Valley of Ashes as Metaphor in The Great Gatsby Throughout F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, location is a key motif. The contrasts between East and West, East Egg and West Egg, and the two Eggs and New York play important thematic roles and provide the backdrop for the main conflict. However, a middle ground is needed between each of these sites, a buffer zone, so to speak; there is the great distance that separates the East from the West; there is the bay that separates East Egg from West Egg; and there is the Valley of Ashes that separates Long Island from New York. The last of these is probably the most surprising. However, the traditional literal interpretation does not fulfill Fitzgerald's theme as well as a more figurative one would: the "Valley of Ashes" is not a literal valley of ashes, but is rather a figurative description of middle-class and suburban values ​​clashing with those of New York and East and West Egg. Assuming that the valley of ashes is literally a valley strewn with ash, some technical concerns arise. The ashes are light and easily transportable: one expects a Sahara-like desert, but the dust storms described by Nick are rather tame, evoking very familiar human images (23); even those Wilson sees are kind and "cool". (160) Perhaps this state of stasis would emphasize the lack of change, but it would still fail to explain the lack of effect of the rain. The rain would wash away the ashes, or at least make a mess, but it fails to do so; the valley of ashes remains, neither swept away nor swept away: weathering of some kind should eventually purge the valley of its ashes, if one sticks to a strictly literal interpretation. Clearly it is imprudent to take Fitzg...... middle of paper ......ting in the novels of Francis Scott Fitzgerald. Bern: Herbert Lang, 1974.Miller, James E. Jr. "Fitzgerald's Gatsby: The World as a Heap of Ash." In Critical Essays on Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, edited by Scott Donaldson. Boston, Massachusetts: G. K. Hall & Co. 1984. 242-58. Moseley, Edwin M. F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Critical Essay. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1967.Pelzer, Linda Claycomb. Student companion of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Westport, CT: Greenwood P, 2000. Roulston, Robert and Helen H. Roulston. The Winding Road to West Egg: The Artistic Development of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell UP, 1995.Stavola, Thomas J. Scott Fiztgerald: Crisis in American Identity. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1979. Zhang, Aiping. Enchanted Places: The Use of Setting in F. Scott Fitzgerald's Fiction. Westport, CT: Greenwood P, 1997.