Winter Dreams of Spring and Then Wakes Up.

F. Scott Fitzgerald-- now there is a guy who could write about the American Dream. Perhaps "Winter Dreams" and American Dreams are synonymous. Winter dreams are of the coming summer just as American dreams are of a future happy. Let's explore this idea further...
*drum roll*

Dexter Green is such an obvious specimen of a Dream seeker. He is a rags-to-riches man who starts as a caddy and eventually makes his fortune. He's got good looks, a work ethic, and either luck or good business sense. He even has a hot love affair. We can also check materialism off on his list: "He wanted not association with glittering things and glittering people - he wanted the glittering things themselves" (1645).

However, not all that glitters is gold. Dexter's good looks and youthful vigor will fade. His money and comfort turn out to be no substitution for true happiness. What he really wants, a permanent relationship with the fabulous Judy Jones, he cannot have. He cannot even hold onto the idea of her fabulousness. At the end of the story, "the dream was gone... even the grief he could have borne was left behind in the country of illusion, of youth, of the richness of life, where his winter dreams had flourished" (1658). So, dreams flourish in illusion? Does this mean that the American Dream is an impossibility because it is not based in reality? This must be true for Dexter, who has it all -- otherwise why is he so sad? Even if he had Judy, I do not think the story would have ended any happier because he says, "No disillusion as to the world in which she had grown up could cure his illusion as to her desirability" (1652). Her desirability is just a mirage. The Dream merely serves to draw us along, appearing to us like the water of happiness in a world gone crazy, and we can do nothing but stumble after it, soaking our clothes with sweat. Perhaps this is why Dexter made so much money in the laundry business.

Is the oasis real?