Being Different Theme Analysis

Although the teenagers of The Fault in Our Stars are in many ways normal teenagers who are obsessed with music, videogames, popular culture, and dating, they are constantly reminded that they are different than their healthy peers. Their physical differences—prosthetics, oxygen tanks, puffy cheeks—are glaring signifiers of their difference, but in a more subtle way, their illnesses often make other people feel uncomfortable and alienated, creating separations between those with the illness and those without it. This separation shows through while Hazel is shopping with her friend, Kaitlyn. While shopping, Kaitlyn nonchalantly says she would “die” if she had to walk in a pair of heels she has found on the shelf. She stops and looks as if she wants to apologize, as if it is wrong to mention death in front of the dying. Hazel is not offended by her comment, but the fact of her cancer makes Kaitlyn unable to talk in the way she would with a healthy peer. Later a young girl asks Hazel why she has to carry an oxygen tank. The little girl's mother is mortified by her daughter’s question, but Hazel simply explains her situation to the girl, limiting the distance between them.

This otherness is not just projected on those who are ill from those who are healthy. Often, people with cancer begin to define themselves based on their experience with cancer. This self-definition through one’s cancer is one that the sick characters fear, as shown through Augustus’ question to Hazel whether she is, “One of those people who become their disease.” While Hazel does not define herself by her cancer, she also works to break down cancer stereotypes, constantly pushing back against the clichés that make people dying of cancer different than normal people. She speaks to the way in which healthy people often hold ideas about those living with cancer that make them seem heroic or overtly tragic. The novel depicts those living with cancer in ways that limit such cancer. The depictions in the novel make the argument that the young people with cancer are not any more noble, valiant, or spiritual than other kids—they are just normal kids living with an illness. Augustus becomes a clear example of the reality of young people who are living with and dying from cancer. After his cancer reemerges, Augustus, the high-spirited, funny, confident, and attractive boy is reduced to a frail, terrified, and humiliated individual. The honesty with which Hazel depicts the end of his life does not allow his illness to place him in any special category of person, and therefore limits the difference between him and any other normal person who is dying.

Through their shared experience of being different, however, Augustus and Hazel form an unbreakable bond. They understand what it is like to be pitied, gawked at, showered with cancer perks (“make a wish” type gifts given to dying children), and just simply misunderstood. They quickly move past the thing that makes them different from others and begin to form bonds based on their identities beyond their illness, the appreciation of the other’s intelligence, beauty, and personality. In this way, Hazel’s narrative depicts the way in which difference can lead to companionship, but ultimately it is the person that exists beyond the illness—who is no different than anyone else—that allows them to develop a deep bond with one another. This perspective allows Hazel to limit the thing that causes their difference, and allows them to move closer to the normalcy that is denied by common misunderstanding that creates separation.