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Looking For Alibrandi Theme Essay

Decent Essays

“The only journey is the one within.” (Rainer Maria Rilke) Why do teenagers love novels on the adolescent mind or the coming of age story or an individual finding their way you may ask? The only thing in common in all these different themes is relatability to every one of those teenagers. Looking for Alibrandi by Melina Marchetta the recipient of The Children’s Book of the Year and the Bilby Award; the relatable story of Josie a seventeen-year-old as she goes on her path of self-discovery in her final year of school. As Marchetta asks the questions of Who am I? Where am I? Where am, I going? How do I get there? Her inquisition are the questions that all teenagers ask in their journey to find their way like Josie as she looks for Alibrandi or herself.
Marchetta uses her Italian heritage to capture the effects of ethnicity, pressure, family issues and growing up on Josie throughout her journey. The realistic, relatable and relevant use of racism and ethnic separation as Josie is caught between two cultures. As she fights her culture and her oppressive, deceptive and traditional grandmother. Her search for freedom and acceptance carries through the end as she matures. As she changes her perception of her grandmother from having “no respect for… …show more content…

As Josie handle the pressures of high school compared to the contrast of John Barton (her former love interest) who takes his life as pressure consumes him. But it is the resilience and strength Josie shows in the darkest situation of his death defines the coming of age metaphor. “‘There’s nothing to look forward to if you don’t have any dreams,’ he [Jacob] said. ‘Because dreams are goals and John might have run out of goals. So he died. But we’re alive… [there’s] something to look forward to” (pg. 239) She merely treats it as an obstacle and continues on her quest to self-discovery as she learns from his heartfelt

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