I recently watched the new Gatsby film starring Leo DiCaprio, and found myself reading the novel again for the tenth time. I couldn't help but notice similarities between the character of Jack and that of Gatsby. There was one obvious difference between the two characters and their respective love and devotion to their particular love interest. It's clear that Gatsby's love was never truly reciprocated, and that the subject of Gatsby's love, the real person was nothing like the image he'd created in his mind. Daisy was unworthy of his love, and a far cry from the woman of his dreams that he loved so passionately.
The tragedy is that the person he loved did not really exist in Daisy...only in his idea of her, how his own idealistic mind had painted her. On the other hand, we have Jack. He loved a person who was worthy of his love, and whom I have no doubt loved him back just as powerfully, though sometimes had trouble expressing it. Ennis loved Jack deeply but was too afraid to make his dreams come true. He knew how he felt about Jack, but was afraid to understand it. Ennis was not an ideal that Jack created in his mind, the real Ennis was indeed the Ennis Jack was in love with and Jack continued to love him despite the frustration and heartache it caused over the years. Unlike poor Gatsby, Jack wasn't in a one-sided ordeal, holding up someone on a pedastal, pretending or being oblivious to the fact that this person's feelings about you don't come anywhere close to your feelings about them.
Despite these differences however, Gatsby and Jack still have something in common. They are both tragic characters and they are both idealists and dreamers who see the world the way they want it to be, the way it should be, not the way it actually is. They both strive for an ideal, and think if they obtain that ideal, they will be fulfilled in this life, though studying both characters, I can't help but think that after one ideal is achieved, they will find a new ideal to strive for. The tragedy of both characters is born out of their naivete and their idealistic dreams which cannot be fulfilled in their lives. I think it's an interesting topic of discussion and would like to know others' opinions, thoughts, views on this topic of these two literary characters. I like the way both films were done, because they focus so much on the scenery and surroundings that symbolize the characters' feelings and the main gist of the story.