The Great Gatsby and The Village By the Sea

The two novels are written by two famous writers , F. Scott Fitzgerald and Anita Desai .

in this compare and contrast of the two novels , I would be touching upon several aspects. They

will be on the themes, characters, setting and conclusion. I would also be comparing the two

novels in these aspects. First of all, before I move on to give the summary of the two novels, let

me give a brief introduction about the authors. The story The Great Gatsby is written by F. Scott

Fitzgerald who was born in St Paul, Minnesota of mixed Southern and Irish descent. He was

given three names after the writer of The Star Spangled Banner, to whom he was distantly

related. His father, Edward Fitzgerald, was a salesman, a Southern gentleman, whose furniture

business had failed. Mary McQuillan, his mother, was the daughter of a successful wholesale

grocer, and devoted to her only son. The family moved regularly, but settled finally in 1918 in

St. Paul. At the age of 18 Fitzgerald fell in love with the 16-year-old Ginevra King, the prototype

of Daisy Buchanan of The Great Gatsby. The Great Gatsby was originally to be entitled

Trimalchio's Banquet. In 1939 Fitzgerald began a novel about Hollywood, THE LAST

TYCOON, loosely based on the life of Irving Thalberg. Fitzgerald died on December 21, 1940,

in Hollywood, in Graham's apartment, before the book was finished. Several of Fitzgerald's

stories have been filmed. The Great Gatsby was adapted into screen first time in 1926, but the

most famous version, starring Robert Redford and Mia Farrow, was made in 1974.

Whereas Anita Desai is a Novelist, short-story writer and children's author Anita Desai

was born in 1937 in Mussoorie, India. She was educated at Delhi University. Her novels include

Fire on the Mountain (1977), which won the Winifred Holtby Memorial Prize, and Clear Light

of Day (1980), In Custody (1984) and Fasting, Feasting (1999), each of which was shortlisted

for the Booker Prize. In Custody was made into a film by Merchant Ivory productions. Her

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children's book The Village by the Sea (1982), won the Guardian Children's Fiction Award.

She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, the American Academy of Arts and Letters,

Girton College, Cambridge and Clare Hall, Cambridge. Her most recent novel is The Zig Zag

Way (2004), set in 20th century Mexico. Anita Desai lives in the United States, where she is the

John E. Burchard Professor of Writing at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge,

MA.

Analysis of the two novels

Synopsis

The Great Gatsby is the story of eccentric millionaire Jay Gatsby as told by Nick

Carraway, a Midwesterner who lives on Long Island but works in Manhattan. Gatsby’s

enormous mansion is adjacent to Carraway’s modest home, and Carraway becomes curious

about his neighbor after being invited to one of his famous parties.  Nick soon learns that Gatsby

is in love Daisy Buchanan, Nick’s cousin and the wife of one Tom Buchanan, an acquaintance of

Nick’s from Yale. Buchanan takes his old friend for a day in the city, where Nick learns that

Buchanan has a kept woman, Myrtle, the wife of a long island mechanic.

      Gatsby sends a message through he and Nick’s mutual friend, professional golfer Jordan

Baker, insisting that Nick plan a “chance” meeting for Gatsby and Daisy. Nick learns that

Gatsby, Jay Gatz at the time, and Daisy had once been in love, but Daisy married Tom while

Gatsby was in Europe during the Great War.  In the aftermath of this, Jay Gatz abandoned his old

identity, becoming Jay Gatsby and amassing a fortune with the help of notorious criminal Meyer

Wolfsheim.  Gatsby chose the site of his house in Long Island because it was across the bay from

Daisy’s house, from which a green light could be seen at night. Nick manages to get Gatsby and

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Daisy together, and while the meeting is awkward at first, Gatsby soon relaxes and invites Nick

and Daisy back to his mansion.  Gatsby and Daisy begin to see each other secretly with some

frequency.  Nick and Gatsby also become close, as Nick is one of the only people who continues

to support Gatsby despite the myriad rumors that circulate around the man.  Buchanan eventually

confronts Gatsby in Manhattan about the affair, and the two argue at length about who it is that

Daisy genuinely loves. Daisy claims to love both of them, but she decides to return to Long

Island with Gatsby, not her husband.  Daisy drives Gatsby’s car, but she accidentally kills a

woman on the side of the road, and then speeds off.  It turns out that this woman is Buchanan’s

girlfriend Myrtle—she had only run out to see the car because she thought it was Buchanan’s.

      Myrtle’s husband blames Buchanan for the death, but Buchanan informs him that it was

Gatsby’s car that killed the woman. The mechanic goes to Gatsby’s house, where he shoots

Gatsby and then himself. Daisy refuses to confess to her crime, and only a few people, including

Gatsby’s father Henry, show up for Gatsby’s funeral.

Synopsis of The Village By the Sea

Village By the Sea by Anita Desai is a story set in a small village called Thul, which is

near Alibagh . Hari is the eldest son, and he has a sister Lila. Their mother is always sick due to

poor diet and their father, a drunkard person is always at the toddy shop and never helps them in

any situation. To take care of the family, Hari and Lila have to struggle their way out, as they

need more and more money due to debt. Their family situation forces Hari to take a decision to

leave to Bombay to go and search for a job. Lila is left alone to manage her sisters Bela and

Kamal, as well as her mother, and somehow keep the family strings together. Help comes from

an unexpected source, the rich De Silva's. Meanwhile, Hari is new in the great city of Bombay,

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and all alone. A kind watchman at a apartment where the De Silvas live brings him to a generous

restaurant proprietor, Jagu, who takes pity on him and welcomes him to work in his restaurant,

Sri Krishna Eating House. There, Hari builds a strong friendship with Mr. Panwallah, the lovable

watch repairer whose shop is just beside Jagu’s. Through his experience with Mr. Panwallah and

Jagu and the chain of events that take place in Bombay, Hari realises that he should return to his

village with savings and help his family overcome their hardships. In the mean time, Lila, Bela

and Kamal are forced to admit their sick mother in town hospital through the help of the De

Silvas. Their father has changed when he looks at his wife’s condition and has accompanied her

in the hospital without touching alcohol for about 7 months. While Hari returns, he returns as a

child who is adapted to the changing environment like the birds that are symbolized. Anita Desai

has described in her very own style of writing, how Hari in the dilapidated conditions of the Sri

Krishna Eating House finds warmth and affection through Mr Panwallah-owner and watch

mender of the Ding-Dong watch shop. Mr Panwallah instills confidence in Hari and comforts

him when he is terribly home sick. He even gives Hari a vivid and inspiring future and teaches

him watch mending .This shows that even in one of the busiest, rickety and ramshackle cities

such as Bombay there is still hope, love and affection.

Comparison between Characters in the story

In the story The Great Gatsby, there are three main characters, they are Jay Gatsby, Nick

Carraway and Daisy Buchanan. These three characters are important as they hold an important

key in the conflicts in the story. First of all let us look at the character Jay Gatsby. Jay Gatsby is

a young man who has lived a harsh and poor life in his childhood. Although he is poor, Gatsby

always think of becoming rich , meaning to say he does not want to stay in the lines of poverty.

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An example would be when he dropped out of St. Olaf’s College after only two weeks because

he could not bear the janitorial job with which he was paying his tuition. Gatsby has become rich

all of sudden but not in the good way. He has gained his wealth by doing illegal business by

selling illegal alcohol, stolen properties and many more. Though Gatsby wanted to be rich, his

main motivation was to win the heart of Daisy Buchanan whom he met as a young military man

before he left to fight in World War 1. Gatsby fell in love with Daisy but unfortunately she

married someone else due to Jay’s poor condition. Nevertheless Jay wanted to win again Daisy’s

heart and started to sell illegal products. Gatsby’s fight to attain Daisy ends in tragedy when he is

killed due to the statement made by Tom about Mrytle’ s death. George who is also Mrytle’s

husband has shot him dead and shot himself in the end.

Whereas in the story The Village By the Sea, there are four main characters as well, they

are Hari, Lila, Bela & Kamal, their mother, father, Mr. Panwallah, Jagu, and the rich De’ Silvas.

Hari is the eldest son in the family. He is a person that work hards for his family and he has to do

so because his father is all day drunk. In order to keep the family going on, Hari has to earn

money daily. But the money earned is not enough as their family has a lot of debt. Therefore

Hari made a decision of going to Bombay in search of a job that would give more income. This

shows that Hari cares about his family and has a lot of determination and courage to leave his

family to search for a job. Despite the fact that Hari’s father is a drunkard person, Hari has never

outcast his father. He knew that it his duty as the only son in the family to take care of his father.

Here we can see a sense of responsibility. Overall Hari has a very good impression and he

always tried to make god relationship with people around him. This can be seen when he met

Mr. Panwallah. His good relationship with him has made Mr. Panwallah to teach Hari about the

knowledge of mending watches.

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 Next would be the comparison of the female character , in the Great Gatsby and Village

by The Sea. In the Great Gatsby, Daisy Buchanan is seen as a character that has influenced much

of the story line. The reason why I said so is because, Daisy Buchanan has made Jay Gatsby to

fell in love with her from the earlier days before Jay went to the World War. But the problem is ,

Daisy married another man, and this lets to a lot of conflicts. Let us look at some important

characteristics of Daisy Buchanan. She is a very beautiful person with high manners as being a

member of the higher class in the society. Daisy is from Louisville, Kentucky. Daisy is a loving

person. She met with Jay Gatsby and fell in love with him, but she didn’t realize that Jay has lied

to her about his background. Nevertheless Daisy didn’t not keep to her promise that she would

wait for Jay and instead married with Tom Buchanan who is also a man from the aristocrat

family. Here we can see untrustworthy in Daisy. She has failed to keep her promise. She can also

be described as a person that does not know how to enjoy herself . in short she is a very boring

person. She follows whatever her husband says without thinking of the consequences and she

does not know how to take action. She is merely an object that belongs to Tom. She is a person

that is so much attached to materialistic life. It is the main reason why she married Tom instead

of Jay. In my opinion she agreed to follow Jay because he is a rich person now. And thus this

proves that she is not looking at Jay’s love, but looking at his wealth. Daisy also can be

characterized as a selfish person. She did not take responsibility over the killing of Mrytle’ and

instead agrees with her husband that puts the blame on Jay eventhough she is the one that drove

the car. She gave a damn to Jay’s death and dint pay a visit and runaway with Tom to some

where else.

In comparison, in Village by The Sea, I would like to discuss about the character Lila.

Lila is the sister to Hari. And she is the second elder after him. Lila takes a lot of responsibility

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as the only eldest daughter in the family. Her mother is ill and the father is useless, Lila feels that

if it is not she that takes care of the family, then who will. Already their family running in a lot of

debts. Lila tries her level best to provide comfort to her siblings, Bala and Kamal and also to her

mother. there are a lot examples in chapter one, where Lila comforts her mother by bringing a

cup of tea to her. Lila is also a very caring person. She is willing to give up her school life for the

sake of her family. This shows how much of love she has for the family. Lila’s constant nagging

of not enough money shows her concern to make the members in her family to be more

comfortable with her life.

And now let us look at the comparison between the antagonist characters in the two

novels. In Great Gatsby, the so called evil person would be Tom Buchanan. He is a young man

that came from a higher class in the society and is married to Daisy. He attended the same

college with Nick Carraway. Tom has a string of affairs despite being married to Daisy, and is

involved with Myrtle Wilson throughout Nick's summer-long friendship with the Buchanans. He

has an affair with Myrtle eventhough he is married to Daisy. Tom is a person who is an

aggressive, short-tempered man. Tom wreaks continual havoc by abusing physically or

emotionally Daisy, Myrtle, George Wilson, and Gatsby throughout the novel. He is also a

wicked person as he planned everything so that the blame will be on Jay Gatsby when it is

supposed to be on Daisy.

And in the Village by the Sea we can see a particular character that has certain

similarities with Tom in the Great Gatsby. Bijju can be said as the antagonist in the story

although he did not do evil things to others. Still Bijju is a very rich man, and he is the first man

to own a diesel powered boat. He never cares about the villagers and thinks he the most powerful

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man in the village. He looks down so much on the people surrounding him. This can be seen in

chapter five where he was shouting about the young men that has left to Alibagh to stop the

building of the fertilizer factory in the village. It is also said that Bijju does smuggling in his

boat. Although there isn’t concrete proof , but people in the village claims that he smuggles

silver and gold from Africa and sells here in India for a higher price.

Themes

In the Great Gatsby we can see the theme of love. Gatsby’s love towards Daisy

has changed his life forever. He met with ther before the World War and both of them fell in

love. Although Daisy has broke her promise to marry Jay Gatsby , he still tries to win her heart

by tackling her back. Jay wanted to become rich but not in the good way. He wanted to show to

Daisy that he too can own wealth and fame as Ton does. With the parties that he always threw,

Jay hoped that Daisy would fell in love with her again. He managed to convince Daisy to

runaway with him but sadly he was killed due to the wrong statement given by Ton about the

death of Myrtle.

Whereas in the story of Village By the Sea, we can see that Hari and Lila being loving

their siblings and parents. Lila is constantly taking care of the family when she is supposed to be

schooling and she acts the role of the mother whereas Hari is being the father in the family.

Eventhough father is a drunkard person, but when he heard of mother being admitted into the

hospital , he has changed himself and turned over a new leaf. This shows that, even when he is

not aware, he still has love to his wife and his family.

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 The next theme is materialistic life. Fitzgerald focuses on certain social group in the

Great Gatsby when he talks about the social. He talks about the privileged young people between

the ages of 20 and 30. Fitzgerald provides a vision of the "youth and mystery that wealth

imprisons and preserves". Throughout the novel Nick finds himself surrounded by lavish

mansions, fancy cars, and an endless supply of material possessions. A weakness to the

seemingly limitless excess Nick sees in the Buchanans, for instance, is a throwaway mentality

extending past material goods. Nick explains, "They were careless people, Tom and Daisy --

they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast

carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess

they had made" .

The next theme in the Village by the Sea is poverty, hardships and sadness of rural

Indians. Desai has brought the view that rural Indians in the villages are living in a harsh

condition with very little earnings and often their hope and despair are not solved for a long time.

It is seen in the chapter one, two and three where the hardship of Lila and Hari trying to provide

food to the family. Desai has described about the poor living condition of the house that people

lives in the village. There is a distinction between the poor and the rich in India. The rich will

become richer and the poor will become poorer unless, he struggles in his life for it. In this story,

Desai explained how poverty has made the father to be a drunkard person. He has lost his money

to a person that has promised him to do business.

The next theme in the Great Gatsby would be the insincerity of the upper class. One of

the major topics explored in The Great Gatsby is the sociology of wealth, specifically, how the

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newly minted millionaires of the 1920s differ from and relate to the old aristocracy of the

country’s richest families. In the novel, West Egg and its citizens represent the newly rich, while

East Egg and its citizens, especially Daisy and Tom, represent the old aristocracy. Fitzgerald

portrays the newly rich as being vulgar, showy, pretentious, and lacking in social graces and

taste. Gatsby, for example, lives in a monstrously flamboyant mansion, wears a pink suit, drives

a Rolls-Royce, and does not pick up on subtle social signals, such as the insincerity of the

Sloanes’ invitation to lunch. In contrast, the old aristocracy possesses grace, taste, subtlety, and

elegance, portrayed by the Buchanans’ tasteful home and the flowing white dresses of Daisy and

Jordan Baker.

What the old aristocracy possesses in taste, however, it seems to lack in heart, as the East

Eggers prove themselves careless, inconsiderate bullies who are so used to money’s ability to

ease their minds that they never worry about hurting others. The Buchanans exemplify this

stereotype when, at the end of the novel, they simply move to a new house far away rather than

condescend to attend Gatsby’s funeral. Gatsby, on the other hand, whose recent wealth derives

from criminal activity, has a sincere and loyal heart, remaining outside Daisy’s window until

four in the morning in Chapter 7 simply to make sure that Tom does not hurt her. Ironically,

Gatsby’s good qualities (loyalty and love) lead to his death, as he takes the blame for killing

Myrtle rather than letting Daisy be punished, and the Buchanans’ bad qualities (fickleness and

selfishness) allow them to remove themselves from the tragedy not only physically but

psychologically.

The courage that Hari had in his heart and the determination to change his family’s life

forever forces him to leave Thul to explore the world outside. He left to Bombay in search of a

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job. There he met with Jagu that owns The Sri Krishna Eating House. Hari worked sincerely and

without any complain in the shop. He also has met with Mr. Panwallah whose shop is beside the

restaurant , and has a good relationship with him. This results in Mr. Panwallah teaching Hari the

knowledge of how to fix watches. The hardship and patience Hari had in his heart earned him

with worldly knowledge and turned him into a better person.

Setting

The setting in the Great Gatsby takes place in America. It takes place mostly in New

York. There are two particular place in the story : the island of West Egg and the East Egg.

Another setting in the story is in Louisville , Kentucky where Daisy originated.

Whereas in he novel Village By the Sea, we can see that the main setting is in India. It

takes place in the small village , Thul where Hari’s family lives together. Alibagh is said to be

the town near to the village , Thul. Another setting would be Bombay City or also known as

Mumbai. The Sri Krishna Eating House where Hari worked is also an important setting in then

novel.

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Reference

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Village_by_the_Sea

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_great_gatsby

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