I really liked this quote from The Great Gatsby, because to me it is the quintessence of the American development and the different aspects of the American dream that are often romanticized. To me, the conflicting ideas of the 20s are really just embodied in this novel, this quote, and the numerous multi-faceted contradictions embedded in society. The idea of the Lost Generation influenced me in a way, and the golden decade of the 20s definitely stood out in this time period. I love to look at history in a retrospective way, and this quote provides some idea of the contrast from the 15th century to the 20th. I couldn’t help but think about whether man’s “capacity for wonder” really has developed into just a depressing amount of praise for mediocrity, considering what America used to be.
