Theme Of Self Fulfillment In The Great Gatsby

In the play Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller and in the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, both text creators use their main character to display how to attempt to overcome the inevitable adversity that comes with the pursuit of self-fulfillment. The quote “Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction.” by John F Kennedy greatly resembles the ideas proposed by the text creators through Gatsby and Willy Loman. Throughout the sources, both Willy Loman and Jay Gatsby pursue the American Dream relentlessly to the brink, where they ultimately drown in the relaxing pool of self-fulfillment that is death. However, in their attempt to secure the satisfaction of self-fulfillment, the main characters are used by the

To start, Gatsby was a well-planned out man who persevered his way into fulfillment. At Jay’s funeral, his father, Henry tells Nick about the daily schedule that Jay used when he was young. The reason F. Scott Fitzgerald used this in the novel was to add the trait of more perseverance to the character of Gatsby. Another example is Gatsby’s love life. After meeting Daisy for the first time, he fell in love with her. However, he felt as though he was not good enough and therefore went to Oxford to complete his education. By the time Gatsby returned, Daisy was already with Tom. This caused Gatsby to throw parties in hopes of getting Daisy’s attention, even though she was married. That is textbook perseverance: not giving up even when there is little to no hope left. Therefore, throughout the novel Fitzgerald used the idea of perseverance as a symbol of self-fulfillment by giving the trait to the wealthiest man, Jay Gatsby. Another symbol used as self-fulfillment is the idea of persistence. While perseverance and persistence are closely related, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses them in a different way to promote the same idea. When Gatsby is chasing his American Dream of getting back together with Daisy, his