The lessons life teaches you can change an individual in a multitude of ways. The things a person experiences through conflict can change their perspective, their ways, and much more within their life. Life lessons are conflicts or experiences that becoming defining moments that useful knowledge could be used. Life lessons do not just apply in the real world, they apply in literature as well to the characters of a novel, which can then affect the reader. Every story line has conflict. Conflict is defined in literature as a struggle between opposing forces in the story usually a protagonist and antagonist. There are two types of conflict, external and internal. Internal conflict is when the protagonist experiences two opposing emotions and …show more content…
The two novels that had protagonists that stood out to me where Miles “Pudge” Halter in Looking for Alaska and Liesel Meminger in The Book Thief. Each of these characters is dynamic and goes through a lot within their individual novels. With everything they go through, they grow as individual as a result of their own conflicts. In Looking for Alaska, Miles Halter is the protagonist. Miles, the shy quiet new student at Culver Creek, the one obsessed with last words changes through many life lessons from his experiences throughout the novel. “I go to seek a Great Perhaps.” (Green, 2005, p.5) , a quote by Francois Rabelais, is the reason Miles chooses to go to Culver Creek because he wants to seek his Great Perhaps; this helps us establish that there will be growth within Miles right from the beginning of the novel. Miles is in search of his true identity and his Great Perhaps, which proves to be the true source of conflict in the novel. Miles meets a variety of people that have an impact on his personal growth but the two that influence him the most are …show more content…
While in The Book Thief, Liesel Meminger, the protagonist seen through Death’s eyes changes through the pain of loss as well but Liesel has a whole different story of personal growth. Liesel comprehends the pain of loss of her father, mother and brother, and these experiences result in her actions and outlooks towards the other characters. When Liesel first arrives at the Hubermanns, her foster family, Liesel has a hard time trusting them or allowing herself to be vulnerable. Liesel comes off as being defensive, but as her foster family and new friends like Rudy and Max treat her kindly, she begins to open herself to the pain of others, while learning to express and alter her own pain and vulnerability. Liesel cares about justice in general, and feels frustrated and angry at the injustices spread by Hitler and war. Her experiences with loss give her motivation, and she is able to channel her anger to stick up for herself as well as others. “Liesel caught sight of him smiling with such absurdity that she dragged him down and started beating him up as well.” (Zusak, 2006, p.79), this is when Liesel beats up Ludwig Schmeikl, which she later saves him at the bonfire. This shows us how she changed from extreme disgust with him to caring enough to save his life. Throughout the novel, Liesel begins to realize that most people in life have experienced loss and pain, and she reevaluates
Every story has a conflict. Conflicts can be either internal or external. Internal conflicts occur within a character’s mind. The main character in Seventh Grade, Victor, deals with an internal conflict. External conflicts occur with a character and an outside force. The main character in Melting Pot deals with an external conflict. Both stories’ conflicts have winners.
John Green is the author of Looking for Alaska and several other award winning books. He is the number one New York Times bestselling author and specializes in writing for young adult fiction. He wrote similar books to Looking for Alaska such as The Fault in Our Stars and Paper Towns. In Looking for Alaska I found that the book had a great use of foreshadowing, tone, but I didn’t really like ending of the book. Miles Halter is a new student at Culver Creek Preparatory School in Alabama.
Conflict is the sole thing that pulls a story together and pushes it forward. Without conflict, there is no action or force moving the story. External conflict usually pushes the story forward with scenes such as fights and internal conflict pulls the story together with more insightful information about the characters’ personalities. However, they could do both pulling and pushing at times. In the fictional short story “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell, there are many instances of conflict in the story between all the characters.
Looking for Alaska starts off with Miles Halter leaving his home town in Florida in search for the Great Perhaps (the last words of Francois Rabelais) at Culver Creek Preparatory High School in Alabama; the same boarding school his father had attended when he was younger. At the beginning of the book Miles is seen as a bit of an outcast with little friends and a weird habit of memorizing people’s last words.
Liesel’s mom leaves her with foster parents because she wishes to protect her from the fate she is enduring. The words Paula, Liesel’s mom, uses go against Hitler because she is a communist which resulted in her being taken away and Liesel to lose her mother and experience the loss of her. This shows Liesel experiences unhappiness because of her mother’s disappearance which is caused by the words she openly uses that contradicts Hitler.
In the Book Thief, both Liesel and Hans have very altruistic personalities. When the Jew’s march through Himmel Street to get to Dachau, everyone knows where they are going. They watch them march by, walking around them and staring. 75 percent of Hungary’s 600,000 Jews were killed by the Nazis, and only a few brave people tried to save just one Jew. (We Are All Bystanders page 4) These people risked their lives to shelter Jews, much like Rosa and Hans Hubermann. As the Jews march to Dachau, and the residents of Himmel Street stand and watch the Jews marching towards their death at the concentration camps, Death writes, “The book thief could do nothing but watch them back in a long, incurable moment before they were gone again. She could only hope they could read the depth of sorrow in her face, to recognize that it was true, and not fleeting.” ( ) Liesel feels helpless, like she can’t do anything. She longs to call out to them and help but knows that it would be worthless. A few minutes later, however, Papa takes action. Papa quickly grabs something from his paint cart and helps an old man who was struggling to walk and gives him some bread. Papa took action when no one else would. Papa pays the consequence, but in that moment, Papa displayed moral courage. Papa’s selfless personality let him reach out to help the man, even
Conflict can be described as “the central struggle between two or more forces in a story, generally occurring when some person or thing prevents the protagonist from achieving his or her intended goal.” (Literature An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry and Drama, page G7) In “The Masque of the Red Death”, Edgar Allen Poe describes a conflict between the protagonist, Prospero, and the antagonist Red Death. Prospero’s goal is to survive forever and in the end it is inevitable that he will die. The belief system of Prospero is that his wealth and power will allow him to live forever.
In literature there are 3 diffrent types of conflict, man versus man, man versus nature and man verus himself. A conflict is something that opposes the protagonist in the story.
Every story has to have some form of conflict, without conflict a story really wouldn’t be much of a story at all. Generally the conflict of a story comes from a villainous person. Just because they are call a villain doesn’t mean they have to be some who has super powers and uses them for evil. A villain is the antagonist, or the person who cause the conflict in the story. Usually the villain is looking for some personal gain of some sort. Othello, MIdsummer Nights Dream, and Hamlet all have villains who have some similarities and some differences.
To engage the reader, authors use a lot of various conflicts. An example of this would be the book “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” by C.S Lewis. One conflict that is external conflict used to engage the reader is person vs person. In the story, Lucy Pevensie - the youngest of the four Pevensie children - finds the wardrobe and the world inside it, which is called Narina first. She then tells her other siblings about the wardrobe and Narina. However, her siblings don’t believe her . On page 27, it says “‘A jolly good hoax, Lu,’ he said as he came out again; ‘you would have really taken us in, I must admit. We half believed you.’” This engages the reader by making them wanting to find out if her siblings really believe her at the end.
In this paper, we take a look at the following pieces in an effort to see the conflict in short stories and poems: Astronomer’s wife by Kay Boyle, Araby by James Joyce and lastly The Battle by Louis Simpson.
Life lessons are good for people. They can help you more than they can hurt you. They really don’t hurt you, because they are like warnings for the bad stuff out in the world today. They are just little helpful hints. They are especially helpful when you are in the time of need. If a life’s lesson hurts you, you are using them in the wrong way.
Looking for Alaska is a book ,written by John Green. The main theme of the book is “Looking for the Great Perhaps.” In the first three chapters of the book, the main characters, Miles “Pudge” Halter, Chip “Colonel” Martin, and Alaska Young are introduced. Looking for Alaska is a story about a guy named Miles Halter who recently switched to a boarding in school in Alabama in order to find out who he really is as a person. At the boarding school, Miles becomes very close friends with his roommate, The Colonel, and a girl named Alaska Young. The Colonel is a very confident guy who’s pretty poor in money, but he’s rich in love and appreciation for people. Alaska is a very beautiful, yet strange girl who is fascinated with death and isn't afraid
Conflict can be found in many stories and it is one of the key pieces to making a story. Without a central conflict in a story the story will seem generic or boring. Writers like to put a conflict in the story to add life to their work and keep the reader interested in what they are reading. It is a way to keep the reader wondering what happens next. In the Divine Comedy, Dante’s Inferno, the main character in the story, Dante, encounters all five types of the different conflicts on his journey through Hell. Some of these conflicts include: person against self, people against people, and Dante against Society.