Sign Up Now
Get instant access to over 1 million+ study documents
OR
Already registered? click here to login
By creating your account, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and student honor code.
Roaring 20s
First published in 1922 in Metropolitan Magazine, F. Scott Fitzgerald's "Winter Dreams" chronicles the life of Dexter Green, a hardworking ambitious young man who wants success and ultimately achieves it. The story highlights themes such as success, failure, loss of traditional ideals but above all, "Winter Dreams" reflects Fitzgerald's perspective on the American Dream.
Set in the Roaring '20s, in the aftermath of the World War I, Fitzgerald's short story looks at the dramatic transformations undergone by contemporary American society. Traditional beliefs that had shaped American society were being replaced with confusion which resulted in the rejection of conventional morality. In the 1920s, Americans embraced a new found freedom expressed through clothing, behavioral patterns, as well as the arts. Fitzgerald called this decade the "Jazz Age," a term which embodied the cultural revolution that defined the decade in question. However, Fitzgerald focuses on how these societal changes affected mentalities by studying the birth and shaping of the American Dream in the 1920s.
In "Winter Dreams," Dexter's ideal of success is characterized by wealth and social status. The opportunities provided by the new century motivate young men and women of the 1920s to dream of success from early ages. This is also the case of Dexter who, working at a local golf course, envisions himself becoming a golf champion. His dreams of success are fueled by his love for Judy Jones who becomes the embodiment of his "winter dreams" of accessing a glittering world which appears full of possibilities and fulfillment. However, just as underneath Judy Jones's exterior lies a dangerous combination of shallowness and bitterness, the interior of this glamorous world is hollow and devoid of true values and meaning. In this sense, Fitzgerald builds an image of a hollow American Dream, one that is characterized by disappointment, loneliness and profound failure as far as the truly important things in life.
Fitzgerald, Scott F., Winter Dreams. Available online at
Behavioral Finance and Human Interaction a Study of the Decision-Making Processes Impacting Financial Markets Understanding the Stock Market Contrasting Financial Theories Flaws of the Efficient Market Hypothesis Financial Bubbles and Chaos The stock market's dominant theory, the efficient market hypothesis (EMH) has been greatly criticized recently for its failure to account for human errors, heuristic bias, use of misinformation, psychological tendencies, in determining future expected performance and obtainable profits. Existing evidence indicates that past confidence in the
Objective observers cannot but agree that the world has never been a better place than this and now. Norberg ascribes and attributes the swift adoption of globalization to the freedom of decision-making, whereby it has enabled individuals and economic freedom as the precedence for political freedom (2003). He writes: In the long run, it is hard for dictatorships, once they have accepted economic freedom, to avoid introducing political liberty as well
Great Gatsby: A Novel of Reinvention "The 1920s were characterized by conservatism, affluence, and cultural frivolity, yet it was also a time of social economic and political change. The first modern decade in American history paved the way for the reforms of the 1930s. American popular culture began to reflect an urban, industrial, consumer oriented society" (Ingui, 89). The strong economic boom following the Great War gave birth to a
We learn that our way of life can change practically overnight. We learn that suffering on a massive scale can happen from just a few high-level missteps. But perhaps most importantly, we learn that the American spirit has an amazing capacity for resourcefulness and resilience -- a lesson that might comfort us in our own times of worry. Works Cited "Always Lending a Helping Hand: Sevier County Remembers the Great Depression."
Chaos and Disintegration As Yeats noted in “The Second Coming,” things fall apart when the center cannot hold. This was how Yeats characterized the seeming collapse of society between the Wars. The 1920s were Roaring in America (but that would end with a bust and a Great Depression). In Germany, the 1920s were abysmally bad: hyperinflation and immorality, the Cabaret, Anita Berber, poverty, prostitution, despair—that was life for Germans in the
OZ and Transition The Wizard of Oz provides Americans with a text that helps them make the transition from the country to the city and sets the stage for the commodified American popular culture of the 20th century. This paper will show how, thanks to its pristine (Emerald) beauty and adventurous episodes, Oz makes "the city" much more appealing than the muted, old-fashioned of America. It will also explain why Dorothy