Name one flaw it has

She is a representation of the green light

I think that the context is sort of irrelevant in this case, that the context and story just exists to convey the message. Fitzgerald happened to live during that certain time with those values and issues in society and therefore they were present in the story, but that doesn't mean that the book was about them.

>But this isn't Gatsby's story exactly. It's Nick's story. And Nick's story is one of a man deeply in the closet, who looks at Gatsby as an aspirational proxy for himself. He is fixated in particular on Gatsby's romance with Daisy because it represents (to him) Gatsby's romantic devotion to a woman--something which Nick himself is incapable of possessing. Nick's infatuation with Gatsby is an infatuation with the man Nick desperately wants to be--which all the social pressures of his time tell him he wants to be--but which he cannot achieve.

This is a really interesting caveat, not discussed enough, and you put it very well. Thank you!

Very true, I agree with that, the good thing about complex novels is that it can be interpreted accurately in many ways.

Sure, this was in the book, but it's literature. What the book is about is not what the words literally say.

He used a description of society at the time to represent his message, by nature of him being a smart man and a wonderful author a description of a flawed society will reflect those flaws.

The wealth was not the focus, it was just the median.

This is literature, what is literally written means little and serves to represent a deeper message.

The class values he sought were just part of the green light.

Couldn't have said it better!

The Great Gatsby is my favorite novel, and I'm a die-hard Fitzgerald fan. I disagree with the idea that the book is some critique about society, certainly that's in there but it's just a side effect of accurately describing society at that time.

The book is about the green light, it is about chasing a mirror image of yourself, Gatsby never wanted Daisy he just wanted the image of him that he dreamed about and she was a part of that fantasy.

It is not a critique of society, sure that's in it but that is not what the book it about.

The book is about the green light at the end of Daisy's dock, nothing more and nothing less. The book is about chasing that idealized, not even fully formed, fantasy in your head of who you want to see when you look in the mirror.