Great Gatsby Entry #3

Blog Entry # 3 (Ch.2 pgs. 23-38)

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

     The first paragraph of chapter two talks about the valley of ashes, which is the place Nick and Tom Buchanan are traveling to meet Tom’s mistress. Tom pursues wealth and his own pleasure. The ashes represent the trail he leaves behind. Moreover, the valleys of ashes symbolize the decay that men create in society through their pursuit of selfish desires. For example, “…men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air,” (Fitzgerald, 23). The ashes also represent the life of the poor. They live in the filthy ashes created by the wealthy in their pursuit of pleasure. They live in an “impenetrable cloud” where they cannot rise above the ashes to escape to a better life. In these ashes the rich are able to conceal their operations from their acquaintances. “Occasionally a line of gray cars crawls along an invisible track, gives out a ghastly creak, and comes to rest, and immediately the ash-gray men swarm up with leaden spades and stir up an impenetrable cloud, which screens there obscure operations from your sight,” (Fitzgerald, 23).