Essay | Symbolism and Nick

F. Scott Fitzgerald uses symbolism in "The Great Gatsby" to portray Nick's openness to entering a new phase in his life. In one specific quote, much of Nick's attitude and excitement for change is shown. Through the symbolism of spring and the approaching summer, the reader knows that Nick has found a point of turnaround in his life. As Nick was taking a walk in West Egg after he had recently moved there, a man asked him how to get to West Egg Village. Nick told him, and then felt a point of change in his heart that West Egg was now home, and he finally belonged to it and its surroundings. He said, "And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees--just as things grow in fast movies--I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer"(8). When Nick...
(read more)