Something I noticed while reading The Great Gatsby

[cattink]

Maybe I'm just biased/skewing things since I love the movie 500 Days of Summer so much, but I've been wanting to share this and swap opinions. Sadly, I don't have enough fellow English geek friends.

Please don't judge me, but I hadn't read Gatsby until this year in AP Lang. We were discussing chapter six in class quite a while ago and suddenly the similarities clicked.

Jay Gatsby and Tom Hansen are both heavily idealistic men who deeply adore their respective love interests. Daisy and Summer both return interest, but to nowhere near the same degree as their men. Both girls also give up on their men and marry someone else.

Also, Gatsby's party in chapter six reminded me quite a bit of the "Expectations vs. Reality" scene in 500 Days of Summer. Jay even describes his expectations to Nick, and has to watch the reality of Daisy being monopolized for most of the evening by her husband.

Again, I'm probably just reading too far into things (as usual), but the English teachers at my school I've shared this with thought it was an interesting find...

[xxxsylviaplathxxx]

Both Gastby and (500) Days of Summer make great use of the classic romance archetypes. Since Gatsby is such a popular and classic novel, I think the writer and director for (500) Days must have some knowledge of the book.

Nice observation, though! I never saw that before.

[Tori]

Wow! I never noticed that before either! I adore the book and the movie, so this is really neat to think about!

[Gina]

Wow! That's awesome! I had never thought of that, and I love the movie even more now!

P.S.- No worries, I hadn't read the book until AP Lang this year either.

[Dodger Thirteen]

May 29, 2011 18:59:48 GMT -5 cattink said:

Please don't judge me, but I hadn't read Gatsby until this year in AP Lang.

That's nothing. I'm going into my fifth year of uni and only just started reading The Great Gatsby this summer. I had no idea what the book was about going into it, either. This is, actually, everything I knew about it:

1. The narrator's name was Nick Carraway.
2. There were characters named Daisy and Gatsby.
3. Gatsby threw parties.

And that's it. I'm now on chapter four and quite enjoying it, but I have no idea what's going to happen next. And I like it that way.

[To those wondering how I got this far without having to read it, it's simple: I never had to. I took a journalism course in high school and there was no reading. It also threw off my entire English career. I don't recommend doing that.]

[krista]

You made some great points! I really have to re-watch 500 Days of Summer now so I can catch the clues again.

Also, don't be embarrassed that you didn't read the book! I personally haven't read some "classical works" due to what I was taught in school.