Linking Sonnets From The Portuguese to The Great Gatsby
Linking Sonnets From The Portuguese to The Great Gatsby
1. The Theme of Love
Sonnet 1. Love enters and transforms our life as totally, as unanswerably as Death. Like Death it is a presence we have almost no say in.
In Fitzgerald’s novel how does love transform Gatsby? But does it transform Daisy? Does it enter into the loves of Nick or Jordan Baker?
Sonnet XIV “If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love’s sake only. Do not say
I love her for her smile – her look – her way
Of speaking gently”
Does Gatsby love Daisy in this way? What indications are there that Daisy is precisely loveable for her smile, her voice, her way of speaking, how people feel when they are around her, all she represents --- everything except the real person she is, the person who drifts on through life with Tom. “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made. . .” (p 170)
“She’s got an indiscrete voice”, I remarked. “It’s full of—“I hesitated.
“Her voice is full of money,” he said suddenly.
That was it. I’d never understood before. It was full of money – that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals’ song of it. . . High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden girl . . .” (p 115)
Sonnet XXII “When our two souls stand up erect and strong,
Face to face, silent, drawing nigh and nigher. . .”
This sonnet insists on the ideal love as being completely mutual, a shared openness. Is this the trouble with Gatsby’s love? That it is his love for Daisy, for the ideal Daisy of his mind, his teenage construct of the girl, while the real Daisy is someone else again, a spoiled rich girl who let Tom sweep her off her feet with money, who married him, who now has a child, who doesn’t want to make tough decisions. . .
1. The Theme of Love
Sonnet 1. Love enters and transforms our life as totally, as unanswerably as Death. Like Death it is a presence we have almost no say in.
In Fitzgerald’s novel how does love transform Gatsby? But does it transform Daisy? Does it enter into the loves of Nick or Jordan Baker?
Sonnet XIV “If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love’s sake only. Do not say
I love her for her smile – her look – her way
Of speaking gently”
Does Gatsby love Daisy in this way? What indications are there that Daisy is precisely loveable for her smile, her voice, her way of speaking, how people feel when they are around her, all she represents --- everything except the real person she is, the person who drifts on through life with Tom. “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made. . .” (p 170)
“She’s got an indiscrete voice”, I remarked. “It’s full of—“I hesitated.
“Her voice is full of money,” he said suddenly.
That was it. I’d never understood before. It was full of money – that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it, the cymbals’ song of it. . . High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden girl . . .” (p 115)
Sonnet XXII “When our two souls stand up erect and strong,
Face to face, silent, drawing nigh and nigher. . .”
This sonnet insists on the ideal love as being completely mutual, a shared openness. Is this the trouble with Gatsby’s love? That it is his love for Daisy, for the ideal Daisy of his mind, his teenage construct of the girl, while the real Daisy is someone else again, a spoiled rich girl who let Tom sweep her off her feet with money, who married him, who now has a child, who doesn’t want to make tough decisions. . .