Before
discrediting the Coming-of-Age story as definitively trite or over-wrought, I
beg skeptics to entreat the 15-year-old boy upon his first revolutionary
reading of The Catcher in the Rye. I have
continually turned to Coming-of-Age literature so as to learn from my
experiences, so as to learn how it is one may learn from experience, and
ultimately to feel as if I am not alone.
Young adult
literature opens doors, expands horizons, and reveals universal truths that sit
dormant, directly beneath the adolescent’s nose; at least, they have revealed
many of the truths that were previously concealed beneath my own.
At age twelve,
doctors uncovered the brain tumor that would render my mother’s invasive brain
surgery imperative; J.K. Rowling did not mock the Social Anxiety Disorder I
developed that year. At age fifteen, doctors declared a close friend’s valiant
struggle with lung cancer to be a losing battle, predicting her premature
passing that summer; John Green did not mock my anger, despondency, or lack of
faith that year. At age seventeen, I acknowledged the sexual and psychological
abuse I endured as a child; finally, Stephen Chbosky did not mock my fear or
distress upon coming to terms with the demoralizing experiences that permeate
my past.
When explored at
the opportune time, a novel can provide solace, sympathy, belonging, or greater
understanding of the world. In the face of society’s tendency to downplay the
intricacies and anxieties of growing up, young adult fiction performs an
imperative task in reaching out a daring hand, taking hold of the most real and
raw components of being a person, pinpointing the most vulnerable and truthful
endeavors set forth by way of the human condition, and capturing them. Those
endeavors, of course, are the years spent figuring out what it means to be a
person at all.
My impassioned inclination
toward young adult literature stems from the invaluable assets it has provided
me: a greater sense of the world, an acute understanding of who I am as a
person, a sympathetic acknowledgement of my own feelings, observations, and
insights, and finally, the ability and direction required to chart a course for
my own future.
Today, I am here.
I am seventeen. I am alive. I am amidst the both beautiful and turbulent
inundation of adolescence, and the painful components of my young life permeate
my memories of the past just as vividly as moments that remind me with such
clarity how wonderful it is to be alive. Some fail to see that an entire life
is simply one overarching Coming-of-Age story. The first twenty years may be
more notably tumultuous, but that does not mean that upon completing them we
will ever cease to learn, or grow, or understand the world more deeply or more comprehensively.
At least, this is what I have learned from young adult literature, and this,
essentially, is the reason that I one day plan to write it.
2012
