“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” are the founding rights upon which the wonderful and majestic country that is the United States of America was founded. These rights have sprouted the hope and aspiration to achieve the glorious and golden concept of the American dream of equality, democracy and material prosperity, but the gold is nothing more than mere gilding that obscures the hidden and unattainable nature of the American dream . Jay Gatsby, in F. Scott Fitzgerald's American classic The Great Gatsby, is a self-made millionaire and ultimately pays the price of achieving the American dream with his life, both physically and emotionally. The life that Gatsby experiences in his pursuit of material prosperity reflects both the lives of those in modern America who have achieved or want to achieve the American Dream. Gatsby's desire to achieve the unjustly coveted American dream is realized with his romantic obsession with Daisy Buchanan. , a woman with whom he had had an affair before leaving for the First World War. Gatsby correctly knew that he needed money in order to woo Daisy, who comes from a wealthy family, so he put his focus on prosperity into action. Many Americans today, like Gatsby, believe that money is the key to a life full of happiness, love, and wonder. Americans take on careers, jobs, and investments that don't satisfy them in the slightest in an attempt to achieve this seemingly gilded lifestyle goal of celebrities and entrepreneurs. The fame that comes with being a celebrity or entrepreneur does not make them immune to ridicule, speculation, loneliness or exploitation. Those chasing the American Dream may see the ultimate goal of becoming rich enough for all their problems to disappear, but this… middle of paper… happy. In Gatsby's effort to achieve happiness and love, his life becomes the embodiment of the American man trying to reach the top to live a better life that was promised to him and the man who now realizes that the summit is not as great as it seemed when he was climbing the social and economic ladder. Fitzgerald shows us that the American dream, while it can be achieved by anyone, of any background, is really just a little nugget of gold covered in fields of sand and mud that hide what little value actually exists. The American Dream isn't as big as it once was; it has been tainted and corrupted beyond the point of desirability. Best put into perspective by George Carlin, "The reason they call it the American dream is because you have to be asleep to believe it." Works Cited Fitzgerald, F Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Scribner Paperback Fiction, 1925. Print.