Questions: Hemingway and Fitzgerald: The American Dream Reconsidered

Question 1

What do Hemingway and Fitzgerald reveal about the American Dream?

• A. The American Dream is easily achievable
• B. The Dream is corrupted and produces disillusionment rather than fulfillment
• C. The Dream has no relationship to modern life
• D. Pursuit of the Dream strengthens character

Answer: (B)

Rather than celebrating the American Dream's promise, both writers show how the Dream corrupts those who pursue it and produces disillusionment when encountered with reality.

Question 2

How do Hemingway's sparse prose and Fitzgerald's lyrical style each critique American culture?

• A. They use identical techniques
• B. Hemingway's sparse prose strips away illusion to reveal emotional numbness; Fitzgerald's lyricism captures desire's intensity while showing its impossibility
• C. Neither writer offers real critique
• D. Style has no relationship to meaning

Answer: (B)

Different styles serve different critiques: Hemingway's minimalism reveals emotional devastation beneath apparently normal life; Fitzgerald's beautiful language captures the seductiveness of desire while showing its corruption.

Question 3

Both Hemingway and Fitzgerald explored how modern life produces emotional numbness and moral failure in their protagonists.

• T. True
• F. False

Answer: True

This shared concern unites their otherwise distinct works: modern American culture damages human capacity for feeling and moral integrity.

Question 4

The protagonists in Hemingway and Fitzgerald achieve the American Dream through effort and virtue.

• T. True
• F. False

Answer: False

Rather, they struggle between aspiration and reality, finding that the Dream, when pursued or achieved, produces disillusionment and damage.

Question 5

Explain how Hemingway and Fitzgerald's different stylistic approaches each reveal corruption in the American Dream and American culture.

Model answer:

Hemingway's sparse, minimal prose strips away sentimentality and decoration. When Hemingway writes about characters facing modern life, the simplicity of language reveals emotional emptiness and numbness. By what's NOT said, Hemingway shows damage and loss. Fitzgerald's lush, lyrical language captures the seductiveness of American Dream imagery—wealth, beauty, romance, success. But the lyric beauty itself becomes ironic: the gorgeous language describes characters whose dreams corrupt them and who fail morally. Fitzgerald shows how seductive the Dream is, how beautiful the vision, even as he shows its falsity and destructive power. Both critiques work through style: Hemingway's emptiness reveals the Dream's spiritual bankruptcy; Fitzgerald's beauty reveals how the Dream seduces while destroying. Together, they demonstrate that the American Dream itself—with all it promises—is fundamentally corrupted and corrupting.