Obsession

Gatsby has a thing for Daisy. The main character in House of Mirth is Lily. Two women whose names are flowers. Coincidence?? Probably.

Now that I've gotten that levity out of my system, on to more serious things...

At first glance, Gatsby and Lily seem quite different. Gatsby behaves almost as a polar opposite to Lily Bart. Lily spends all of her life trying to squeeze herself into the higher realm of social status at the expense of her humanity. Gatsby, on the other hand, is already in high society yet utilizes his social position as a means to fulfill his humanity (namely, winning Daisy back). The irony here lies in the idea that Gatsby's emotional shallowness is about on par with Lily's. Gatsby has an almost childish obsession with Daisy much in the same way Lily has an obsession about being "one of the group." With each character, this emotional shallowness dictates the majority of their actions and ultimately leads to each character's end (in both cases, death).

While both characters know what they want, they both fail to recognize that what they want isn't necessarily what they need. Obsession consumes them both and warps their perception of reality.