Gatsby's Great Love

Why the “Great” Gatsby? What’s so great about this fool who gave up his everything for a woman, who is herself wholly ungreat? After my first reading, these were my thoughts. However, as I read the book again, this time in English, and watched the movie, I began to feel different about Gatsby. Now I can say that it is really the “Great Gatsby”, because his love was worth the word. Although unfruitful in reality as Daisy deserted him in the end, I believe his love was what we would call ‘true love’, because he was faithful to it every moment of his life.

Gatsby is a millionaire who throws huge parties every week at his castle of a house, but he is a lonely person who lives alone without friends. “I”, Nick Caraway, who had moved from the West to New York to work in Wall Street, settled next door to Gatsby. Daisy, Nick’s cousin, and Tom Buchanan, live right across the bay in a luxurious mansion that could be seen directly from Gatsby’s house. The story line is simple. Gatsby and Daisy were a couple, but when Gatsby was away for long in army, Daisy, tired of waiting, got married to Tom. Gatsby comes back 5 years later, still firmly believing in Daisy’s love, and he tries to retrieve her and relive the past.

Among the many themes in the novel, “love” caught my attention the most. What is it that we call “love”? Was Daisy and Gatsby’s relationship love? After much mulling over, I came to the conclusion that there is no such thing as a universal definition of love; no one can define it because everyone can in their own unique ways. For some, precious emotions of flitting moments, such as the quiet thrill of one’s beating heart, or the magical pleasure brought on by someone’s smile, might be love in itself. For people like Tom, love could simply mean physical pleasure, and for those like Daisy, a way to ensure a wealthy and secure life.

So if one asks if Gatsby and Daisy had really loved one another, the answer is yes. One of the most memorable quotes was on Gatsby and Daisy’s first kiss. “He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning fork that had been struck upon a star. Then he kissed her.” That instant just before their kiss, when they had looked into each other’s eyes in silence, so much meaning had been poured out and shared between the two: anticipation, responsibility, fate, and love. That moment’s lingering was the essence of Gatsby and Daisy’s love. A moment so cherished cannot have another name than love.

However, although all kinds of things could be called “love”, not all can have the prefix “true” or “great”. To make a love “great”, one needs to take responsibility for it; that is, be faithful to it until the end, no matter what the consequences. Daisy had loved Gatsby, and we cannot deny that fact. However, her love was not “great” as she cold-heartedly discarded Gatsby in search for security in life. Gatsby, on the other hand, had stayed near Daisy till the end in an effort to “protect her from Tom”, and had held on to his dreams of his future with her. He was completely wrong about Daisy: she wasn’t threatened by Tom but was rather planning with him to put all the blame of murder on Gatsby and to run away. The consequence of Gatsby’s love was tragic as he got murdered and ferociously slandered by people even after death. Yet, unlike that of Daisy, his love was great because he had taken responsibility for it.

When we love, it is a matter of two people not one. The moments spent in love are shared and the promises bound to both of the lovers. So a love can be great only when it is based on respect and responsibility. Gatsby is “The Great Gatsby” because he took responsibility for his love with Daisy until the last moment, and thus made the love everlasting, alive in the hearts of millions today as a green light of inexhaustible hope.

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