kipling's story gadsbys possible source fitzgerald(plath)

7/25/2019 Kipling's Story Gadsbys Possible Source Fitzgerald(Plath)

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132

Journal

of Modern Literature

by's

initials

?

J.R

?

allude to financier

J.R

Morgan

and

help

"define the

boundaries of

his

new

name and

personality.

Thus,

James Gatz

became

'J.

Gatz

P'

For

ease of

articulation,

Fitzgerald

rendered the name Jay Gatsby."5 Crim and Houston, meanwhile, suggest that Jay, the name Gatsby

takes as an

adult,

derives from

James,

which

in turn

derives from the biblical

name

Jacob,

mean?

ing

"the

supplanter,"

and that

Gatsby "attempts

to

supplant

Tom for the life

and love of

Daisy."6

Alexander R. Tamke

sees in

"Gatsby"

the

1920s

slang

term for

revolver,

"gat,"7

while

Horst Kruse

suggests

that

"Gatsby"

derives

from

"Gadsby,"

the

name of

a

Washington,

D.C.,

hotel

mentioned

in Mark

Twain's A

Tramp

Abroad,

the

significance

of the

name

reinforcing

the

sense of

Gatsby's

mansion

functioning

as

a

hotel for

way

ward

guests.8

Kruse

may

be

right

about the

"Gadsby"

connection,

but

Ernest

Hemingway points

the

way

to

a

more

convincing

source.

"East

is East

and

West is

West,"

Rudyard

Kipling

wrote,

"and never

the

twain shall meet."9 Nor, apparently, East Egg and West Egg. Two years after The Great

Gatsby

was

published,

Hemingway

wrote Scott

Fitzgerald

that

he was

titling

his

new

collection of

stories

Men

Without Women.

Kipling,

Hemingway

explained,

"had

been there

before me and

swiped

all

the

good

[titles]

so

I

called the

book Men

Without

Women

hoping

it

would

have a

large

sale

among

the fairies and

old

Vassar

girls."10

This is

vintage

Hemingway

?

the

hurtful,

yet playful jabs

at

Fitzgerald's Ivy

League

background

and

paranoia

over his

manhood,

as well

as the

unabashed

rep?

etition of a

word Robert

McAlmon had

been

using

to

spread

rumors

about

Fitzgerald

and

Heming?

way.11

But what

stands

out most and

invites

further

consideration is

Hemingway's

pointedly

sarcastic

reference to

Kipling

and

"swiping"

titles

?

especially

if we

bear in

mind

Hemingway's

earlier

veiled

attacks

on

Fitzgerald

in

print

and in

letters.12 A

Kipling

connection

is

not

as

remote

as it

might

seem,

since

one critic

already

has

observed a

common

denominator:

that

"Kipling's

'The

Finest

Story

in

the

World'

seems

one of

the

key

texts

behind

Eliot's

most

famous

poem,"

The

Waste

Land,13

an

"oft-debated

topic"

of

affinity

with

Fitzgerald's

novel.14

Something

inspired

Fitzgerald

to

change

The

Great

Gatsby

from a

novel

set

in

Victorian-era New

York

and the

Mid?

west15 to a

Modernist

fable on

love

in

the Lost

Generation,

and it

may

well

have

been

Kipling's

1888

play,

The

Story

ofthe

Gadsbys.

Hemingway

owned

twenty-two

volumes

by

Kipling,

and,

according

to

his

siblings,

he

"par?

ticularly admired Kipling's effective titles."16 It is not difficult to imagine that Hemingway may

have been

more

than a

little

annoyed

at

the

similarity

between

Fitzgerald's

latest

novel and

one

of

5.

Bellenir,

p.

111.

6. Crim

and

Houston,

pp.

114-15.

7.

AlexanderR.

Tamke,

"The Gat' n

Gatsby:

Neglected

Aspect

of a

Novel,"

Modern

Fiction

StudiesXIV

(1968-69),

p.

443.

8. Horst

H.

Kruse,

"'Gatsby'

nd

'Gadsby,'"

Modern

Fiction

StudiesXV

(1969-70),

p.

540.

9.

Rudyard

Kipling,

"The

Ballad of

East and

West,"

Departmental

Ditties and

Ballads and

BarrackRoom

Ballads

(Doubleday,

Page

&

Co.,

1917),

p.

3.

10. ErnestHemingway,ErnestHemingway:SelectedLetters,1917-1961,ed. CarlosBaker(CharlesScribner'sSons,

1981),

p.

260.

11.

Matthew

.

Bruccoli,

Fitzgerald

and

Hemingway:

A

Dangerous

Friendship

Carroll

and

Graf,

1994),

pp.

144-45.

12. See

my essay,

"The

Sun

Also

Rises as 'a

Greater

Gatsby,'"

n

French

Connections:

Hemingway

and

Fitzgerald

Abroad,

ed. J.

Gerald

Kennedy

and

JacksonR.

Bryer

St.

Martin's,

1998),

pp.

257-75.

13.

Robert

Crawford,

Rudyard

Kipling

n

The

Waste

Land"

Essays

in

Criticism

XXXVI

(1986),

p.

36.

14.

JacksonR.

Bryer,

"Style

as

Meaning

n The

Great

Gatsby:

Notes

Toward New

Approach,"

n

Critical

Essays

on F.

Scott

Fitzgerald's

The

Great

Gatsby,

d. Scott

Donaldson

G.K.

Hall,

1984),

p.

123.

15.

Matthew .

Bruccoli,

Apparatusor

F.

Scott

Fitzgerald's

The

Great

Gatsby

Under

the

Red, White,

nd

Blue]

(Uni?

versity

of

South

Carolina

Press,

1974),

pp.

3-4.

16.

JeffreyMeyers,

"Kipling

and

Hemingway:

The

Lesson ofthe

Master,"

American

LiteratureLVI

(1984),

p.

92.

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Plath:

Kipling

and

Fitzgerald

133

Kipling's

least

imaginative

titles. After

all,

he

knew

the

play

The

Story ofthe

Gadsbys

well

enough

to remind Max Perkins

years

afterwards,

in

suggesting

that

his

own

play,

The

Fifth

Column,

be published along with his short fiction, that Kipling had successfully combined genres

in

that

volume,

"one

of

his best."17

Fitzgerald

himself made

no

revealing

remarks

about

Kipling

and included

no

Kipling

titles

on

his "10 Best

Books

I

Have Read" list.18

However,

as

Andre

Le Vot

notes,

young

Fitzgerald,

during

his

Catholic

prep-school years

at

Newman,

was

enough

influenced

by

the author to write

a

bitter

"thirty-six

stanza

poem

in the

Kipling

manner that more or less

duplicated

the

theme

of

'Reade,

Substitute

Right

Half,'

a breathless celebration of a lone

hero

who wins

for his

side"

after

Fitzger?

ald

is

falsely

accused

of

cowardice on

the football field.19

"Gadsby"

and

"Gatsby"

are

too

tantalizingly

alike not

to

wonder

about another

Kipling

con?

nection, especially when there are so many curious thematic, structural, and idiosyncratic simi-

larities. We

are told

early,

for

example,

that

Kipling's

"Gaddy

has

money,"20

as does

Fitzgerald's

hero.21

Although

stationed

in

India,

Gadsby

has

a

"place

at

home,"

in

the West

(p.

22),

just

as

Gatsby

lives

across

the

bay

from

Daisy

in

West

Egg (pp.

22,75).

Nick

concludes

that

"[Gatsby]

has

been a

story

of the

West,

after

all

?

Tom and

Gatsby, Daisy

and Jordan and

I,

were

all

Westerners"

(p.

151),

living,

somewhat

out-of-place,

in

the

East;

so too

is

Kipling's play

about Western soldiers

and

colonials

living

equally out-of-place

in the

East. Both

stories center on a

captivated

hero's

enthrallment

with

a

captivating

female,

with

a

quasi-sidekick

admirer ofthe

hero

(Nick

Carraway/

Captain

Mafflin),

who,

himself

spared

the smitten

state,

fears the

worst for his

friend.

Much

has

been made of Nick's

occasional direct

addresses to the reader in

The Great

Gatsby,

and in

The

Story ofthe Gadsbys

Kipling's

characters

frequently speak

in

asides to the

audience. In

fact,

both

narratives

begin

with

authorial

self-consciousness. In The

Story

ofthe

Gadsbys,

Kipling

addresses

a

particular

reader: one

of

the

play's

characters,

Captain

J.

Mafflin, who,

like the

hero

of

the sad fable which

he

says

will

follow,

succumbs

to

a

woman's charms and

leaves his

bachelor

days

behind.

Kipling

reminds his

reader that he

wrote The

Story

of

the

Gadsbys

as "an

Awful

Warning":

"It is

your

kismet,

as

it was

Gaddy's,

and his

kismet

who

can

avoid?"

(p.

3).

The Great

Gatsby,

meanwhile,

opens

with a

narrative

persona

addressing

readers

directly

and

speaking

of

"Gatsby, the man who gives his name to this book" (p. 20). Carraway discusses his own attitudes

in

relation to

the

story

of

Gatsby,

whom

he describes as a

parabolic

representation

of

"heightened

sensitivity

to the

promises

of

life"

(p.

20).

The

opening

chapter

deals with

honesty

?

how

honest

people

should

be,

and

how

honest the

narrator

believes he is

?

just

as The

Story

ofthe Gadsbys

deals with

the

question

of how honest

one

should

be,

especially

how

honest men and

women

should be with

each

other. Like

Kipling,

Fitzgerald's

narrative

persona

immediately

attributes

the

sad

fate of

his character

not to a

tragic

flaw,

but

to forces

beyond

the

character's

control,

address?

ing

the

"kismet"

that

proved

Jay Gatsby's

undoing:

"No,

Gatsby

turned

out all

right

at the

end;

it

is

what

preyed

on

Gatsby,

what foul dust

floated in

the

wake of

his dreams" that

ruined

him,

and

17.

Hemingway, .

466.

18.

F.

Scott

Fitzgerald,

.

Scott

Fitzgerald

on

Authorship,

d. Matthew

.

Bruccoli,

with

JudithS.

Baughman

University

of

South

Carolina

Press,

1996),

p.

86.

19. AndreLe

Vot,

F.

Scott

Fitzgerald:

A

Biography,

rans.

William

Byron

Doubleday,

983),

p.

23.

20.

Rudyard

Kipling,

The

Story

ofthe Gadsbys

and

Other

Stories

(ArcadiaHouse,

1950),

p.

22. All

subsequent

uota?

tions

fromthis

edition

will

be

included

parenthetically

n the

text.

21.

F. Scott

Fitzgerald,

The Great

Gatsby,

1925,

Seventy-Fifth

Anniversary

Edition,

ed.

MatthewJ.

Bruccoli

Scribner

Classics,

1992),

p.

22.

All

subsequent

uotations

romthis

editionwill

be

included

parenthetically

n

the

text.



5/11

134

Journal

of Modern

Literature

disillusioned

the narrator

as well

(20).

And

just

as

Kipling

in

his

preface

calls

Captain

Mafflin

a

"hypocrite" (p.

4),

Carraway imposes

the

same

judgment

on

most

of the characters in

Gatsby,

concluding,

with

equal sanctimoniousness,

"I am

one

of

the

few honest

people

that

I

have

ever

known"

(p.

61).

The first

section of

Kipling's play,

"Poor

Dear Mama"

?

an

obvious source

for

Hemingway's

playful referencing

of P.O.M.

(for

"Poor Old

Mama")

in

Green Hills

of Africa

?

exposes

the audi?

ence to

attitudes about the

title character before he ever makes an

entrance.

The

Story ofthe

Gads?

bys

opens

with a

discussion about

a

mysterious Captain

Gadsby,

between Miss Minnie

Threegan

and Miss

Deercourt,

who are

lounging

in

bodices

of

ballroom frocks on

a

hot

May

afternoon:

Miss D: "Who is this

Captain Gadsby?

I

don't

think

Fve met him."

Miss T: "You must have. He belongs to the Harrar set. Fve danced with him, but Fve

never talked

to

him.

He's

a

big

yellow

man,

just

like a

newly-hatched

chicken,

with an

e-normous moustache."

(p.

110)

In

the

first scene of

Gatsby,

in which the

narrator

Carraway begins

interacting

with

other char?

acters,

two women

?

Daisy

Buchanan and Jordan Baker

?

also

provide

the

dominant visual

image,

wearing

white

"rippling

and

fluttering"

dresses and

reclining

on "an enormous couch . .

.

buoyed

up

as

though upon

an

anchored

balloon"

(p.

24)

as the hero's

name

is

raised,

but

not discussed in

anything

more than

casual,

curiosity-piquing

detail.

Fitzgerald

obviously

used

the

technique

to

much

better

effect than

Kipling,

making

his readers wait even

longer

for the title

character's first

entrance and

having

them

listen

to all

manner of

hyperbolic speculation

and evaluation.

Like

Captain

Gadsby,

Jay Gatsby

was

"a

captain

before he went to the front"

(131).

Just as

the

soldier's

lot

is a

dirty

one,

with details that

the

women cannot

know about the

business

?

"you

never do

tell me

anything

about

yourself,

or what

you

do,

or

what

you

take an

interest

in,"

Mrs.

Gadsby

later

complains (p.

81)

?

so

too

is

Gatsby

involved in

business matters that

are

'"a

rather

confidential

sort

of

thing'"

(p.

80).

Gatsby's

past,

like

Gadsby's,

carries

roguish

implications,

with

a certain

bad-boy

air still

lingering.

Gadsby

is

linked to

the

dark-skinned Harrar

through

rumor

and then to the rough-and-tumble Hussar Indian regiment by actuality, just as Gatsby is linked to

shadowy

figures

first

by

rumors

?

as the

Kaiser's

nephew

and

a

German

spy (pp.

42,

50)

?

then

later

by

association with

such dark underworld

figures

as

Meyer

Wolfsheim,

the man

supposedly

responsible

for the Black

Sox scandal

(p.

72).

In

Kipling's

version,

when Miss T.

remarks,

'Tm

not afraid

of

Captain Gadsby"

(p.

111),

it

implies,

of

course,

that others are.

In

Gatsby,

Myrtle

Wilson's sister

confesses,

"Tm

scared

of

him. Fd hate to have

him

get anything

on me'"

(p.

42),

while

shocking

rumors

persist

that

Gatsby

"killed

a man"

(pp.

50,

54)

?

just

as

killing

is

a

part

of

Gadsby's

past,

as Miss

T. learns

after

marrying

him and

noticing

a

long

knife-scar

(pp.

80-81).

The

running joke throughout

the

opening

scene

is an

egg

?

which,

in

curious

fashion,

is echoed

by

Fitzgerald's naming

of East and West

Eggs.

The

second

scene of

Kipling's play,

"The World

Without,"

finds

soldiers

chatting

in

the

smoking

room

of the

Deychi

Club

?

again,

about

Gadsby.

'"The talk is that

"Gaddy's

hooked

at

last '""

(p.

20).

He is

engaged

to Minnie

Threegan,

the

daughter

of a

colonel. But

someone asks

about

Gadsby's

other woman

?

isn't it

bigamy? Gadsby

had

become

engaged

to

the

widow

of an

officer,

an

older

woman

named

Mrs.

Herriott. She serves as

the woman

of

his

past,

as

Miss T. is

his

younger

dream

girl,

the

one he calls his

"angel";

in

Gatsby,

Fitzgerald

apparently

reversed

the



6/11

Plath:

Kipling

and

Fitzgerald

135

poles

and

combined the

women,

so

that

Daisy

fuctions as both

Gatsby's

dream

girl

and

his

girl

of the

past

?

while

Tom Buchanan is involved with two women.

In

Gatsby,

too,

the action shifts

from an opening scene featuring women talking to one with men only, with Nick and Tom chatting

alone en

route to what

will

become a

rendezvous with Tom's mistress.

As Kenneth

Eble

observes,

it is

"[t]he

'old

sport'

phrase

which fixes

Gatsby

as

precisely

as his

gorgeous pink rag

of

a suit."22 A

comparative

reading

with

The

Story ofthe

Gadsbys

yields

a

pos?

sible

source for both

distinctive features.

Gadsby

was one of

the

Pink

Hussars

(p.

22),

an Indian

cavalry

unit

known for

its

flamboyant

uniforms

(pp.

110,

134),

while

the men's

talk is

sprinkled

throughout

with

such

masculine

terms

of endearment as

"old

man,"

"old

horse,"

"old

fellow,"

and

"old

pal."

At

some

point

in

both

narratives,

someone

challenges

the main

character's use of such

"sporting" language.

A

week

into

his

marriage, Gadsby

(breaking etiquette by

using

slang

with

a woman) calls his new bride "Little Featherweight," and she protests, "T won't be called those

sporting pet

names,

bad

boy'" (pp.

63-64).

In

Gatsby,

it's

Tom

who

cries,

at

one

point,

'"Don't

you

call

me "old

sport '""

(p.

119)

and who

mocks,

'"That's a

great expression

of

yours,

isn't it?

All

this "old

sport"

business.

Where'd

you

pick

that

up?'"

(p.

113).

As

it turns

out,

from

Kipling,

perhaps.

In

addition

to the

sporting

talk,

there

is

also

talk

of

"ponies"

?

a

logical topic

for

cavalry

men

which,

again,

finds an

interesting

echo

in

Gatsby

with

Tom Buchanan and his

polo ponies.

A

Gadsbys/Gatsby

comparison

also

helps

to

explain

the

otherwise

curious Indian

references:

Gatsby,

who

wears shirts

"with

monograms

of Indian

blue"

(p.

87)

and

who

"live[s]

like a

young

rajah

in all the

capitals

of

Europe

...

collecting jewels,

chiefly

rubies,

hunting big

game, painting

a

little"

(p.

66),

shows Nick a

photograph

of himself as a

young

man "with a

cricket bat in his

hand,"

after which

Nick

can

visualize it

all: "T saw the

skins of

tigers

flaming

in

his

palace

on the Grand

Canal;

I saw him

opening

a

chest of

rubies

to

ease,

with

their

crimson-lighted

depths,

the

gnawings

of

his

broken

heart'"

(p.

67).

The

third

section of

Story

of

the

Gadsbys,

"The Tents

of

Kedar,"

takes

place

at a

Naini Tal

dinner

for

thirty-four

?

the

equivalent

of

Gatsby's party

(pp.

133-44).

Gadsby

uses

the

party

for

the

explicit

purpose

of

repelling

Mrs.

Herriott,

of

finally breaking

it

off with her and

tell?

ing

her

about his

impending engagement

to

Minnie.

Gatsby's parties,

ironically,

are

designed

for

the explicit purpose of attracting a woman. Much has been made of Gatsby's "dream girl," and

Gadsby

is

so hooked on

his own

dream

girl

that

he refers

to Her with

a

capital

H

and calls her

"the

sweetest little

angel

that

ever came

down from

the

sky" (p.

53).

He talks

about

wanting

to

marry

her and all

but

swoons,

"Sweet

state I'm in "

(p.

54);

when he

does

finally

marry,

his former

fiancee,

Mrs.

Herriott

writes,

in a

letter of

veiled

congratulations,

"And

so

the moth has

come

too

near

the

candle

at

last"

(p.

89).

In

addition to the

shared moth

image

of

attraction/destruction

?

in

Gatsby's

"blue

gardens

men

and

girls

came and

went like

moths

among

the

whisperings

and the

champagne

and

the stars"

(p.

47)

?

when

Gadsby,

on the

night

before his

wedding,

is

offered a

four-finger

drink and

protests,

"O bus

bus It'll

make me

as drunk as an

owl"

(p.

55),

one

cannot

help but think of Owl

Eyes

and his drunkenness at

Gatsby's

party. Fitzgerald

thought

the

parties

at

Gatsby's

mansion central

enough

to the

story

that he had

considered

titling

his

novel

Trimalchio,

after

the Petronius

tale of

a

rich

freedman who

hosts a

banquet

which

becomes

progressively

more

22. KennethE.

Eble,

"TheCraftof

Revision:The Great

Gatsby"

n

Critical

Essays

on F.

Scott

Fitzgerald's

The

Great

Gatsby,

d.

Scott Donaldson

G.K.

Hall,

1984),

p.

90.



7/11

136

Journal

of Modern Literature

Bacchanalian.23

Thematically,

Gadsby's party

scene

is

important

because it sets

up

the

wedding

scene and

juxtaposes

the

cool

Gadsby

?

the

one who

turns

away

women

?

against

the

gelatinous

Gadsby, turned rubber-kneed by one particular woman.

Despite

their

tough

reputations,

around their dream

girls,

both men

act

comically spineless,

particularly

in

scenes that function

as fulcrums for the action.

On

the

day

of

his

wedding,

in

sec?

tion

four,

"With

Any

Amazement,"

Gadsby

is

so

"paralyzed

with fear" that

he

forgets

his name

and

goes

"Ha-Hmmm

deep

down

in his

throat when

he

can't think

of

anything

to

say," although

his bride-to-be is

cool

and

composed (pp.

7,

58-59).

Jay

Gatsby

is

just

as

tongue-tied

and awk-

ward in the

pivotal

scene

when he faces

Daisy

alone for the first

time,

at Nick's

house.

He needs

Nick

to

act

as

go-between

and arrives

looking pale

and

sleepless

(p.

81),

bolting

before

Daisy

makes her

entrance,

then

reappearing,

"pale

as death"

(p.

82).

Swooning,

he

almost

knocks over

Nick's mantelpiece clock, and thinking about her afterwards, he nearly topples "down a flight

of stairs"

(p.

86).

Just as

best man Mafflin has to

push

Gadsby

during every

step

of

the

wedding

ceremony

?

saying,

at

one

point,

"Look like a

man "

(p.

57),

and

then,

"(In

a

piercing

rattle meant

to be a

whisper.)

Kneel,

you

stiff-necked ruffian

Kneel "

(p.

59)

?

Nick has to

push Gatsby,

and,

when the

latter tries to

leave,

scolds,'"

You're

acting

like

a

little

boy.

Not

only

that,

but

you're

rude.

Daisy's

sitting

in

there all

alone'"

(p.

84).

In

both

crucial

episodes,

clocks

and time

factor

prominently. Waking

on

the

morning

of

his

wedding, Gadsby

is

teased

by

his best

man

that

he

is his "own

master

for the

next twelve hours"

and

given

ten minutes to

dress;

this sets the

tone for

Gadsby's

overwound

tension. "What time

is

it?"

he

asks,

and

hearing

the

answer

mutters,

"Five hours more. O Lord "

(p.

50).

Twice more the

panicked Gadsby

asks

what time

it

is,

until

finally

the church

clock strikes three

and

the

ceremony

begins

(pp.

53-56).

Gatsby

too

is an

"overwound clock"

(p.

87),

and

before his

big

meeting

with

Daisy

(and

his

nearly

breaking

Nick's

already

broken

clock),

he is

just

as

preoccupied

with

time,

looking

"at his watch as

if there was some

pressing

demand on his

time

elsewhere"

(pp.

81-82).

"This

is

Hades,"

Gadsby

says

(p.

60),

just

as

Gatsby grouses,

"'This

is

a

terrible mistake'"

(p.

84).

Even

as

Gatsby

cannot

stop thinking

of

Daisy

frozen

in time

as

the first "nice

girl"

whom he knew

(p.

130)

and is

shocked

by

the

appearance

of her

child,

a

reminder of

her

age (p.

106),

Gadsby

is

taken aback when he notices during the wedding ceremony, apparently for the first time, "Little

Featherweight's

a

woman

?

a

woman

And I

thought

she was a

girl" (p.

58).

Lyrics

sprinkled

judiciously throughout

The

Great

Gatsby

add a

countermelodic

texture and

resonance which has

fascinated critics

?

particularly

lines

from

"The Sheik of

Araby"

?

and

in

The

Story

ofthe Gadsbys,

lyrics

also

appear

in

strategic

places throughout.

In the

wedding

section,

the most

thematically important

lyric

follows the knell

of

church bells that

signal

the start

of the

ceremony:

"We

honor the

King/

And

Bride's

joy

do

bring

?

/

Good

tidings

we

tell/

And

ring

the

Dead's

knell"

(p.

57).

When

the

ceremony

is

completed, Gadsby

"winces as

if

shot,"

and the

Mendelssohn

wedding

march plays (p. 60). Marriage in Story ofthe Gadsbys ? at least for the men ? is

equated

with

death,

with

going

to

the

gallows (p.

55).

In

the

Deychi

Club,

a

cavalryman

asks,

"Who's dead

now?" and

another

responds,

"No one that

I

know

of;

but

Gaddy's

hooked

[engaged]

at

last"

(p.

20).

After

the

wedding,

Mafflin

mourns,

"Fve

lost old

Gaddy,"

then

sings

to

himself,

"You

may

23.

F. Scott

Fitzgerald,

Trimalchiho: n

Early

Version

fThe

Great

Gatsby,

d. James

L.

W. West

III

(Cambridge

Uni?

versity

Press,

2000),

p.

190.



8/11

Plath:

Kipling

and

Fitzgerald

137

carve it

on

his

tombstone,

you may

cut it

on

his

card,

That

a

young

man

married

is a

young

man

marred "

In

an

aside

to

the

audience,

Mafflin

laments,

"They say marriage

is like

cholera.

Wonder

who'll be

the

next victim?" (p. 62).

A

comparative reading suggests Jay Gatsby, who ironically

wishes

desperately

to

marry

his own dream

girl

but

is

denied

that

metaphoric

death,

but, instead,

is

literally

shot to death because

of

Daisy

and

her reckless

driving.

Gatsby

"knew that when he

kissed

[Daisy],

and forever wed his unutterable visions to her

perishable

breath,

his mind would

never

romp again

like

the mind

of

God"

(p.

101).

Yet,

still,

he kisses

her,

entering

into

a

marriage-

fixation that would

pull

him,

five

years

later,

like

a moth into the flame. In

Gatsby,

as in

Story

of

the

Gadsbys,

Mendelssohn's

Wedding

March

plays,

but

off-stage. During

a

confrontational scene

between Tom and

Gatsby,

the

march

resounds from

a

ballroom below and

momentarily

breaks

the

tension,

with

Jordan

crying, '"Imagine

marrying anybody

in this heat '"

(p.

113).

Fitzgerald

sets the stage for a wedding theme relatively early in the novel, describing a "frosted wedding-

cake"

ceiling

in the

opening

scene

(p.

24)

and Nick

bristling

at

being

"rumored into

marriage"

(pp.

32-33).

Within

marriages

and

prior

to

them,

the

women

in

both

narratives

are

treated as if

they

were

girls.

In an

aside to the

audience,

Gadsby says,

of

his

soon-to-be-fiancee,

"little

girls

shouldn't

understand these

things" (p.

12).

After

the

marriage

he

persists,

calling

her

"child" and

remarking

as

she reaches for a

trooper's

saddle,

"Little

girls

aren't

expected

to

handle

numdahs"

(p.

80),

and

she

complains,

"Will

you always

treat me like a child?"

(p.

87).

"They

train us women

well,

don't

they,

Pip?"

Mrs.

Herriott

says

(p.

38),

a

comment which has

an echo

in

Daisy's

remarks,

upon

hearing

that

she

has

given

birth

to

a

daughter:

"T

hope

she'll be a

fool

?

that's the best

thing

a

girl

can

be

in

this

world,

a

beautiful little fool'"

(p.

30).

With its

largely

male

perspective

and a central

thesis

claiming

that

marriage

ruins

males,

The

Story

ofthe Gadsbys

is,

at its

core,

more than a

little sexist

?

a

man's book

about the world of

men.

Fitzgerald

likewise

thought

of his

novel as "a

man's book" and

wondered if that

would hurt the

book's

popularity.24

No ideal

marriages

exist in

either

Kipling's

play

or

Fitzgerald's

novel.

In

the

latter,

Catherine

whispers,

of

her

sister,

Myrtle,

and

Tom,

'"Neither

of them can

stand the

person

they're

married to'"

(p.

42),

and most of

the

women

at

Gatsby's

party

have

"fights

with men

said

to

be their husbands"

(p. 56). In Story ofthe Gadsbys, marriage and unhappiness go hand-in-hand,

with

Gadsby

reminding

the

unattached

Mafflin,

"A man

has a

right

to live his

life

as

happily

as

he

can. You

aren't married"

(p.

113).

In both

texts,

marriage

is

also

equated

with

madness: "Are

you

mad?"

Mafflin asks

Gadsby.

"No

?only

married,"

the

hero

responds

(p.

111),

while

in

Gatsby,

Myrtle

screams,

'"The

only crazy

I was

was

when I

married him'"

(p.

43).

Section five

of

the

play,

"The Garden

of Eden"

?

again,

shades of

Hemingway

?

is set

out-

doors and

sets

up

the

all-important

next section.

Gadsby,

a

husband

of

three

weeks,

"smokes a

pipe

of

peace

on

a

rug

in

the sunshine"

during

a

temporary

truce

in the

battle

of

the

sexes

(p.

63).

As

Gadsby

prepares

for

a

ride,

his wife

says

that she is

lonely,

and

Gadsby

suggests,

"Why

don't

you ask some nice people in to dinner?" She responds, "Nice people Where am I to find them?

Horrid

frumps

And if I

did,

I

shouldn't

be

amused"

(p.

82).

Neither,

Nick

observes,

are

any

of

the

freeloading party

crowd at

Gatsby's

mansion

amusing

(p.

134).

Bored,

Mrs.

Gadsby begins

to

prod

her

husband for

details

about his

past

love,

Mrs.

Herriott

?

gearing

up

to

sample

the

forbid?

den fruit.

The section's

epigraph,

"And

ye

shall

be

as

?

Gods "

comes,

of

course,

from the

story

24. F.

Scott

Fitzgerald,

The

Letters

ofF.

Scott

Fitzgerald,

d. Andrew

Turnbull

Charles

Scribner's

ons,

1963),

p.

173.



9/11

138

Journal

of

Modern

Literature

of

Eve's

temptation

in

the Garden of

Eden,

after

which she coaxes

Adam to sin with

her. And in a

burst of

emotion

that calls to

mind

Nick's own

cry

to

Gatsby

that he was '"worth

the

whole

damn

bunch

put together'" (p. 134),

Mrs.

Gadsby cries,

"You're

so much too

good

for

me. So much too

good " (p.

65)

Section six of

Story of

the

Gadsbys,

"Fatima,"

begins

with a related secular

epigraph

from

The

Story ofBlue

Beard:

"And

you may go

into

every

room of

the house and see

everything

that

is

there,

but into the blue room

you

must

not

go."

In

choosing

Blue

Beard,

a

fairy

tale wherein

the seventh

wife

of

the title character

ignores

the Eden-like edict not to enter

the "blue"

room

and

discovers the bodies of her

husband's former

spouses,

Kipling

finds a

perfect

allegory

for one

of

the

play's

main themes: that

past

loves have

the inherent

capacity

to

destroy present

ones

and

that,

as a

result,

men and

women

may

not be wise to be

totally

honest

with

each other.

Mrs. Gadsby is disturbed by the scar which she notices in this episode and by the sordid story

behind it. More

importantly,

she discovers a

letter

from Mrs. Herriott to

Gadsby

and,

in

reading

it,

despite

Gadsby's

exhortations to leave

matters

alone,

she enters the blue

room

and

exhumes

Gadsby's past

love.

Upon learning

some of the

details,

she becomes

instantly

insecure and seeks

reassurrance.

Even

when

he offers

it,

she is still so tormented

by

the

thought

of

his

ever

having

loved another

that she

presses

for an assurance of his love

beyond

the

present, sighing, "Only you

and

I

?

I and

you

?

in

the whole

wide,

wide world until the end"

(p.

67).

By

contrast,

Gadsby

is

not bothered

at all

by

her

past.

When

he

asks out

of

near-conversational

politeness

if

she

has

"ever

been mixed

up

in

any

dark and dismal

tragedy" (p.

70)

and hears the

story

of

a

man she was

previ?

ously

involved

with,

he

is

absolutely

unaffected

(pp.

70-71).

In

Gatsby,

Daisy

is

the forbidden:

she arrives for

her clandestine

meeting

with

Gatsby

with

a

"damp

streak of hair"

laying

like "a dash of blue

paint

across

her

cheek"

(p.

82).

In

Gatsby,

letters

also

play

a

prominent

role,

with

Gatsby receiving

the

devastating

news

of

Daisy

and Tom while at

Oxford

(p.

132)

and

Daisy clutching

one, drunk,

on the

day

she is to wed Tom

(p.

74).

Gatsby

is

as

insistent as Mrs.

Gadsby

that the

love

be

exclusive,

all-encompassing,

and

guaranteed. Although

Tom is

perfectly happy

to

accept

Daisy

in

the

present,

as

unconcerned about her

past

as

Gadsby

is,

Gatsby

insists

upon entering

the

forbidden room

of

Daisy's past

loves,

seeking

to

extract

a reassur-

ing

confirmation

from

her

(pp. 117-18). Although

it never

comes,

he still tells

himself, speaking

aloud

in

front

of

Nick,

"1 don't think she ever loved

[Tom]'"

(p.

132).

Hovering

about

in

section seven of

Story

of

the

Gadsbys,

"The

Valley

of the

Shadow,"

is a

doctor who attends the

gravely

ill Mrs.

Gadsby,

with

Gadsby

himself

looking

"the color

of

good

cigar-ash" (p.

95)

?

an

image

echoed

in

Gatsby

by

the

"valley

of ashes"

and another

hovering

medical

presence,

the

gigantic

blue

billboard

eyes

of

Doctor

T. J.

Eckleburg

(p.

35).

Subtitled

"Knowing

Good and

Evil,"

this section

of

Story

of

the

Gadsbys

picks up

the Garden of Eden

theme,

with a

post-euphoric, post-honeymoon Gadsby agonizing

as his wife

almost dies.

Mafflin,

who has himself been

considering marriage,

remarks,

"What

am

I

let in

for?

Gaddy

has

aged

ten

years in the night" (p. 105). In Kipling's version, taking a bite of the forbidden fruit means leav-

ing

the

garden,

which

means

facing

the

day-to-day drudgery

and

turmoils of

marriage

and

the

death of

freedom.

In

both

Story

of

the

Gadsbys

and The Great

Gatsby,

for

characters to

leave

the

garden

and

know

good

and evil also means to

know death

?

either as a

close

contact,

as with

Story ofthe Gadsbys,

or with

Myrtle's

death in

Gatsby,

another

accident which

once more forces

Tom and

Daisy

to relocate.

In

the world of

Fitzgerald's

lost

and careless

generation,

the

sinning

and

leaving

the

garden

episode

is

repeated

over

and

over,

with no

compunction

and

no

apparent

lesson learned.



10/11

Plath:

Kipling

and

Fitzgerald

139

The

final

Story

ofthe

Gadsbys

section,

"The

Swelling

of

Jordan,"

takes

place

in

January

in the

Gadsby bungalow,

where

Gadsby

and Mafflin talk. More

than

conversation,

this has the

feel of

a

post-mortem. Gadsby, who once "left his sword .

.

. in an Utmanzai's head"

and who

had

sworn

that "he'd stick

by

[Mafflin]

and

the

Pinks as

long

as

he

lived,"

has

just

announced that he

will no

longer

serve in

the

army (p.

112).

To

Mafflin,

the

old

Gadsby

is dead.

Just

as

Gatsby

was burdened

with the

kryptonite

of

romance,

attracted

to one

who

ultimately

destroyed

him,

in Mafflin's

eyes

marriage

has reduced

Gadsby

to

rubble,

turning

him

away

from his friends and

rendering

him

absolutely

spineless

and

paranoid,

a mere

shadow

of his former self.

Gadsby

protests

that Mafflin

does not "know what it

is

to

go

into

your

own

room and see

your

wife's

head on the

pillow,

and

when

everything

else is safe

and

the house shut

up

for the

night,

to

wonder whether

the

roof-beams

won't

give

and kill her"

(p.

113).

Moments

later,

though, Gadsby

admits

that "even as

good

a mar?

riage as mine . . . hampers a man's work, it cripples his sword arm, and oh, it plays Hell with his

notions

of

duty "

(p.

121).

As one

critic

reminds,

"Gatsby's pursuit

of

Daisy's

love

is

Fitzgerald's quest

for Zelda's

hand"

as

a

young

lieutenant from

Camp

Sheridan, Alabama,

competing

for

the debutante's attention.25

But

in

the

summer

of

1924,

Fitzgerald

suffered

through

an

emotionally

crippling

time

with

Zelda.

As he was

working

on the first draft

of

The

Great

Gatsby,

their

marriage

was in

trouble.

Zelda,

"bored

and

restless,"

had

an

affair with "a

handsome

French

naval

aviator,

Edouard

Jozan,"

and

the

"crisis

peaked

on

July

13 when

Zelda told Scott that she loved Jozan

and asked for

a

divorce."26

If ever

Fitzgerald

was

ripe

for

writing

about the

pitfalls

of

marriage

and the

ways

in which a

woman could

destroy

any

man

who

was drawn

to

her,

it was then.

In

Story ofthe

Gadsbys,

one

ofthe men at the

Deychi

Club

remarks,

"Curious

thing

how some

women

carry

a

Fate with them"

(p.

31),

and the

play

indeed shows the

power

that

a fateful

woman

can exert over a

man who

is

attracted to

her

beyond

all

reason

and

control.

As

Kipling's

play

is

pur-

posefully

illustrative,

so too

is

Fitzgerald's

novel. Kenneth Eble has

observed that

while

"a

writer

ordinarily

reworks to more

sharply

delineate

a

character,"

that is

not

"Fitzgerald's

extraordinary

intention.

Daisy

moves

away

from

actuality

into

an idea

existing

in

Gatsby's

mind

and

ultimately

to

a kind of

abstract

beauty

corrupted

and

corrupting

in

taking

on

material form"27

?

an illustra?

tion of what can happen when she is overvalued on the gauge of Gatsby's "appalling sentimen-

tality" (pp.

86,

101).

Daisy,

like

Tom,

is

a

careless driver

whose

fate

it is

to leave victims in her

accidental

wake:

"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"

(p.

153).

In

our last view of

them,

"Daisy

and Tom were

sitting opposite

each

other at

the kitchen

table,"

where,

from

Nick's

vantage point,

there

is

an

"unmistakable air

of natural

intimacy"

between

these

two,

who

are

"conspiring

together"

(p.

127).

The

Story of

the

Gadsbys

ends in

a

curiously

similar

way,

with

Captain

Mafflin

remarking,

after

the

Gadsbys

"little

villain" has

broken

his

watch,

"Everything's

made

to

be

played

with

and

broken,

isn't

it,

young 'un?" Then, "Oh Diamond, Diamond, thou little knowest the mischief that thou hast done"

(p.

122).

After

Mafflin

leaves,

the audience's

last view of

Gadsby

and his wife

is of his

telling

her to

"Bring

a

chair

out

here,

dear.

Fve

got

something

to talk

over with

you"

?

an

open-ended

25. Tim

Sherer,

"Midwestern

nfluences

n

F. Scott

Fitzgerald's

The

Great

Gatsby?

Society or

the

Study

of

Midwestern

Literature

Newsletter

XI,

2

(1981),

p.

15.

26.

Jeffrey

Meyers,

Scott

Fitzgerald:

A

Biography HarperCollins,

994),

pp.

115-16.

27.

Eble,

p.

92.



11/11

140 Journal

of

Modern

Literature

remark,

inviting

the audience to

speculate

on what

they

are

talking

about,

just

as

we are invited at

the

beginning

of

the

play

to

speculate

on

the nature

of

the

title character.

Ronald Berman astutely observes that "there are certain silent scenes" in The Great Gatsby

that

are

"openly

cinematic,

as in the

theater view

that

we

get

of Tom and

Daisy through

the

pantry

window in which

they

are

on

stage

in

the

light

and

we

see them from

the dark. Such scenes can

be

reminiscent of film

staging,"

Berman

concludes.28 Such

a

leap

is

easily

made,

given Fitzgerald's

involvement with

Hollywood.

But the

many

structural and

elemental similarities

between

The

Great

Gatsby

and

Kipling's

The

Story of

the

Gadsbys

more

likely suggest

that,

in this

case,

the

stage

?

not

the

screen

?

inspired

Fitzgerald

to treat his

novel

in an

unnovelistic

way,

so

that,

like a

script

with its

minimal

details,

even the

"conventional

language

of

description

seems

not

to

matter

to the

narrator."29

If

Kipling's

play

can indeed be added to the

long

list of

"influences,"

then it

appears

to be a

key

influence: it

contributes

to

the

novel's

theatrieal

style

and

partially

accounts for

what Eble

called

"the

tight

inevitability

of its

construction."30

Further,

it

suggests origins

for

some of the

novel's more

quirky

details

?

including Gatsby's

"old

sport" jauntiness

and odd

pink

suits.

More

than

anything,

Kipling's play

was a

play

about

marriage

and

the

symbolic

"death" it

occasions in

males.

Given the

turmoil of

Fitzgerald's

own

marriage during

the

novel's

composition,

perhaps

the

American

Dream in

Gatsby

is more

a dream

of

wife, house,

children

and

two-car

garage

?

that

is,

marriage

?

than

it

is

a dream

of

financial success or an

unattainable

dream

girl.

Part

of the

problem,

as

audiences

learn from

Kipling's

play,

is

that

men fall in

love with

girls

who

then sur-

prise

them

by growing

up,

while

the men still

see them and

treat

them as

girls

?

a

conflict

between

expectations

and

reality,

between the

past

and the

present

or future

?

so that

any

dream

of

mar?

riage

is

doomed

from the

start.

Moreover,

as Berman

notes,

"For most

of his

professional

life,

F.

Scott

Fitzgerald

was

deeply

aware of

the

conflict

between modern

times and

what he

called,

in

1937,

'the

old America' . .

. a

world

of

excess

and

pretense."31

A

reading

of the

novel with

Kipling's

play

in

mind

?

especially

considering

the

otherwise

strange,

metaphorical

comparisons

of

Gatsby

to

an

Indian

rajah

?

sug?

gests

a

world

in which

privileged

old-money

colonials dominate

and

people

such as the

Wilsons

will forever be small and unimportant, victims of class and its limitations, in a novel in which East

and

West can

take on

significant

colonial

overtones for

its

ill-fated

hero. And

allusions

to Dutch

sailors,

those

early

New

World

explorers (p.

154),

suddenly

seem

to take

on

an

even

greater

reso-

nance for

Gatsby.

Or

Gadsby.

But

what's in a

name,

Old

Sport?

28.

Ronald

Berman,

The

Great

Gatsby

and

Modern

Times

University

f

Illinois

Press,

1994),

p.

10.

29.

Ronald

Berman,

The

Great

Gatsby

and

Fitzgerald's

World

f

Ideas

(University

f

Alabama

Press,

1997),

p.

22.

30.

Eble,

p.

7.

31.

Berman,

The

Great

Gatsby

and

Fitzgerald's

World

f

Ideas,

p.

1.

kipling's story gadsbys possible source fitzgerald(plath)

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