Pop Goes the Dream

So Gatsby is a self made man. Be it. But what came out of it?

Jay Gatsby, in the Roaring Twenties novel, "Great Gatsby", by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is illustrated as a self made man who has built his wealth and reputation in a common goal to get his dream girl, Daisy Faye Buchanan. Sadly a few problems already rest for Gatsby. She's already married, Jay; if you want a girl, you gotta go get her quick if you really want her.

But once he has finished building his ability to run parties on a weekly basis, Daisy was already married. While the that fact allowed Gatsby to be held 'esteemed' among his 'peers' (oh, the irony), he had only one goal to achieve such success: Daisy. Once he loses this sense of goal, he lacks a reason to continue on. In this sense, he loses nothing when Wilson kills him. 

This seems to be a running theme between pieces from Fitzgerald; another example is his short story, "Winter Dreams", in which Dexter goes after a deja vu - causing rich girl named Judy Jones. Dexter also happens to be a "self-made man". But similar to Jay, he finds Judy, many years later, not only married, but left without her beauty. 

Society considers 'self-made' an extraordinary attribute. But even such can lack a meaning if dreams are popped. 

"We made ourselves, one by one like Lego blocks

Got the fire in me goin, blocks melt down

What's this for if I can even tell who I am

Let me break back apart and organize my dreams"

-Fana, "Still a Team"