking through a single window, there is always another dimension.