You All Know The Story Of The Other Woman Analysis

The reality of heartbreak and injustice in marital affairs is similarly criticized in both F. Scott Fitzgerald’s modernist novel The Great Gatsby and Anne Sexton’s poem “You All Know the Story of the Other Woman”. Both texts display the other man or woman’s obsession with a fake or previous relationship. However, while Sexton’s poem attacks the cheating man and emphasizes his arrogance, Fitzgerald’s passage focuses more on denouncing Gatsby’s impractical hope and ludicrous belief in reliving the past (110). The phone mentioned in Sexton’s poem is also symbolic in The Great Gatsby. In the poem, the mistress is being placed “like a phone, back on the hook” by her lover, demonstrating how temporary their romance is and how hooked on the woman is (18). Indeed, she is waiting at his command to be used again when he desires. Likewise, Gatsby waits for Daisy’s call that never comes. He is also being kept on a hook, waiting for a call from the person he loves but loves him back only temporarily (161). Moreover, both works address the trouble the “other (wo)man” has with letting go of the past. They over-immerse themselves
Instead, Fitzgerald disapproves of Gatsby’s naivety and claims the loss of memories were “all going by too fast now for his blurred eyes” (153). Also, this passage mostly reminisces happy memories and then compares them with Gatsby’s now bitter, vacant heart which felt “he was leaving her behind”, as if there was anything left to find (152). Evidently, Sexton believes the power the man holds over his mistress is wrong and passive-aggressively states “She is his selection, part time” (16). Meanwhile, Gatsby’s desperate snatch of of a wisp of air “to save a fragment of the spot that she had made lovely for him” proves the endless chasing of an unattainable dream will lead to ultimate doom. Either way, someone has to hang up