A few weeks ago, the novelist and vlogger John Green tweeted that “CBS Sunday Morning” was doing a feature on him (timed to the opening of the movie adaptation of his popular novel The Fault In Our Stars ) and they wanted to interview some fans. My 14-year-old daughter, Elena, responded with a thoughtful and impassioned letter, and let’s just say it was a happy day in the Messinger-Tayne family when Elena was one six fans who were selected.
They called the segment: “John Green And His Awesome Fans.” There’s a part of the letter—about kids being able to pursue their passions with “unironic enthusiasm”—that I especially wanted to share with you, parent-to-parent. However, with Elena’s permission, I can, with unironic pride, share the whole letter. Read on below, and enjoy!
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Hi!
My name is Elena Messinger and this is my attempt at showing you why John Green and The Fault in Our Stars is so important to me. I should start off by saying that putting my admiration and love of both this book and its author into words is extremely difficult but I will try my best to express my feelings adequately.
Side note: I will try to keep this letter as original and engaging as possible, but with a fan base as large as that of The Fault In Our Stars, some ideas might have already been expressed by others.
Since getting into Nerdfighteria and John Green’s writings in early 2012 I have spent a lot of time trying pinpoint why I had this obsession with a thirty year old guy who posted videos on the internet. I had spent hours and hours laying in various positions on my bed watching these two brothers discuss everything from giraffe sex to blendarized Happy Meals. I do this thing when I have free time where I go to Barnes and Noble and just sit there and read for hours on end. Usually finishing a book or sometimes, depending on the length, two. I think by now I have read four John Green books there, starting with TFIOS and ending with Will Grayson Will Grayson. I remember when I first read The Fault in Our Stars, reaching the point where Augustus Waters dies and crying actual tears while onlookers just stared judgmentally. This book and author had clearly struck a cord in my barely-teenage heart but I had yet to figure out why.
By now, I have a pretty good idea and my explanation comes to you in two parts.
Part 1: Empathy
All in all, I try to be somebody I would like. I try to say things that I would find funny or intelligent and I try generally to be a nice person. So it worries me when adults look back on their teenage years with a semi- disgusted nostalgia. For instance, “ [laughing] I was such an idiot back then.” or “Thank god I have changed.” The reason this worries me is I get scared that I will look back on myself during this period with a similar opinion as others. Right now, my thoughts and feelings seem so legitimate and important but what if I’m just another teenage girl and everything I’m thinking and feeling will eventually be laughed at by future me. It makes me nervous to write down things like diary entries or “letters to my future self” and express things like having a crush on people.However, through his writing, John Green is able to show me that teenagers are important. He shows me, that we are just as interesting and funny and capable as anyone else and I am not just a regretful memory. His books are relatable. At the end of the day, the characters in The Fault in Our Stars are just people like all of us dealing with some awful circumstances. It’s almost like looking at a weirdly distorted mirror that highlights your profoundness and amazing qualities even though you are young and sometimes dumb. When I flip through those pages Hazel and Augustus feel familiar. They are struggling with the concept of leaving a mark on this world, something I often think about and they know what’s like to not feel like they fit in. Something I think everyone struggles with. John Green doesn’t make me want to hide away my thoughts and emotions, but share them and accept that although they might change (because everything does) there’s nothing wrong with what I’m thinking and feeling in this moment.
Part 2: Unironic Enthusiasm
There is one vlogbrothers video, probably my favorite if I had to choose, that pretty much sums up why I love Nerdfighteria. In this video, John says something that I think is important and has stuck with me for a long time. He is talking about how excited and buzzing the entire theater was before a Harry Potter movie was about to play, and goes into explain why nerds are awesome:
“…because nerds like us are allowed to be unironically enthusiastic about stuff… Nerds are allowed to love stuff, like jump-up-and-down-in-the-chair-can’t-control-yourself love it. Hank, when people call people nerds, mostly what they’re saying is ‘you like stuff.’ Which is just not a good insult at all. Like, ‘you are too enthusiastic about the miracle of human consciousness.’”
As a self- identifying nerd, this really resonated with me. Early today I was talking to my friend about the TFIOS movie and basically started exploding with excitement. We were standing in the middle of the hallway, just yelling at each other (in a good way) about how we should dress up like Gus and Hazel for the movie and how excited yet nervous we were to be witnessing something we love so much on the giant screen. During this moment, I realized that if I had been self-conscious about what the other non-TFIOS loving people were thinking or if I had not fully immersed myself in the awesomeness that is Nerdfighteria, I wouldn’t have been as happy right then. Whenever I see or think about Nerdfighteria and John Green’s writings, I get filled with a weird joy. Something I have only really experienced with the Harry Potter books. And trust me, that is the highest of compliments.
I know I’m probably just another crazed teenage girl writing to you about someone who doesn’t know I exist, but I hope that you were able to see how much John Green and TFIOS means to me.
~ Elena
Eric Messinger is the editor of New York Family. He can be reached at [email protected].
