The Great Gatsby and the American Dream The Great Gatsby depicts the story of a young man trying to win back a long-lost love. Nick Carraway tells the story of the future in the order of the events in which they occurred. The story of Gatsby and Daisy is only on the surface, in fact, The Great Gatsby communicates a larger theme. The Great Gatsby exposes the ugly truth about chasing the American dream. A common misconception about the American dream is that anyone has the potential to acquire a fortune and reverse the past. Gatsby is considered rich, but there is a difference between the rich. Gatsby earned his wealth through organized crime and smuggling. Daisy was born into an aristocratic family. Unlike Gatsby, who is vulgar, he believes he can become anything he wants and erase his past, which he does successfully. Jay Gatsby is not his real name, but James Gatz is. Nick mentions in his narration: “James Gatz__that was really, or at least legally, his name. He had changed it at the age of seventeen and at the precise moment that marked the beginning of his career: when he saw Dan Cody's yacht drop anchor on the most insidious flat of Lake Superior. (104) As Jay Gatsby, the person formerly known as James Gatz wanted people to see him as someone who was successful and constantly threw lavish parties attended by rich and famous guests. He didn't want people to know that he was actually James Gatz from North Dakota, whose parents were unsuccessful farmers. His American dream includes Daisy Buchanan, who married Tom Buchanan at the end of World War I instead of waiting for Gatsby. In 1917, as Gatsby prepares to go fight in the war, he meets Daisy, an extremely wealthy young woman from Louisville who has many suitors hoping to win her love. He expected Daisy to marry him when he returned from the war, but Daisy had already married Tom and was still on her honeymoon in France. Even though Daisy is married, Gatsby feels the love of a woman he briefly loved. “Gatsby fired all the servants from his house a week ago and replaced them with half a dozen others… “I wanted someone who didn't gossip. Daisy comes quite often – in the afternoon. » (119, 120) Gatsby defends his actions by arguing that he does not want his servants to find out and gossip about his affair with Daisy. This happens after Tom and Daisy attend one of Gatsby's parties, and Daisy did not appreciate the loud nature of Gatsby's parties. He has an ulterior motive for appealing to Daisy's wishes: to make Daisy say that she had never loved Tom. After the party, Gatsby told Nick that Daisy didn't like the party and dismissed Nick's question about his dancing with Daisy. Nick comments in his story: "He [Gatsby] wanted nothing less from Daisy than for her to go to Tom and say, 'I never loved you.' After she had cleared three years of prison time with this sentence, they were able to decide on the most practical steps to take. One was that, once she was free, they would return to Louisville and get married at her house – if that was five years ago. Gatsby wants Daisy to tell Tom that she never loved him during those years and believes that a single sentence is powerful enough to separate Daisy and Tom. Gatsby has oversimplified the method of separating the couple and does not consider Daisy and Tom having a child together. He doesn't understand