Miles Halter, protagonist in Looking for Alaska, is seeking "The Great Perhaps."
Spoilers ahead.
There's a reason that the first time I ever read the young adult novel, Looking For Alaska, I finished it in two days. And maybe that's not that impressive, but I was in seventh grade, about thirteen and seventh-eights years old. And maybe our age past a certain quantifier has nothing to do with how fast one should be able to finish a short book, but might I add I was on spring break in The Florida Keys. I distinctly remember my family yelling at me to get outside, enjoy the sunshine sabbatical before we had to return to the everlasting gloom that is a Chicago April and that I can read on the plane. The sunshine may have been a valid point, but the latter sure wasn't. I couldn't start to read when I was on the plane, I couldn't start to read after dusk had settled that night; I had to read now, and every moment following until I reached the back cover.
This description undoubtedly sets me up as some kind of book-obsessed teenager who characterized The Fault In Our Stars' Augustus Waters as her dream husband and Divergent's Tris to be her best friend. Although this isn't entirely untrue (I do have a tendency to get over-invested in characters that will never come to life), I cannot say I am an expert in literature. Especially today, I have lost that habitual drive to read for pleasure daily, something I am certainly not proud of. Despite all of the distractions and phases that guide us through our adolescent and adult years, there is one book that will always reign superior.
There is a reason I read John Green's Looking For Alaska so fast, and it is not because I was an outright nerd (I wish), could relate, or had nothing better to do. It is instead because this novel is a universal form of art for both young adults and adults alike. It transgresses all of the age barriers that cause the division of "Juvenile Fiction" on the library second floor and "Adult Fiction" on the third. It lacks the exaggerated and cringe emotional drama found in almost every teenage story. (Disclaimer: still love you, Jenny Han, but there was a time and a place for boardwalk summer boyfriends.) It omits the excessive use of seasoned jargon that seventy percent of the adult population probably cannot grapple anyway. (Disclaimer: I'm a huge fan of ~big words~, but there is a time and a place. Most people like to enjoy a story without too many dictionary visits.) Looking For Alaska has the impulsive adolescent innocence every quality coming-of-age literary requires, but is matched with deeply philosophical questions that will leave the reader reflecting for weeks. Years, in my case.
Growing up, I had read the book at least five times. I had always appreciated the love story between the quiet new kid who is hopelessly captivated by the mysterious rebel who lives life with pretentious metaphors calling her shots. I had always cried at the heartbreak and loss, understanding the protagonist is feeling insurmountable amounts of pain, but had never really extended the premise of the novel beyond its binding. As I've matured into being half a young woman (and still half my seventh-grade self), I've begun to ask the "so what". The foundation isn't new: we've always been taught to ask "so what" in class. In fourth grade we'd learn about something seemingly arbitrary like the habitat of whales. The teachers would always follow up a lesson asking, "so what," and some kid who should probably be in an advanced college prep course already would expound upon how "to understand whales is to understand oneself." Meanwhile, my childhood best friend Cara was teaching me how to tie my shoes "the bunny ears way," and my mind lingered on what type of Oreos would be in my lunch box that day.
Today, the "so what" has an entirely different meaning, simply because I now have responsibility. Yes, the kind of responsibility our parents and teachers nag on us about, telling us that if we don't do the dishes when we have our own apartments, rats will happily be your roommate. Also, the kind of social responsibility that comes with being a citizen of the United States now falls upon us: to invest ourselves in a cause bigger than ourselves. Finally, the third responsibility I've begun to hone in on, and inversely the one I think is most overlooked, is the responsibility to grow ourselves, for ourselves. Life is full of opportunities in careers, relationships, homes, and love, but if you aren't willing to prepare yourself for these opportunities, there's no one to blame for a lack of self-fulfillment besides, well, yourself. That is why so many people choose to avoid the responsibility to show up for yourself; the fear of failing at life's greatest test: happiness. The fear is enough to avoid "The Great Perhaps" entirely.
You're probably wondering why I brought up Looking For Alaska if I was just going to ramble on about purpose and whatnot anyway. In this phase of growth experienced since the first time I read my favorite narrative, I've learned to grasp the reason why the greatest authors achieve what they do. Reading used to be seen primarily as a source of entertainment for me, but authors never intended their greatest, most compellingly detailed novels to just entertain. These stories are made to change, morph, shape, and cultivate our individual growth. To really read a novel is to develop a personal relationship with the story: no one is around except you, the characters that you create in your mind to catalyze the B&W print on the page, and your thoughts. So, John Green did not write this book, or frankly any of his other novels, to make my flight time pass by faster or to help me fall asleep. He wrote Looking for Alaska in the hopes that I begin to look for myself, and that I ask the "so what" of it all.
Some of the key ideas/quotes/mantras/concepts I love or struggle with the most:
Alaska holds an entire library of books in her dorm room called her Life's Library. She's only read a few, but plans to read them all before she dies. Only, she doesn't know how long that will be. Whether her death was intentional or not, she didn't know when her breaking point would hit, when she would snap once and for all. The snap is not something she, or anyone, planned for: the moment the ground cracked underneath her and she was sucked in by the illusion of emptiness that comes with death.
When Miles' grieves Alaska's death, his mother tells him she will help him move on from this with time. He immediately lashes out in response, telling her he does not ever want to get over her because Alaska cannot become a memory, and getting older only means he will lose more people he loves, and how much space does he even have to hold all these memories until people become faint polaroids of the individuals you used to know. Why do we immediately jump to forgetting when we experience a loss? We have a cultural misconception that putting the bandaid of forgetfulness will make the wound heal quicker, let alone do the person we love any justice. I am certainly no expert in grief, and there are millions upon millions of people who have faced far more loss than me. However, Miles breaking down our instinct of absentmindedness in the novel makes it all sound so ludicrous.
Finally, the legend himself, John Green, writes:
“It's not life or death, the labyrinth. Suffering. Doing wrong and having wrong things happen to you. That's the problem. Bolivar was talking about the pain, not about the living or dying. How do you get out of the labyrinth of suffering?”
"But ultimately I do not believe she was just matter. The rest of her must be recycled, too. I believe now that we are greater than the sum of our parts. If you take Alaska’s genetic code and you add her life experiences and the relationships she had with people, and then you took the size and shape of her body, you do not get her. There is something else entirely. There is a part of her greater than the sum of her knowable parts. And that part has to go somewhere, because it cannot be destroyed."
Because nothing I could write could ever expand upon the two quotes cited above with any degree of justice, I will end my thought-spiraling letter of appreciation to the novel here. I have yet to find a story that tops this, no matter how juvenile some portions may be, and given how much room my heart has already carved out for this narrative, there may not be room for another lifelong favorite.
To finding the "so what" in the classroom of life,
caroline hughes