Elizabeth Barrett Brownings Sonnets from the Portuguese celebrate the

love between herself and soon-to-be- husband, Robert Browning. Through

her appropriation of the conventions of courtly idealised love and the
sonnet sequence, Brownings female speaker gives voice to the once
voiceless to show a pure love that can only be achieved in a relationship
of mutuality and equality. Thus the sonnets become an analogue for
transforming gender roles in the 19th century. F. Scott Fitzgeralds novel,
The Great Gatsby, similarly uses the motif of idealised love, however, to
criticize the morals corrupted by the self-serving nature of the American
Dream that have made such pure visions unachievable. A comparative
study of the two texts reveals the contrasting perspectives on love in two
different contexts and demonstrates how the emancipation and liberation
aspired to in the earlier world has received a cruel and destructive
realisation in the Americas Jazz Age. 150
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Sonnets from the Portuguese inverts the
conventions of the traditional male-speaking sonnet form to give the
once-silenced and passive female voice an active role. Just as male poets
use autobiographical poetry to explore universal aspects of human
experience, Barrett Browning uses her relationship with Robert Browning
as an analogue to the 19th century transformation of gender roles. Her
reference to the Epithalamions of ancient Greek poet, Theocritus,
celebrates a marriage of mutual respect, reflecting her relationship with
Robert Browning. However by using a female voice to replace the
traditional male voice, Barrett Browning depicts the ambiguity of
nineteenth century womens roles. The submissive female conveyed by
the simile, like an out of tune, worn viol and self-effacing claim,let the
silence of my womanhood/ commend my woman-love to thy belief,
reflects the subjugated role of women in the patriarchal Victorian era.
However, the persona also takes an active role as she demands not to be
loved for her smileher lookher way of speaking gently, thereby
satirically rejecting the patriarchal perspective of women as submissive
and inferior. Hence Barrett Browning is able to give voice to once voiceless
women as well as addressing the ambiguity of womens role in society.
201
Conversely, The Great Gatsby presents the Roaring 20s era wherein
idealised love and human aspiration deteriorates in the hollow world of
materialism and self-serving. The females who wander and weave
through Gatsbys parties drunk, glittering and drifting ingraceless
circles are examples of the ambiguity of womens role in this later age,
emancipated yet dependent on men for wealth and protection. This lack of
substance and recklessness of women of the age is explored through the
extended metaphor, women buoyed up as though upon an anchored

balloon. This symbolic characterisation of Daisy Buchanan and Jordan

Baker implies how the lack of responsibility and morality allows both to
appear weightless. Daisys self-piteous petulance and self-indulgent
escapism are symbolized by the Pearl necklace. The image of casting
away the pearls and putting them back on shows that her period of crisis
is overcome and soothed by her materialistic values. Fitzgerald depicts
women as breaking down gender stratification yet nonetheless submissive
to dominant men like Tom Buchanan who offer social status and wealth.
Fitzgeralds satiric characterizations show that despite the gradual
emancipation of women over time, their moral decadence have caused
them to revert to their traditional patriarchal roles as they defeat the
aspirations of Browning in her quest for gender equality. 208
Barrett Brownings gradual acceptance of the love becomes a narrative of
self-emancipation, as she again inverts other sonnet conventions in the
trope of distance between herself and her lover. Barrett Brownings
persona metaphorically overcomes such distance, as love is requited and
the speaker unites with her lover. This is expressed through the tactile
imagery in sonnet 22, "stand up erect and strong, Face to face drawing
nigh & nigher", signifying a sensuous touching and physicality in an era
where passion was seen to be deviant. The sonnet sequence sees a
movement from imagery of death to life as the personification of all dead
papermute and white, become alive and quivering in sonnet 28
representing her invigoration as inanimate objects become infused with
vitality. Browning uses this to embody increasing feminine desire as she
departs from the doubtful spirit voice and embraces the sensual and
physical aspect of love, I love thee with a passion put to use.Hence
rather than women being destroyed by love, Barrett Browning shows
vivification and revitalisation from her love, emphasising the need for a
love based on mutuality and reciprocity that negates the gender
stratification of the Victorian era. 200
Conversely, Gatsbys quest for love is corrupted by self-serving ambition,
as his desire for love comes into conflict with the values of the American
dream. Gatsby is fascinated by the fragile, insubstantial allure of bright
feathers showing how his apparent materialism has created an illusion of
an ideal love. The eras spiritual abandonment is embodied by Tom and
Daisy who are portrayed as carless people who smashed up things and
then returned back into their money or their vast carelessness and let
other people clean up the mess. Gatsbys ultimate demise because of his
relationship with such people is encapsulated in the novels modernist
wasteland known as the Valley of Ashes. It represents broken dreams and
desperation imposed by the rich who indulge themselves without regard
for their impact on others. Fitzgeralds perspective on the immorality and

self-indulgence of the Jazz age is embodied by the eyes of T.J Eckleberg

gazing over the valley of ashes. The pair of bespectacled eyes shows
Fitzgeralds condemnation of the 1920s society that has led to a
wasteland devoid of truth and principles. With Gatsbys demise,
Fitzgeralds represents how the materialism and moral decay that
permeated the Roaring 20s failed Brownings aspirations and that ideal
love cannot be realised in a world with such circumstances. 211
Both composers use the motif of idealized love to hold a critical mirror up
to the values and attitudes of their worlds. Brownings uses her
celebration of love to protest against the patriarchal perspectives of
women as submissive and unimportant in the Victorian era. Fitzgerald
critiques his contexts values based on self-serving immorality,
materialism and wealth that make ideal and meaningful love an
impossibility.
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