Consequences of False Illusions People tend to forget the negative parts of the past, holding on to the positive ones and idealizing them to create nostalgia. It's easy to romanticize and live in the past to avoid difficulties in the present. The past becomes a false illusion and an enchanted and safe refuge from the corruption of reality. However, trying to apply false illusions to reality leads to isolation and corruption. F. Scott Fitzgerald's book, The Great Gatsby, investigates the harmful effects of longing for a false sense of security in the past. Gatsby's obsession with false hope and an idealization of the past contrasts with the Lost Generation's attempt to find self-fulfillment after the war and the American dream that disillusioned them. Gatsby's feeble attempt to live in an idealization of the past to escape the corruption of the present traps him in an illusion. He longs for Daisy's perfection and the young love they shared. He overly idealizes the past, demonstrated by his reunion with Daisy where yellow is used as an enchanted color. It is most evident when Nick describes “the pale golden smell of kiss me at the gate” which represents Gatsby's attraction to another flower: Daisy (90). The pale gold lacks luster, resembling an enchanted past that is fading away without Gatsby realizing it. The inability is due to the fact that his alter ego, Jay Gatsby, is created through a seventeen-year-old boy's naive ideas about love and Daisy's acceptance by putting "some idea of ​​himself...into the love Daisy" (110). The innocence and childlike imagination that James Gatz uses to create his false identity causes an excessive idealization of the past. As time passes, he adds new expectations until it transforms into a “colossal vitality of his illusion” and in...... middle of paper... a larger version of the lake: a miniature embodiment of his quest of the past like James Gatz. Gatsby avoids the reality of living in isolation by nurturing romantic love with Daisy from his dreams. Gatsby never had a genuine relationship which is a consequence of pursuing the American dream and also a reason why the Lost Generation stopped believing in false hopes. Gatsby represents the many reasons why the Lost Generation gave up on America's past of hopes and dreams and began to find themselves. -realization in the present. Unlike Gatsby, they tried to avoid the consequences of pursuing a single dream. They were unable to hope for a better future and realized the real corruption and isolation when the Great Depression hit. Not living a life of illusions for some future or past, decreases optimism but at the same time improves the life of the present of reality.