The Importance Of Love Life In The Great Gatsby By F. Scott Fitzgerald

Motivational speaker and best-selling author Steve Maraboli once stated that “the past will be your teacher if you learn from it; your master if you live in it”; this, in many ways, can be applied to scenarios in life. It can also be applied to American novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald’s personal life as well as his most famous novel, The Great Gatsby as the concept and role of the past is brought into question multiple times. Much of Fitzgerald’s love life can be seen through the relationships of the characters in Gatsby such as the tumultuous romance between Daisy and Gatsby and this was done intentionally by the author to cement his experiences in life within a novel that he died believing was a failure. Outside of Daisy and Gatsby’s relationship

On the other hand, there is Nick Carraway who demonstrates the constructive forces that will Daisy and Gatsby together; because Nick is biased and shares many of the same opinions as Gatsby as a result of their friendship, Nick becomes the reassurance for Gatsby that what he is doing is logical and moral when, in reality, Gatsby is completely disillusioned by his love for Daisy. Ironically, Fitzgerald also wrote himself into each of the characters within the novel to illustrate how he embodies both destructive and constructive forces, a paradox that displays the disillusionment of both Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship and Fitzgerald and Zelda’s relationship. Fitzgerald weaves the lust-and-love filled story of Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan to mirror his own life with his wife, Zelda, and writes himself into each character in the process to illustrate the opposing factors in relationships within The Great Gatsby as well as his own personal

In the glorious aftermath of Fitzgerald’s first successful novel, they became accustomed to the glamorous celebrity life that was available to them but not long after, Zelda’s physical and mental health began deteriorating which effectively placed hardships on their marriage. The Fitzgerald family traveled frequently, never permanently residing anywhere but instead moving from hotel room to apartment to rental home for the majority of their lives. During one of their stays in France in 1928, Zelda begins practicing dance and is invited to dance with the Royal Ballet of Italy and although she declines, she continues to dance which eventually leads to her first hospitalization in Switzerland for exhaustion. Here, she is officially diagnosed with schizophrenia. From this point on, Zelda is almost constantly in a mental health institution such as the Johns Hopkins Hospital while Fitzgerald drowns himself in alcoholism to cope with the deterioration of not only his wife but his marriage as well. Even though their relationship suffered heavy burdens, their love undoubtedly persevered, seen through the multitude of letters between the two as Zelda was hospitalized. In one 1930 letter to Fitzgerald, Zelda wrote “Wasn’t it fun to laugh together over the phone? You are so infinitely sweet and dear – O my dear – my love, my infinitely inexpressible sweet darling dear, I love you so much…If all