F. Scott Fitzgerald's masterpiece The Great Gatsby employs objects as narrative tools to reconstruct the landscape of the Jazz Age. Since the "object turning" in the 1990s, objects have become important parts to analyze literal works. In this novel, daily items such as clothing, telephones, and automobiles are used to integrate the characteristics of the age into his fictional narrative, providing a depiction, interpretation, and critique of the material culture of America in the 1920s. Serving as hidden threads, these objects closely interweave the leisure fashions, moral changes, class ascensions, and spiritual desolation of this age, revealing rich historical implications and a strong critical tone. The new materialistic writing od this novel not only portrays the Jazz Age as materially prosperous but spiritually decadent, but also profoundly criticizes the erosion of human nature and morality by consumerism, offering a unique perspective for the study of 20th-century American literature and providing significant insights for our times marked by increasing material prosperity.
Li Wanting (Wed,) studied this question.