Blog Post 21

Throughout the book we have seen the use of many colors. The author is incorporating different colors into his text to stand for much bigger things. When Nick arrives home after his dinner at Toms house, he looks out and see's what we can assume is The Great Gatsby himself standing on the end of a pier staring off into the distance at a flashing green light. Into the second chapter, around the beginning we are told about the valley of ashes which is located around the middle of the West Egg and New York. On page 27 there is a brief description of the Valley of Ashes: "where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens, where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air" (27). This Valley is described with words such as smoke, dim, and ashes. All of these words resemble the color gray. I think the authors used the green light in the two eggs as a bright color, possibly representing wealth and money. Back then, brighter colors cost much more. In the valley, where people have less money, all the stuff is dull and gray. The colors in these 2 chapters show the difference between the residents in the two areas.