The Great Gatsby & Enduring Love Comparative Essay ‘Obsessive Love Has the Capacity to Drive a Person to Insanity, Leading to Irrational Behaviour, Alienation and Despair’ Compare and Contrast the Ways Mcewan and
The Great Gatsby & Enduring Love
‘Obsessive love has the capacity to drive a person to insanity, leading to irrational behaviour, alienation and despair’
Compare and contrast the ways McEwan and Fitzgerald present the complexities of human love in light of this comment.
F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ian McEwanpresent obsessive Idealised love as deranged and harmful.Fitzgerald’s ‘The Great Gatsby’, published in 1925,epitomises the euphoric atmosphere which permeated consumerist attitudes after WW1, during the period known as the ‘Roaring Twenties’ a revolutionary time associated with breaking tradition, Modernism, rapid technological change andnew definitions of the ‘modern’ woman. Fitzgerald’sfictional characters can be understood asvictims of a Capitalist culture which valued materialism over personal integrity. Complexities of love and lust co-exist with cultural conflict andmoral blindness in adecade dubbed by the French as ‘l’années folles’; (the crazy years1.) McEwan’s Post-modern novel ‘Enduring Love’, published and set in 1990's, also explores the damaging and potentially destructive consequences of intense and passionate desire. Both authors convey the complexion of human emotionand explore how obsessive love differs from the conventional view of romantic love. Sharing the theme ofidealised love, presented as unwavering loyalty and passion, the authors take these traits to extremes. McEwan questions what we think we understand and making the reader uncomfortable; pastiche of narrative style catches the reader off guard, especially when the novel switches abruptly from being a philosophical exploration of ideas to a thriller style, metafiction which challenges the suspension of disbelief by being self referential. McEwan, strongly influenced by E.O. Wilson’s critical scientific development of socio-biology and uses the narrative to explore aspects of human love and the evolutionary mechanics behind behaviours such as altruism and aggression. Both novels
‘Obsessive love has the capacity to drive a person to insanity, leading to irrational behaviour, alienation and despair’
Compare and contrast the ways McEwan and Fitzgerald present the complexities of human love in light of this comment.
F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ian McEwanpresent obsessive Idealised love as deranged and harmful.Fitzgerald’s ‘The Great Gatsby’, published in 1925,epitomises the euphoric atmosphere which permeated consumerist attitudes after WW1, during the period known as the ‘Roaring Twenties’ a revolutionary time associated with breaking tradition, Modernism, rapid technological change andnew definitions of the ‘modern’ woman. Fitzgerald’sfictional characters can be understood asvictims of a Capitalist culture which valued materialism over personal integrity. Complexities of love and lust co-exist with cultural conflict andmoral blindness in adecade dubbed by the French as ‘l’années folles’; (the crazy years1.) McEwan’s Post-modern novel ‘Enduring Love’, published and set in 1990's, also explores the damaging and potentially destructive consequences of intense and passionate desire. Both authors convey the complexion of human emotionand explore how obsessive love differs from the conventional view of romantic love. Sharing the theme ofidealised love, presented as unwavering loyalty and passion, the authors take these traits to extremes. McEwan questions what we think we understand and making the reader uncomfortable; pastiche of narrative style catches the reader off guard, especially when the novel switches abruptly from being a philosophical exploration of ideas to a thriller style, metafiction which challenges the suspension of disbelief by being self referential. McEwan, strongly influenced by E.O. Wilson’s critical scientific development of socio-biology and uses the narrative to explore aspects of human love and the evolutionary mechanics behind behaviours such as altruism and aggression. Both novels
Bibliography: 1. Andrew Lamb (2000). 150 Years of Popular Musical Theatre.Yale U.P..p. 195. http://books.google.com/books?id=wYfyNV5FUQEC&pg=PA195. 2. 'You Are What You Own: A Marxist Reading of The Great Gatsby ' Lois Tyson http://www.yorknotes.com/alevel/the-great-gatsby/study/contexts-critical-debates/04010301_critical-debates 3. ‘The Great Gatsby: Thirty-Six Years After’ by A. E. Dyson. 4. ‘love’. Oxford Dictionaries. April 2010. Oxford Dictionaries. April 2010. Oxford University Press. 04 December 2012 <http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/love>. 5. “insane, adj. (and n.)". OED Online. September 2012. Oxford University Press. 6 December 2012 <http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/96605?redirectedFrom=insane>. 6.