Gatsby and Belfort Parallels?

In this book, I immediately thought of Gatsby being a kind of parallel to Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street. The extravagant lifestyles they portray vastly separate them from the ordinary people that live in the surrounding areas. As well as their originally humble beginnings that soon were erased once they came into money through questionable avenues.

Gatsby and Belfort surround themselves with very extravagant and greedy/rich people who I believe encourage the twos behaviors. In my opinion, they are in very similar settings, while even taking place in primarily the same areas. I just believe The Wolf of Wallstreet is a few decades later and the changed social norms that come with it.

They both are very flashy with their money and made it by majority illegal means. Gatsby with his bootlegging, as well as other shady business dealings. He is also associated with a known gangster Meyer Wolfsheim who is suspected to have fixed the world series. As Tom speculated of Gatsby, he was involved in organized crime amongst other things. In the Wolf of Wallstreet, Jordan was also involved with some organized crime, and fraudulent schemes. Belfort also was known to have worked with gangsters similar to Gatsby’s connections.

Though they are played in movies by the same person, I still feel that they are similar in many ways disregarding who portrays them in film. Up until writing this blog, I haven’t really gone into deep thought of the similarities between them. Though I believe I always noticed it and its why I felt intrigued by both stories. When reading the Great Gatsby and about Gatsby’s character, I’d always felt like I was reading of someone else I’d heard of and by writing the blog I was able to put the pieces together that it was Jordan Belfort