The Great Gatsby: The American Dream In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses many repeated references to time to draw attention to the so called "American Dream", which is something Jay Gatsby sorely desires in this novel. Time is the most important motif in The Great Gatsby by far. There are over 450 time words, and the word itself appears 87 times. Gatsby always seems to want to go back into time to recapture Daisy's heart and get back to that perfect moment in time. Some episodes which symbolize time are when Gatsby knocks over a clock during his reunion with Daisy and Nick's famous list of people who attended Gatsby's