Poetic Analysis And The Great Gatsby
A writing assignment taken a little too artfully.
The Ash valley is depicted in “The Hollow Men” by T.S. Eliot,
The watching eyes gaze upon the judged
The hard-working fall into darkness
Those who inhabit these lands of Ash and Darkness can not escape.
— — The parallels of the wolds are incredible.
The eyes of the on-looking can hurt
Those who do not fall, despite moral in both stories, are not punished.
Tom commits atrocities and does not fall.
Jordan lies and does not fall.
— — She drifts through a garden waiting for a day when the Truth will come to her.
— — Waiting for her fine clothes to degrade,
— — her refined life to blow away in the wind.
— — — — To let the Truth come out into the open.
Nick does not fall.
— — He is bored by his life
— — People do not understand his opinions
— — he has heard theirs his entire life,
— — — — he has no “Inner Resources”, he is waiting for his Truth.
— — — — But,
There are some who are punished
Daisy is in Shadows, punished for her faithfulness
— — Her “Lips that would kiss/ Form prayers to broken stone.”
Her losses can’t be cut
She has nowhere else to go but,
to the Shadows. To Gatsby.
George B. Wilson drives, unknowingly, into a trench.
Punished for surviving.
His wife won’t wait.
He is The Hollowed Man
— — The Stuffed Man
Pushed around and used.
“Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!” He cannot see his destination of betrail.
He has not yet woken up in
the Shadows.
— — — His world will end in a whisper.
