After reading A Raisin in the Sun and The Great Gatsby, The two books are from complete opposite perspectives, and I came to the conclusion that we read them in the wrong order. This sounds kind of silly, but the way that the American Dream is presented in both caused me to to come this conclusion. A Raisin in the Sun should’ve been read first to get an idea of how it is difficult to achieve the American Dream when one is poor. Once we had that in our heads, we should’ve read Gatsby to show that being rich and also having achieved the American Dream can be just as bad, if not worse, than being in poverty.
A Raisin in the Sun follows working-class family who has just come into an extra sum of money left over in the father’s will. The American Dream is a major theme of the book, but the family hasn’t achieved it. The lack of the dream is more evident. Walter tries to reach his dream by using the money to invest in a liquor store, but they get duped and the money is stolen. The whole play focuses on the hardships of being poor, and how difficult it is to obtain the American Dream from nothing. They still end up with a new house, but they altogether don’t increase in happiness very much. We should have read this one first; we would’ve gone into The Great Gatsby already seeing what it is to be poor, and starting a new book to see what is to be wealth.
The Great Gatsby focuses on the upper class lifestyle, and the ritzy luxury that it entails. On the outside, being rich seems awesome, but Nick describes a lot of it as phony. While people are having a good time in Gatsby, a lot of it is portrayed as false happiness, and an obligation to be elegant just because of one’s social class (Daisy’s fake laughter comes to mind). In addition to that, a lot of pretty bad stuff happens- Tom and Daisy cheat on each other, there’s some sketchy insider trading business, and three people get killed. That’s even worse than the events in Raisin in the Sun.
I think it would’ve been really interesting to read Raisin in the Sun first, to get an idea of the hardships of being poor. We probably would’ve all had the opinion that living in conditions such as those and also achieving the American Dream would be very difficult, and rich people have it easy. Then, when we read The Great Gatsby, we would be expecting something a little less dark and more to do with those who have achieved the American Dream already. It couldn’t be as bad as poverty, right? WRONG. We would’ve seen that those particular wealthy people’s lives all kind of suck. They’re also pretty bad people.
A Raisin in the Sun and The Great Gatsby both portray the American Dream from different perspectives; from those who are poor and can’t achieve it, and from those who are rich and have already achieved it. The way that the books are written make it seem as if neither option is a very good thing. That isn’t to say that one can’t be poor and be happy or be rich and be happy, but from these viewpoints, that’s pretty much what it’s saying.
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