Topic > Theme of Women in The Great Gatsby - 1815

Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby satirizes 1920s America as a time of fame, glamour, and excitement. It's a time when women greatly influence culture. Although Fitzgerald uses women as vital characters in his novel to symbolize the beauty, status, and personality behind the ideology of the American dream, there is still a widespread idea that a woman's role should not overlap with that of a man. Men mainly dominate women. Women are commonly evolving into the new mode of flappers sporting knee-highs and baggy dresses. Their behavior and attitude contribute to the carelessness of the era and the drive towards the American dream. The characters Daisy Buchanan and Myrtle Wilson exemplify the plight of women in 1920s America in The Great Women in this era are considered “their celebrity and the fact that their public manners and physical appearance so suited perfectly to the fascinating and unbridled images projected in Scott's piece. They didn't make the twenties, they did the twenties” (Moore 71). Zelda, Fitzgerald's wife, had a great impact on the culture of the 1920s as a prominent woman in society. She projected the character of Zelda onto Daisy as a model of what women should be like in that society. Fitzgerald uses flowers as an ascetic representation of temporary beauty, which is particularly emphasized in the names of Margaret and Myrtle. A daisy, which is a delicate flower, represents beauty and purity. For Jay Gatsby the name is apt. However, this beauty and purity represented by the petals is short-lived, as at the center is yellow, which represents its greed, poor values ​​and corruption of morals. The core represents his willingness to lie and deceive for the good of the social class. Fitzgerald uses the term “women” only when referring to lower-class women, but refers to wealthy women, like Daisy, as “girls.” As the flower dies, it represents how her love for Gatsby died just as quickly. His name represents the consumerism of the time and the belief that one is better than what one has, the empty values. Myrtle is a flowering shrub, with white flowers but dark berries, as it looks beautiful but has dark elements. The dark berries foreshadow the blood of his impending murder. Myrtle is described as a "rougher" plant than a daisy, describing how Myrtle is lower class than Daisy, but acts above her actual social position, through behaviors such as "Myrtle raised her eyebrows in desperation at the 'impotence of the lower orders' (69). A myrtle flower is immortal and Myrtle emphasizes this and foreshadows her impending murder through statements such as "Everyone