Reading Response Two; Looking for Alaska by John Green

Looking For Alaska by John Green

"I may die young, but at least I'll die smart." This is a quote from the book looking for Alaska by John Green. This is from the character Alaska. Alaska is a young girl who is sent to a boarding school and is very educated and also popular. Alaska shares a love for books and education. She views herself as someone that isn't very important. Throughout the story you start to understand how her mind works. She is a very free spirit and also very stubborn. Alaska only wants to do the things she wants to do with no regard to anyone else. She only does what makes her happy. Alaska sees dying as a doorway to escape. At one point she says the answer to the "labyrinth of suffering" is straight and fast. This means that the only way to really stop suffering is to die in a way that doesn't take much time at all and is instant. During the story Alaska forms a very close relationship with the main character Pudge and makes him experience new things that he had never even dreamed of before. They had many adventures together and at one point filled bottles of shampoo with pink hair die to get back at the rich kids at their school. Alaska has a very free soul and doesn't like anyone to get in her way of things. She loves to pull pranks on people and wanted to create one of the biggest pranks ever pulled at her school. She could never even start the prank because she died in a car wreck with the motto straight and fast. She thought that she was very well educated as had a love for books, and dying didn't scare her. She embraced the idea of dying from the first few lines of the book. That's why the quote "I may die young but at least I'll die smart" is so relevant to the story. Because she does die at a very young age. But she thought of herself as achieving the ultimate knowledge by taking her own life.