About Stars and Infinities

The Fault, dear Readers, is in our Stars.

"It seemed like forever ago, like we’d had this brief but still infinite forever. Some infinities are bigger than other infinities."

It would be rather cliched for me to start off with a statement like "For the first time in my life, I read a book this outstanding." On the contrary I'd rather say, "I hope I don't have to read another book like this ever again. I cannot imagine a modern literary creation more beautiful than this."

I don't mean to review this book, nor do I mean to praise it. I bet loads of people have done that already. I simply want to grab those quotes, wrench them apart from the immobile text and present to you, the depth, the unfathomable beauty that comes along with them.  

A summer romance, a cancer-stricken lover, and a poignant conclusion has been the recipe for modern tragedies for quite some time. But what sets John Green's The Fault in Our Stars apart from these conventional novels, is the simplicity and straightforwardness of his characters.

While reading this story, I met two of the most extraordinary people. Somewhere in the middle of the diseased atmosphere, I actually fell in love, in the most effortless manner possible. How can anyone depict a romance, so brutally grounded in reality and yet at the same time so ethereal? How can anyone paint the picture of two people, madly in love with each other but still hanging on to the thread of life which is on the verge of tearing apart?

Hazel's characterization of Augustus is breathtaking. Her realization of the harsh truth of life, yet her defiance of all materialistic and emotional barriers when she meets him, is perhaps the bravest move any woman can make in her life. The childish, bubbling infatuation she shares with this good-looking young man, the simple exchange of words...and then she finally concludes, with the statement, 

" You choose your behaviors based on their metaphorical resonances "

Augustus on the other hand, is perhaps the most realistic male protagonist I've come across. His obsession with metaphors, his earnest wish to make Hazel's wishes come true, his mad desire to give her the ending for the unfinished story that she so yearned to know. But what I liked about him the MOST, that I don't think anyone can deny, was his daring metaphorical relationship with a cigarette. Smoking may lead to cancer. But here's a guy who holds the cigarette in between his teeth, and flirts with danger. In the entire story, he never lights it, showing all the people in the world, how he's holding his killer right there in front of him, but not giving them the chance to kill. 

There is a heavenly connection between Hazel and Augustus and it is so beautiful.

 It's remarkable how she, despite the terrors clinging to her future, can still think about his infallible smile and his clarion voice, realizing that with every step, she is falling in love with him. The glorious feeling of listening to a voice, and forgetting everything around you because the speaker, in his true essence, is so melodious. And it all shows after his death, when she dials his number, only to hear his voice mail, only to listen to that voice one last time. Then there is the deep anguish and sorrow after his death. Her fear of being a burden to him, had changed into the unspeakable fear of losing him to Death. 

This is one hell of a love story. Lovers dream about being with each other till "death do us part". But here both boy and girl, are so worried about how they won't be able to live to write the eulogy for the other. Green makes it sound so simple, when in truth, it is perhaps the most painful thought in the world. The thought of pre-funerals and the like, making it almost a childish game. 

The unfair stringent rules of life, almost make it very difficult for us to go out there and proclaim "We are in control of our own Fate". That's where Shakespeare really went wrong when he made Cassius say,

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars

But in ourselves, that we are underlings."

For truth be told, those who are disabled in the worst ways possible are not underlings, they are as Green puts it across.....side-effects. They are not heroes or fighters or any of those polished beings that doctors, spiritual leaders and preachers claim they are. They are simple normal human beings, who are born to show themselves to the world, earn trophies of love and respect and depart sooner than the rest. They are a world among themselves. They find endlessness within small periods of time. They live more than all of us combined, because for them life is about spending each and every second like there is no tomorrow. 

So when Hazel says, 

"You gave me a forever within the numbered days, and I’m grateful."

she means every word of it. The world is a very unfair place, and we are always bound by vices such as depression, sorrow, jealousy and anger. But if we can grow to radiate happiness in between these dull phases, if we can live every minute without wasting it on small, useless things, we will create infinities too. 

And I'm sure, we will love it.