Themes From American Literature (Required)

One theme from American Literature is the American Dream. The American Dream is a theme created in America, which basically says that all Americans have the equal amount of opportunity to pursue whatever their dreams are, and that anyone in America can achieve their goal.

In words of James Truslow Adams,
"The American Dream is "that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper classes to interpret adequately, and too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position."

We see the American Dream in Roy Hobbs throughout the entire novel. A poor, country boy who lives on a farm was how Roy Hobbs started off. His love for baseball carried him from a farm-boy to a rich, and famous baseball player. If this transition is anything, it is the American Dream. Boys don't start out in the middle of nowhere raising cattle and end up in the Major Leagues rich and famous. The American Dream is one for everyone of all ages, boy or girl, big or small, etc. Hobbs transition is easily an example of the American Dream because he starts out poor and a nobody and ends up the exact opposite, and what he's always dreamt of being.

The American Dream, a dream in which all people who come to America think, "I am going to do whatever I want, and I am going to be extremely successful in doing it," is the exact theme Roy Hobbs portrays in The Natural by following his dreams of becoming a baseball player.