Literary Analysis On Looking For Alaska

The before and after approach in Looking for Alaska is vital to the story in multiple ways. Throughout the story, Miles undergoes a journey of self-discovery, during which he gains his independence; establishing confidence in his social skills and personal relationships. As John Green says in his interview, “Humans tend to measure time within the framework of important events.” Though Miles’s confidence has begun to blossom prior to Alaska’s accident, her death strikes a dramatic change in his view on life as well as his overall personality. Her death, as John Green says, is “the defining moment of these people’s lives (at least so far) and it reshapes their relationship to the world so completely that it also reshapes their understanding of time.” Miles now views his life in two separate chapters: before and after Alaska. Tragic events in our lifetime almost always change our entire view of the world, causing us to view situations and relationships in a completely different way. I think that Miles’s story of how he deals with the tragic loss of
Alaska makes multiple comments throughout the story, such as “I may die young, but at least I’ll die smart” and “I smoke to die”. I believe that her character signifies the constant struggle we as humans go through to try to understand and cope with the unfair suffering that we constantly witness every day. After Alaska’s death, Miles and his friends all must learn to cope with this tragic event, and each person must do so in their own way. In the end each character grows significantly, especially Miles, by learning to accept things we cannot change or understand, and using those experiences to grow from, which is the major turning point of the story, impacts the characters in an extremely significant way; their view on life will never be the