Title: American Dream Faces Harsh New Reality : NPR
Headings: American Dream Faces Harsh New Reality
American Dreams: Then And Now
American Dream Faces Harsh New Reality
Uniquely American
A Long History Of Optimism
Around the Nation
We Want To Know: What Is Your American Dream?
Skepticism Grows

Content: Historians say that text marked the American Dream's emergence into the spotlight. Yet the underlying themes had been bubbling up through the American psyche for much longer. In 1925, F. Scott Fitzgerald opened his iconic novel The Great Gatsby with these lines: In my younger and more vulnerable years, my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone, he told me, just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had. The American motifs of growth and optimism even stretch back as far as the Constitutional Convention. "The chair in which Washington sat had a sun, and the question was asked, is it rising or setting?" White says. " And the framers answered that question by saying it's a rising sun." At that time, the American Dream was not available to everyone in the country.