Synthesis Gatsby Project
Loss of Life Through the Pursuit of a Dream
Despite the obvious differences Martin Luther King Jr., Abraham Lincoln, Jesus, the business men from Inside Job, and Jay Gatsby, there is a common sacrifice towards the accomplishment of their goal. In order to succeed each of them sacrifices their life. In King Jr.'s speech "I Have A Dream" he stated that he was pursuing his dream to change America so that it would one day "live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal"" (King Jr. 4) and later on in his efforts to change America he was shot and killed which is similar to the way Jesus saved us sinners with the way he "suffered on account of sins, once for all, the righteous one on behalf of the unrighteous. He did this in order to bring you into the presence of God" (1 Peter 3:18). They both had noble causes and to them the costly price of their life was the trade off.
In the pursuit of love and unity, the lives of Jay Gatsby and Abraham Lincoln were taken from them. In a similar fashion both men were gunned down in unjust circumstances. Jay Gatsby was gunned down because Wilson's false thought that "he murdered [Myrtle]" and Lincoln was shot down for trying to "free slaves within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States" (Lincoln 2).
Just as Lincoln lost his "life" or became dead in the eyes of the southern slave owners, the business men from inside job also lost their "lives". In their pursuit of unjust riches, they became dead in the eyes of the clientele that they dishonestly cheated out of money. Some even sacrificing the remainder of their lives to the hell hole of a prison that criminals of their caliber are sent to.
Five different dreams but only one cost: life. In the pursuit of dreams, both good and bad, the sacrifice of life turned men into heroes and gave justice to those who deserved it but in the end the sacrifice was still the same: life.
Bibliography
Fitzgerald, F. Scott, and Matthew J. Bruccoli. The Great Gatsby. New York, NY: Scribner, 1996. Print.
Inside job. Dir. Charles Ferguson. Perf. Matt Damon. Sony, 2010. DVD.
"Abraham Lincoln." The Emancipation Proclamation 1863. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Jan. 2014
"Compare Translations for 1 Peter 3:18." BibleStudyTools.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 08 Jan. 2014.
King, Martin L., Jr. "I Have a Dream." I Have a Dream. Archives, n.d. Web.