The Fault in Our Stars

No matter how old you are, you might know what It feels like to lose a loved one. Hazel Grace has never been anything but terminal, until she meets Augustus Waters, and that’s when her story is about to be completely rewritten. The novel is an emotional roller coaster dealing with first loves, terminal illnesses, secrets, passion and trust. In the novel, The Fault In Our Stars, Hazel Grace must go through what any person with a terminal disease must go through and beyond that: overcoming a terminal disease, love, and fear.

As Hazel first introduces herself she gives off a quite sophisticated but also depressed vibe. My first impression of Hazel was that she was a little too smart for a girl who hadn't been to school in three years. I soon learned that she took classes at the local community college. A couple weeks into support group Hazel meets her match and is instantly drawn to the intriguing character of Gus. I could immediately tell that gus and Hazel had a mutual attraction but a roadblock stood in the way, cancer. The relationship that soon developed between Hazel and gus is what intrigued myself, how they both were incredibly scared to hurt the other emotionally. They bonded over their overuse of symbols and metaphors. For example, how gus used the cigarettes as a metaphor… “It’s a metaphor, see: You put the killing right between your teeth, but you dont give it the power to do its killing.” (Green, 20). I could immediately tell that Hazel has become immensely attracted to Augustus and they would soon become star

Augustus makes an impact on Hazel’s life. Augustus and Hazel meet at Support Group and grow a close bond. Augustus and Hazel fall deeply in love throughout the story. When Augustus’ cancer sprung up again, he asked Hazel to write him an eulogy. In Hazel’s eulogy she says, “My name is Hazel. Augustus Waters was the great star-crossed love of my life. Ours was an epic love story, and I won’t be able to get more than a sentence into it without disappearing into a puddle of tears”(Green 259). This shows that when Augustus dies he will leave a (mental) scar on Hazel, because Hazel will deeply miss Augustus when he dies. Augustus transformed Hazel

Despite the adversity they face, the characters in The Fault in Our Stars identity lies within their inner selves, and is not defined by societal expectations. Hazel expresses her frustration with the lesser standard that is expected of cancer patients, saying “According to Maslow, I was…unable to feel secure in my health and therefore unable to reach for love and respect and art…which is utter horseshit: The urge to make art or contemplate philosophy does not go away when you are sick” (Green 213). According to society, cancer patients, and those who are not “secure in their health” are restricted from experiencing life at its fullest. The outside world sees Hazel in singular terms, as “a cancer kid”, unable to reach for greatness;

Hazel Grace Lancaster has been diagnosed with Stage 4 Thyroid Cancer since she was a preteen and this is one of the conflicts of this novel. This is both an external and internal conflict because she has to deal with carrying around an oxygen cart and being judged for having to keep nasal plugs in her nose in order to breathe. It’s an internal conflict as well because she is constantly thinking about what people are saying/thinking about her and thinks about death pretty much 24/7. That is however before Augustus Waters shows up.

She desperately starts to look for this last testament with hope that she could have changed something. Later comes depression; in the finding and hunting for Gus’s last testament she feels frustrated and slowly starts to depress. Until that spark of flame ignites her and she reaches the last stage of grief, which is acceptance. She finally finds the last testament which ends with this: “You don’t get to choose if you get hurt in this world but you do have a say in who hurts you, and I like my choices, and I hope she likes hers. Okay, Hazel Grace?”. (Green. 313) With her response being: I do. Peter Van Houten became a monster after he lost his daughter to Leukemia. He is a symbol of what you can become if you do not overcome grief. John Green was wise when incorporating him to the novel because he put him as a species of foreshadowing tool of what could have happened if Hazel would not have accepted Augustus’s death. She saw that and she accepted

Hazel grace is a dynamic character because she changes throughout the story. In the beginning, Hazel doesn’t want to get close to Augustus, because she was afraid he is going to be shattered when she dies. But towards the ending, hazel finds out it doesn’t matter if you die in the middle of a relationship, it’s about the moments you spend together. A quote in the book, on page 214, “Only now that I loved a grenade did I understand the foolishness of trying to save others from my own impending fragmentation: I couldn’t unlove Augustus Waters. And I didn’t want to.”

Augustus realizes that a lot of people let their cancer identify them, which it seems at first like Hazel does. Through the novel Augustus mentions multiple times how he wants his life to mean something other than cancer. “I fear that I won’t be able to give anything in exchange for my life. If you don’t live a life in service of a greater good, you’ve gotta

Hazel Lancaster, a teenage girl with the fourth stage of thyroid cancer, is forced to join the Support Group due to her parents’ will. Her world has totally changed after meeting a high school basketball player that lost his right leg to cancer, Augustus Waters along with his friends, Issac. Hazel and Gus together becomes a perfect bond. Hazel shares her affection toward the book called An Imperial Affliction with Gus and anticipates knowing the ending because the story just left undone. A week later, Gus reveals that he is able to track down Van Houten's assistant,

When something is valuable to you, you do not like sharing about it and it sharing about it means you have to share your feelings, thoughts, and emotions with someone else. The book presents her life, as the main character Anna also battles cancer. However, she does not hesitate sharing this with Augustus because he already knows what it feels like to battle cancer. One of the many reasons that Hazel feels a connection with this book is due to the fact that her favorite book describes what death feels like without dying. Anna, the main character in An Imperial Affliction, says that she is "the side effect," which Hazel agrees to. Hazel feels as the book is only meant for her, as she understands how Anna might have felt when battling cancer. She is able to relate to the character so much that she is believed that the author is the only person who can truly know what it feels like to leave your family behind when you die. Hazel reads the book over and over again, as she is able to escape the reality and live a life through

When Hazel and Augustus came back from Amsterdam Augustus health was deteriorating. One day he decides to go to the gas station to by a pack of cigarettes knowing he was sick he then noticed that something was terribly wrong with him so he called Hazel and hazel rushed over to him. When she took a closer look she noticed that he had an infection where they had entered his tubes. When she saw this she said she was going to call 911 but he said no but she called anyways. When they came to take Augustus to the hospital. While their in the ambulance Augustus asks Hazel to read a poem as he loses conscience. This is a near death experience death because he had an affection and while unconscious something could have gone wrong and he could have died. When you get an infection you have to rush straight to the hospital. If it was not for Hazel he could have been

Personally, I believe that in order to live my life to the fullest I should always try to make the best out of situations. This is something that both Hazel and Augustus try to follow, which make their situation a little relatable even though I have never experienced anything even close to cancer. This connection is significant because it

As human beings everyone suffers but we all suffer differently. Some suffer emotionally, some suffer physically, some suffer mentally. And through suffering and pain we gain different experiences, we either overcome pain and sorrows or we break down waste our lives. Edwidge Danticat present the theme of suffering in each of her stories. In all the stories the characters have to go through pain, but they all over come it in different ways. This is true in real life too. in the children of the sea that characters suffer but the outcome is that, in 1937 the outcome is inner peace, and My outcome is discovering myself.

Firstly, within the novel, it is clear that Hazel is a caring person and is fully aware of what her body’s condition does to her

Hazel flawlessly describes her pain at multiple points in the book. One definition is, “Even then, it hurt. The pain was always there, pulling me inside of myself, demanding to be felt” (Green 142). Pain is an underlying condition that damages one from the inside out and hides itself until it’s expressed. Pain can represent itself physically, mentally, or psychologically. In this way, it destroys a person; it doesn’t matter how or where the pain started. All humans experience pain and suffering, creating the concept that pain is humanly impossible to avoid. At some point, people must overcome pain to survive which is what Hazel is trying to do with her cancer. Overcoming suffering is a difficult process, especially when it’s always there, however one must cope with pain to live.