Was The Great Gatsby the great stalker?

Cafe Society
1

Not just Gatsby, though he’s a good example, but I was thinking of ALL the “romantic” heroes of literature, refusing to be deterred by broken romances (in Gatsby’s case, refusing to take Daisy’s marriage and her daughter as a sign that she was no longer interested in him) and overcoming all the obstacles that lay in their quests to rekindle the romance, etc.

In literature, these inspiring stories speak to the romantic lover’s passion, his devotion, his doggedness, but in life, especially today, wouldn’t we call them “stalkers” and stop far short of praising their virtues?

Again to go back to Jay Gatsby (who’s fairly unobstrusive), he kept clippings on Daisy for five years, bought a house so that he could look over at her house across the bay, set up a meeting with an intermediary so that she would “run into” Gatsby without knowing why she was there, etc.

Of course, he wouldn’t be a stalker unless Daisy pressed charges, but is his behavior in itself harassive? More to my point, is Gatsby’s behavior a role model for young male readers to avoid rather than to admire? When I read the book in my teens, I found his refusal to accept Daisy’s marriage as inspiring: “True love can overcome anything!” But now I’m wondering whether such messages are good for teenage boys, who may view themselves as young Gatsbys but whose Daisys will slap a restaining order on them PDQ.

2

Is this really what we have de-evolved into?

Yes, Gatsby’s obsession was exactly that, but it was borne of geniune circumstance, rather than delusion. Daisy DID love him and welcomed Gatsby’s advances with only a token verbal resistance.

Had Daisy refused him after his Monte Cristo-like self reinvention, there is nothing in Gatsby’s behavior to indicate he would have done her violence or harm, because HIS obsession was born of geniune love, rather than a desire to control.

Despite Gatsby taking extraordinary steps (that, admittedly, could inspire delusional people of any stripe into thinking that’s how they should do it), he was never a threat to Daisy’s well-being or person, only to her stagnant day to day life.

Gatsby is, indeed, a role model. Yes, he was far over the top, but the lesson he taught was that if you want something, improve yourself constantly, work hard, see all the angles and make your attempt at getting what you want when the opportunity arises. Following this, even if you fail, you’re still better off than when you started.

That’s hardly the outlook of a stalker or of a dangerous person. It really troubles me that anyone could find anything “stalker-like” in Jay Gatsby.

3

well, you know that Gatsby’s pure of heart, and I know it, but the police, not being exposed to Fitzgerald’s sterling prose describing Gatsby’s fine motives, might be alarmed by hearing from Daisy thus:

“Hello, police? This is Mrs. Buchanan. An ex-boyfriend of mine, back before I was married and had a daughter, has moved into my neighborhood and apparently has been following me around. In fact, he’s bought a house specifically so he could spy on me, across the bay. Anyway, the other day, my cousin Nick, who lives next door to him, was asked by this fellow to invite me over, and when I arrived at Nick’s house, this fellow, without my knowledge, was standing there and telling me how much he’s missed me, how he still loves me. He showed me a collection of newspaper clippings he’s compiled in the last few years, all about me, my marriage, and thousands of intimate details about my life. I was polite enough but, officer, I’m terrified that this creepy ex-boyfriend is saying how he wants to un-do the past, how he expects me to run away from my husband and my daughter. He didn’t seem to care when I told him that I wasn’t interested in him, either. Can you please do something to stop this crazy man?”

If a cop heard that, don’t you think he’d classify Gatsby as a pure stalker-type, and act on it? Again, Daisy wasn’t afraid, but don’t today’s values say that it doesn’t matter if Daisy’s actually afraid, as much as it matters that Gatsby’s pursuing her when she says she’d rather not be pursued?

4

So many things to say, where to begin? (spoilers ahoy!)

I do see some stalker-like things in Gatsby, but I guess I would put him more in the camp of people with an unnatural fixation rather than full-blown stalking.

I think when evaluating whether or not he’s a role model, we should look at where he ends up. In my view, he’s a cautionary tale, not a role model. Yes, he works hard, accomplishes much, succeeds in many areas, but at the core of all this is the fact that he has pinned his own measuring standard for success on something that we can see is 1. unreasonable, and even in many ways, 2. unworthy. Gatsby’s desired outcome is unattainable, no matter how the circumstances of the plot play out.

I’m not sure I see how he is better off than where he started. He strikes me as more of a “running to stand still” kind of character. He acheives great material success, but since it doesn’t serve him in the way that he intended (winning Daisy back), it’s an empty victory at best. That’s why the episode when Gatsby tells the story of the guy with the exploding boat is so telling – Gatsby finds inspiration from this, yet he seems to miss the most important point – that you need to set yourself free. Gatsby can act on this to the extent that it makes him materially successful, but never becomes free of his obsession with Daisy. It’s like he wins 90% of the race, but can’t make that last, crucial step.

The most stalker-like thing I see about him is that he loves Daisy and yet he doesn’t seem to know her at all. In other words, what he is in love with is the idea of Daisy that he has in his mind, not the actual person. Throughout the book, there is a sharp contrast between the way Gatsby describes Daisy, how Nick sees her, and the most telling (in terms of examining a text, as opposed to real live people) – the way that she acts.

This is definitely a novel of decay, rather than redemption. Gatsby sees himself as Daisy’s savior, but Daisy’s character is so flawed (and we’re left to ponder if the miasma of the East corrupted her, or Tom, or if she was always that way, or some combination) that she ends up dragging him down as opposed to him pulling her up. Like a stalker, Gatsby believes that he simply had to do the things he did, that they weren’t free choices, that Daisy needs him to act the way he does (and Nick is put off by this when he sees to what extent Gatsby has allowed his obsession with Daisy to blind him to the less savory aspects of the lengths to which he is going).

Back to the unworthy thing for a moment, I think it’s important to note that the real life stalker comparison breaks down on this point. In real life, I’d be loathe to say that any person was “unworthy” of being stalked, because stalking is about the stalker, really, not the victim (as opposed to someone being worthy of being stalked? No such thing!). But within the framework of the novel, we can say that Daisy is unworthy because the author shows us that, it’s key to understanding the work.

Thanks for such an interesting thread, PRR!

5

Any time, Delphica. I’m not clear on what you referring to by “Gatsby tells the story of the guy with the exploding boat”: what story is this? His mentor has a boat, and Gatsby first meets him by swimming out to his boat, but exploding? I’m confused.

I’m still interested in literature more general than Gatsby, in which the hero “nobly” pursues a woman who’s playing hard to get (or who really doesn’t want to be gotten). I can think of two others offhand: THE GRADUATE, where Ben Braddock is told by Elaine’s parents to stay away from her and he follows up up to college, moves into a roominghouse to keep track of her, accosts her with his undesired attentions, crashes her eventual wedding–and he’s the hero because instead of having him arrested, she flees the wedding with him. If Ben’s feelings were mistaken as to Elaine’s attraction to him, he’d be doing 2-to-5, wouldn’t he? It’s only because his feelings wind up being reciprocated that he’s a figure of admiration to us, and he has no way of knowing that his feelings are reciprocated until she actually runs away with him.

I saw The Graduate when I was fifteen, and I saw nothing wrong with Ben’s pursuit of Elaine. Now I watch it and I think “Nutjob! Nutjob!” There also David Lodge’s romance SMALL WORLD, in which the hero pursues a woman who has no interest in him, other than to politely banter with him as he (and several dozen other males) proceeds to hit on her. Again, Lodge’s protagonist is perceived as the book’s hero because he doesn’t know the meaning of the word “No” (or “Drop dead” or “Fuck off” for that matter), yet boys who admire any of these figures are learning a dangerous lesson in today’s society, where reckless pursuit without strong encouragement is violative of several laws.

6

I think the Onion once did an article like “Romantic Comedy Behavior Gets Real Life Man Arrested For Stalking”, but I can’t find it in their archives.

You make a valid point re: Gatsby as a symbol of blinding self-delusion and ultimate decay. In terms of literary romance, this is often used to dramatic purpose. There are probably thousands of examples, but maybe for that reason, I’m having trouble coming up with more off the top of my head. Movies seem to love this plot: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boys wins girl back through ridiculous stunts/dogged persistence. The moral seems to be that no matter how screwed up you are, as long as you finagle yourself into various situations with the object of your affections and pull off moronic stunts with the help of your amusing sidekicks, you will evetually win over your dream boy/girl when they finally realize how dedicated/spontaneous/entertaining you are. Breaking up their wedding with your arch-nemesis seems to be a popular in these sorts of stories.

This is all based on the tacit assumption that the object of affection secretly returns the affection but for whatever reason cannot admit this to others or to themselves. I think this is the big difference. If the other person secretly does love the hero, thaen it’s somehow not stalking but merely “fulfilling their destiny” or somesuch nonsense. If the love is not returned, then it careens straight into stalker territory.

As to whether or not such actions would ever be emulated in real life, I seriously doubt it. Stalkers as such generally have more or their minds than just love; if the love isn’t returned, they tend to get violent in a hurry. As mentioned, one gets the impression in literature and film that if the love truly is not returned, the hero will eventually give up. But you’re right insofar as it can set up unreasonable expectations of what love is. I’ve always said this. Do a search for those ubiquitous “nice guy” threads and see how many people actually take seriously the literary conceit of finding “the one”. People seem to have this idea that love is all about flowers and sudden improptu vacations to tropical locales via private jet. Literature studiously ignores everyday events and everyday people. This why it’s called literature, and not “some stuff that happened”. To some people, this gives them a skewered idea of what certain real-life events and situations should be like. Not that everyone reading The Great Gatsby will turn into a borderline psychotic socialite with a sour case of erotic mania. I’m just saying it’s probably best to take everything you read/see/hear with several grains of salt.

7

Sorry to be cynical, but I think in both fiction and real life, the distinction between stalking and True Love (or infatuation and True Love) is determined primarily by whether it’s reciprocated.

8

Maybe I should ask another couple of questions: “Have you ever been stalked? If it was by someone you found attractive or otherwise intriguing, would you have considered it stalking?”

DOES the stalkee’s reaction transform a crime into a positive, admirable act, and vice-versa?