Behavior Vs Environment Essay Research Paper There

Behavior Vs. Environment Essay, Research Paper

There is a very direct similarity between one.s behavior and one.s

environment. Humans are products of the environments they inhabit. Humans evolve

and adopt behaviors which are very similar to those found in their social

climate. This is especially true when examining the characters of F. Scott

Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald presents the characters in his novels as products of a

society void of moral integrity. Since Fitzgerald.s protagonists in The Last

Tycoon, The Great Gatsby, and Tender is The Night, succumb to the moral desert

of high society, they end their lives in failure. Fitzgerald places his

protagonist in The Last Tycoon, The Great Gatsby , and Tender is The Night, in

the moral desert of high society; an environment very foreign to these

characters. Jay Gatsby, the protagonist in The Great Gatsby, is drawn into the

decadent and morally defunct society of upper-class Long Island. Daisy

illustrates the moral void that exists in the Long Island society when she

discusses her daughter with Nick. Daisy says: It.ll show you how I.ve gotten

to feel about–things. Well, she was less than an hour old and Tom was God knows

where. I woke up out of the ether with an utterly abandoned feeling, and asked

the nurse right away if it was a boy or a girl. She told me it was a girl and so

I turned my head away and wept. .All right,. I said, .I.m glad it.s a

girl. And I hope she.ll be a fool– that.s the best thing a girl can be in

this world, a beautiful little fool.. … I (Nick) felt the basic insincerity

of what she had said. It made me uneasy… as if she had asserted her membership

in a rather distinguished secret society to which she and Tom belonged (21).

Daisy depicts the moral void that exists in Gatsby.s society with her

insensitive and selfish response to her daughter.s birth. In addition to this

Daisy also depicts the snobbery that exists in this society through the way she

treats Nick, the narrator of the novel. Nick makes an observation that shows the

lack of moral value held by the Long Island society when he describes Tom and

Daisy. Nick says, "They were careless people, Tom and Daisy — they smashed

up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast

carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people

clean up the mess they had made . . ."(180) These quotes clearly illustrate

the insensitivity, snobbery and utter selfishness held by those who inhabit the

morally void society. This society influences Gatsby.s moral decline. The

amoral Long Island society in The Great Gatsby is very similar to the corrupt

Hollywood society found in The Last Tycoon. Again in The Last Tycoon the

protagonist is catapulted into a corrupt society that is unfamiliar to him. The

protagonist Stahr, has entered into a deviant society saturated with characters

full of lust, greed, and capitalism. The narrator depicts the valueless society

and what it can do to decent people when describing the character Reinmund. The

narrator says: Reinmund was a handsome young opportunist, with a fairly good

education. Originally a man of some character, he was being forced daily by his

anomalous position into devious ways of acting and thinking. He was a bad man

now, as men go. At thirty he had none of the virtues which either gentile

Americans or Jews are taught to think admirable. (46) Reindmund is

representative of many of the people living in Hollywood. Therefore the above

quote proves Stahr did in fact enter into a society lacking virtue. The moral

decay of this society can also be seen through the characters Cecilia Brady, and

her father, Pat Brady. Cecilia Brady is a character of very little moral value.

She lusts after Stahr and throws herself at him while he is involved with the

woman of his dreams, Thalia. Her father Pat Brady is an equally immoral

character. An example of this behavior can be seen when he attempts to steal the

production business from his partner. He tries to achieve this when Stahr (his

business partner) is extremely ill in New York. Not only is Brady a shady

businessman he also a capitalist participating in the immoral act of degrading

the art of film-making to increase profits. Writer R. A. Gallo, makes a similar

observation about Hollywood.s cultural wasteland as she writes: In The Last

Tycoon Fitzgerald examines his conception of the contemporary wasteland. The

deprivation of the Hollywood wasteland is cultural. Films have become a

bastardized art form, exploited by the Bradys whose interest in the .booming

circus. stops at the box office. (120) The behaviors of Pat, Cecilia and

Reinmund clearly illustrates the state of moral decay that Stahr.s Hollywood

find acceptable. The moral decay of Hollywood spilled over to the society of

Tender is the Night. In Tender is the Night , the pro

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