GRAY ANALYSIS Sydney Dawson

Deja KearnyMalik Goods

Excerpts “Occasionally a line of gray cars crawls along

an invisible track, … and immediately the ash-gray men swarm up.. the gray land”(Fitzgerald 23).

“Wilson’s glazed eyes turned out to the ash heaps, where small gray clouds took on fantastic shape”(Fitzgerald 159).

“At the gray tea hour there were always rooms that throbbed incessantly with this low, sweet fever, while fresh faces drifted here and there like rose petals blown by the sad horns around the floor”(Fitzgerald 151).

Excerpt 1

“Occasionally a line of gray cars crawls along an invisible track, … and immediately the ash-gray men swarm up.. the gray land”(Fitzgerald 23).

Objects : The land, the cars and the people living there.Characters: The people living in the Valley of Ashes for example Wilson.Meaning: The use of color symbolism helps you to understand the extreme poverty and despair. It also shows the death of peoples America Dream.

Excerpt 2 “Wilson’s glazed eyes turned out to the

ash heaps, where small gray clouds took on fantastic shape”(Fitzgerald 159).

Objects: gray cloudsCharacters: WilsonMeaning: The symbolic meaning of the gray clouds is the lost American Dream Wilson used to have. I believe that the color gray represents the lost dreams and despair of the people who live in the valley of ashes.

Excerpt 3 “At the gray tea hour there were always rooms

that throbbed incessantly with this low, sweet fever, while fresh faces drifted here and there like rose petals blown by the sad horns around the floor”(Fitzgerald 151).

Object: Tea , Flower petalsCharacter: Daisy Meaning: The color gray shows lack of happiness. The tea hour use to be an exciting social time. Now it has faded because the lack of a dream. It shows that it has a repetitive meaning to it now.

Through the entire novel so far, what is the one central meaning of the color?

The color symbolism of gray represents a sense of despair and lost dreams. For example, this is seen with Wilson’s life, The Valley of Ashes, and Daisy’s tone. With Wilson it shows that he is sad because he could not obtain his dream of a happy life with Myrtle. It also shows how he sad about Myrtles death. The valley of ashes shows the death of peoples American Dreams. Therefore gray shows that because of sadness some people may never fulfill their American Dream.

Which of the following characters is symbolically represented by your color?

The character most symbolically represented by the color gray is Wilson because of he is detached from life. Wilsons life is dull without love because he wants to be happily married to myrtle. Therefore, Wilson’s character shows the color gray in “The Great Gatsby” because of his lack of emotion from life and unhappiness even though his American Dream differs from the average person. This shows that the dream is just false hope of having the perfect life with the perfect person.