Najlepsza discusses: Valley of Ashes with The Great Gatsby (2023)

WGran Gatsbybetween sparkling emotionManhattan and the majestic East and West Egg mansions,through the area covered with dust and ash from the nearby factories is a terrible stretch of road.

Why does the novel insist on spending time in this depressing place? Why, instead of simply calling it Queens or giving it a fictitious name, does Nick refer to it by the vaguely Biblical "valley of ashes"?

In this article I will analyze this powerful symbol.failure of the american dream, analyzes where it appears in the text, finds the characters they most associate with that place, and gives tips on how to write essays about that image.

A quick note about our quotes

Our format for citations in this guide is (chapter.paragraph). We use this system because there are several editions of Gatsby, so using page numbers will only work for students with our copy of the book.

To find a quote we quoted in a chapter and paragraph in your book, you can look at it (paragraph 1-50: start of chapter; 50-100: middle of chapter; 100-onwards: end of chapter) or use search if you are using the online version or the text eReader.

Where is the Valley of Ashes?Gran Gatsby?

Ash Valley is a dismal industrial district in Queens that sits between West Egg and Manhattan. It's not actually made of ash, but it looks like it because it's gray and smoky.

This gray and dust are directly related to the factories that are nearby.—their chimneys cover everything with a layer of soot and ash.

The valley is adjacent to the railroad tracks and the highway that runs from West Egg to Manhattan - Nick and other characters travel through it on both modes of transportation.

There is also a small river and a drawbridge in the area where the factory's products are shipped to their destinations.

Key quotes about the Valley of Ashes

Before we find out what the ash piles mean as a symbol, let's take a close look at the times they appear in The Great Gatsby.

Episode 2

After speaking to us of the "beautiful health that is drawn from the young air that he breathes" (1.12) ofwestern eggWChapter 1, Nick shows us how the dazzling wealth of the nouveau riche who live there accumulates. Much of it comes from industry: factories polluting the countryside, creating a "grotesque" and "ghostly" version of the beautiful countryside.

Instead of the bucolic green image of an ordinary farm,here we have a "fantastic farm" (fantastic here means "something from fantasy land") that produces ashes instead of wheatand where pollution makes the water "polluted" and the air "dusty."

DiezimagesGrowth has two purposes.

• First, it's worrisome because it's clearly meant to be.The beauty of the natural world has been transformed into a horrifying hellscape of gray ash.Not only that, but it turns ordinary people into "ash gray people" who "swarm" like insects around factories and freight trains (this is the "grey wagon line"). These are people who can enjoy neither the luxury of living on Long Island nor the faster-paced anonymous entertainment that Nick enjoys in Manhattan. in the novelthe world of keepers and keepersThose are the ones that don't have.

• Second, the extract showshow disconnected are the rich from the source of their wealth. Nick is upset when he is a passenger on the train who has to wait for the drawbridge to bring the barges. But barges transport construction products from factories. Nick is a bond trader, and bonds are basically loans made to companies (companies sell shares of bonds, use that money to grow, and then have to pay that money back to the people who bought the bonds). In the 1920s, the bond market fueled the construction of skyscrapers, especially in New York City. In other words,the same building boom that is turning Queens into a valley of ashes is also elevating the new moneyed class that populates West Egg.

"Oh, sure," Wilson agreed hastily, and walked into the small office, which immediately blended in with the concrete-colored walls. The white ash dust enveloped his dark suit and blond hair, as it obscured everything near him, except his wife, who approached Tom. (2.17)

In the valley,there is such a thick layer of gray dust that it seems that everything is made of this ash. It should be noted that from the general description of people as "ash gray men" we now see that the ash description refers specifically togeorge wilson. It is covered with a "veil" of despair, sadness, hopelessness and everything else associated with ashes.

we see that toomirto wilsonIt's the only thing that isn't covered in ashes.. It stands out visually from its surroundings because it does not blend in with the "cement color" that surrounds it. It makes sense because he's an ambitious character who wants to get away with it. He notes that he literally chases Tom, allying himself with a rich man who only walks over ash heaps on his way from better place to better place.

Chapter 4

One secondWest and East Egg are scenes of absurd extravaganceboth the old and new money crowd, andManhattan is home to business and organized crime.,the valley of the ashes is usually the place where the novel places dirty and insidious manipulationsthat show the dark side of the surrounding glow.

Check how many unethical things are going on here:

• Gatsby wants Nick to set him up with Daisy so they can have an affair.

• Mrs. Wilson's "breathing vitality" reminds us of her completely unpleasant relationship with Tom.

• A police officer fires Gatsby for speeding due to Gatsby's connections.

• Nick jokes about Gatsby's bleak story about being an Oxford man.

• Gatsby suggests that he do something possibly illegal for the police commissioner (possibly supply him with alcohol?), which results in the commissioner being permanently in his pocket.

Chapter 8

Wilson's glassy eyes looked up at the ash-heaps, where little gray clouds took on fantastic shapes and fluttered here and there in the faint morning breeze. (8,101)

This brief mention of the ash heaps once again provides a shocking conclusion to the chapter.positions Wilson as a man emerging from a gray world of factory ash and dust. Notice how the word "fantastic" keeps coming up. The twisted and terrifying world of Ash Valley is expanding. It's not just buildings, roads and people anymore, that's what Wilson's sky is made of. At the same time, combined with Wilson's "glazed" eyes, the word "fantastic" seems to indicate his deteriorating state of mind.

No phone message came, but the butler was awake and waited for him until four in the afternoon; much later there was no one to pass it on to if he arrived. My idea is that Gatsby himself didn't think he was coming and maybe he didn't care anymore. If that was true, he must have felt that he had lost the warm old world, that he had paid a heavy price for living too long on a single dream. He had to look at the unknown sky through the terrifying leaves and shuddered to discover how grotesque a rose was and how the harsh sunlight fell on the barely made grass. A new world, material but not real, where poor ghosts, breathing in dreams like air, floated freely. . . like this fantastic ashen figure gliding towards him through the shapeless trees. (8,110)

The last reference to the ash piles occurs at the time of the murder-suicide when George stalks towards Gatsby by floating in his pool. Again, the ashen world is "fantastic," a word reminiscent of fairy tales and ghost stories, especially when combined with Wilson's eerie description as a "floating figure" and strangely shapeless and out of focus ( "amorphous"). trees.

is significantWhat threatens Eggs' fantasy world is the creeping ashthat they look down on and dislike so much.

But truth be told, I'm also not a big fan of dust getting into my house.

The meaning and importance of the Valley of Ashes inGran Gatsby

In a world of novels that tell so much about the stark differences between the rich, the struggling, and the poor,The valley of the ashes represents the forgotten poor class that makes life possible for a handful of rich people. The people who live and work there are factory workers, whose production fuels the construction boom that provides wealth for the residents of West Egg, as well as allowing the criminal underclass to thrive by creating bogus bonds to collect (this is a illegal activity that Gatsby tempts). Nick).

This region of industrial production is shown burying its inhabitants in a contaminated byproduct of its factories: ash that covers everything from cars to buildings to people. This literal burial also has a symbolic meaning, asthose who cannot sneak to the top are left behind and stagnant. The valley is a place of hopelessness, loss, and resignation.This is emphasized by the fact that Myrtle Wilson is the only resident of the ash heap who isn't covered in gray dust: she's ambitious enough to try to hitch her cart to Tom and hopes to be his ticket out of this life until tomorrow. final. . On the other hand, even though Wilson is also trying to leave the dump by moving to another part of the state, her defeatist attitude and her general weakness doom her escape attempt.

At the same time, the expression "valley of ash" connects with the Biblical "valley of the shadow of death" from Psalm 23. In the Psalm, this terrifying place is saved by the presence of God. But in the novelthere is no divine presence or higher moral authority in the valley. Instead, the ashes indicate an inexorable march towards death and decay., linking this valley to Anglican services recalling that the body is "dust to dust, dust to dust". Even when George tries to feel the divine presence throughthe eyes of Dr. T.J. eckleburg, the fact that the inanimate presence of this billboard affects no one else also dooms George.

Characters, motifs, motifs and symbols related to the Valley of Ashes

george wilson:George Wilson's garage is in the middle of the valley.He is so strongly identified with this place that at the end of his book he is described as "a figure from the ashes."It's almost smudged with the dust that covers everything in this Queens neighborhood. He is also the weakest, most hopeless, and least ambitious character in the book, traits that doom him to the cynical, selfish, and amoral world that Fitzgerald describes, and traits that are consistent with what the ash heaps represent.

mirto wilson:George's wife remains vibrant and colorful despite living amidst ash heaps for 11 years. Her escape dreams allow her to avoid being covered in dust, which eventually suffocates everyone else. However, as her path away from her centers on Tom, Ash Valley becomes Myrtle's death trap.

society and class:Anyone who can afford to move out of the dirty, dreary valley does, which means the only people who live and work there are those who have no other choice. The state of the area shows what happens in a culture where overtaking is valued above all else: those who cannot succeed in these cruel conditions have no choice but to be buried alive by pollution and misery.

The eyes of Dr. TJ Eckleburg:A billboard with the strikingly haunting Dr. TJ Eckleburg's disembodied giant eyes sits in the middle of the valley of ashes, right next to Wilson's garage.Just as ash piles reveal the great chasm between the poor and the rich, so eyes stare at the havoc wreaked by careless capitalism.The look seems accusing, but of course the eyes are completely inanimate, so the guilt they evoke in the person they look at vanishes almost instantly. The eyes speak of a lack of God/religion in the novel and that George is the only person who outwardly gives them more importance than Nick and Tom without the conviction that they feel uncomfortable under his gaze.

Symbols: Colors.Fitzgerald does not deviate from the standard association of gray in this novel. He describes things that are dirty, unpleasant, boring, uninteresting, monotonous, and generally depressing; all these qualities are also associated with ash heaps. When this color is combined with ash, it also means death, decay, and destruction (all fun "d" words).

Theme: cars.Although most of the time the novel treats automobiles as a dangerous, exciting, and liberating mode of transportation, these positive qualities vanish when automobiles enter the valley of death:

• At the softer end, there is constant movement. (Nick complains about waiting for the barges to go under the drawbridge.)

• There is also the risk of running out of fuel. (Tom, Nick and Jordan stop at Wilson's gas station to refuel because Gatsby's false empty gas warning upsets Nick.)

• And, of course, accidents are common (as evidenced by both the drunken accident Nick sees leaving Gatsby's party and Tom's gleeful exclamation that the accident means more business for Wilson's garage as they get closer). to the Myrtle hit-and-run scene).

• At last,Ash piles are the site of Myrtle's death in the car,when Daisy runs her over, which brings us back to the novel's constant theme of death and failure.

This may be the first time a drawbridge has been directly linked to a murder...

Essay Ideas and Tips for Writing about the Valley of Ashes

Now that we've explored the layers of meaning beyond the valley of ashes, you're in a good place to think about how to write about this symbol.

Tips for Writing About Symbols

Here are some tips for writing an essay on the role of a symbol in a novel, including Valley of Ashes:

• Create from text.In this article, I first looked at the valley of ashes as the novel's setting before writing about its general meaning and connections. The same approach is worth remembering in his own essay. Work from the small ideas to the big ones and you will support your arguments.

• Make an argument.Simply describing the symbol and explaining its possible meanings is not enough. Instead, you need to make sure you say something about why/how the symbol works. How do you know if you are arguing and not just stating the obvious? If you can imagine someone arguing the opposite of what you are saying, then you have an argument on your hands.

• Don't overdo it.Sure, the ash piles could be said to represent many things: the failure of the American dream, the lowly position of the working class in the novel, or how death sets the stage for a brilliant life in Manhattan and ballrooms. But that's not to say it also means doomed love, Gatsby's mysterious past, or international collaborations. In other words, be careful not to stretch symbol parsing too far from what the text tells you.

Essay Ideas for the Valley of Ashes

These are some possible essay arguments. You can build on them as they are, discuss their opposites, or use them as starting points for your own interpretation.

1. Valley of Ashes shows what happens to people who try to live the American dream through honest, hard work: they end up nowhere.

2. The valley of ashes is only the most obvious place of decay in the novel. In fact, all the places show traces of rot and decay, which is the basis of the seemingly brilliant lifestyle of wealthy heroes.

3. For Myrtle, Ash Valley is a trap from which there is no escape, as the Buchanan estate is for Daisy.

The whole place might as well be surrounded by barbed wire because it's easy to escape.

bottom line

• Ash Valley is a dismal industrial district in Queens between West Egg and Manhattan. It's not actually made of ash, but it looks like it because it's gray and smoky.

• The valley is mentioned in:
• Chapter 2 where Nick details what the place is like before going there to meet Myrtle, Tom's lover.
• Chapter 4 where Gatsby can show the cop his secret ticket exit card and also ask Nick to set him up with Daisy.
• Chapter 8 where a beaten and depressed Wilson looks at piles of ash trying to find divine moral guidance.

• This symbol is related to discussions about:
• Class division because it means the forgotten poor underclass that allows the lifestyle of a rich few.
• The way the working class is left behind when this place literally buries its inhabitants in the polluted byproducts of its factories and figuratively buries those who can't trick their way to the top only to sink into hopelessness and despair. despair.
• No system of moral values, which is especially lacking in the valley, which has no divine presence or higher authority beyond a creepy, inanimate billboard.

• The characters, themes, symbols and motifs most associated with the valley of ash are:
• George Wilson, whose garage is in the middle of the valley.
• Myrtle Wilson, who remains alive and colorful despite living amidst ash piles for 11 years.
• Society and class because everyone who can afford to move out of the dirty, depressing valley does, which means the only people left to live and work there are those who have no other choice.
• The Eyes of Doctor TJ Eckleburg, a billboard that makes no mention of God or any religion in the novel.
• The theme of colors, where gray describes things that are dirty, unpleasant, boring, uninteresting, monotonous and generally depressing.
• The issue of cars that every time they enter the valley of death lose their usually positive associations.

Whats Next?

visit againEpisode 2,Chapter 4, IChapter 8Dosee the context surrounding the mention of the valley and its mounds. You can even investigate why Ash Valley almost stands alonehere is the title of the novel.

Consider the characters inJerzyImirto wilsonunderstand why he succumbs to the ashes and she rises above them. You can also read aboutall other symbolsWGran Gatsby.

While the Valley of Ashes is aboutimagesItone words, there are several othersiterative elementsin the game inGran Gatsby. learn to recognizepersonificationIrhetorical tricks in actionwith our guides.

You have to test your knowledge ofliterary mediaand poetic terminology for English/literature classes?keep readingassonance,iambic pentameter, Ipoint of view.