Coming of Age and the Search for Meaning  Theme Analysis

At one point in the novel One Day, Emma says that she and her husband Dexter grew up together. In one sense, this isn’t totally accurate since they didn’t know each other as children—in fact, they met in college. However, Emma’s observation rings true in the sense that she and Dexter met at a critical point in their lives, when they were both young adults searching for meaning and purpose in life and really did grow and mature together  in that regard. One of the first things that Emma and Dexter discuss on the night they spend in Emma’s room is what they want to be after they graduate college. Dexter in particular is unsure about what he wants to do with his future, but as she leaves university, even Emma struggles with how to turn her strong ideals into a viable career. Dexter’s desire to be successful and well-liked leads him to a career as a television presenter, but he finds that he isn’t mature enough to handle the pressures of the job and bad reviews, and he ultimately leaves the industry. Meanwhile, Emma tries to find her purpose in life by writing various half-finished poems and novels. Her inability to settle on a project leads her to take jobs that don’t totally fulfill her, even if they do loosely fit with her ideals, like her brief stint as an actor with the Sledgehammer Theater Cooperative.

As Emma and Dexter get older, they still face challenges, but they have a better sense of who they want to be in life. Dexter realizes with Emma’s help that, although he is no longer partying on the town all the time, his interest in food can translate into him running an artisanal café in his neighborhood. Meanwhile, although Emma quits teaching, one of the experiences that she has there helps inspire her to create the protagonist of a children’s book series. Each of them makes compromises—Dexter has to accept success on a smaller scale than he once dreamed of, and Emma has to accept that her 22-year-old self wouldn’t like her book series, which is commercially successful but devoid of the artistic integrity she once aspired to—but they have both learned how to live happier and more purposeful lives than they did when they were younger. The journey of Dexter and Emma in One Day dramatizes how searching for meaning can be a lifelong process and how the maturity and wisdom that come with age can bring new perspective and opportunities. Critically, the novel also suggests that learning to make compromises and take challenges and setbacks as they come are essential to finding one’s purpose and feeling content with one’s life.