Theme Of Labyrinth in Looking for Alaska Essay Sample

Miles changes throughout the book of Looking for Alaska along with his labyrinth. During the book Miles struggles with the feelings that he has for Alaska before and after her death. He questions the whys and how's about which will never be answered. For this reason, Miles’s labyrinth is Alaska and the feelings he has for and the guilt he feels after she dies. 

Miles struggles with his feelings towards Alaska early one in the book. When Miles first meets Alaska, he has this to say about her “but I barely heard him because the hottest girl in all of human history was standing before me in cutoff jeans and a peach tank top.” (Green 14). Before he had even talked to her, she was already the hottest he had seen. This immediately sets up the stage for Mile’s labyrinth. After this first encounter with Alaska, he quickly gains feelings for her as stated by the book “Maybe she could be mean . . . but the way she talked that first night about getting out of the labyrinth—so smart. And the way her mouth curled up on the right side all the time, like she was preparing to smirk,” (Green 30). Even though she was mean to him early in the day he still makes her out to be perfect. He is infatuated with her even after hearing that she has a boyfriend. Later in the book the struggle really starts to set in with Miles when they stay at the school over Thanksgiving week. When she falls asleep on the couch Miles thinks to himself “But I lacked the courage and she had a boyfriend and I was gawky and she was gorgeous and I was hopelessly boring, and she was endlessly fascinating.” (Green 88). He struggles with the fact that they are not very alike, and that Alaska has a boyfriend, yet he is still hopelessly in love with her. He does not want to face the labyrinth, the struggle of his emotions toward Alaska, and instead makes this fantasy that they will one day be together. This is the beginning of Mile’s labyrinth.  

Alaska causes him to suffer the night when she dies. Earlier in the day he was spending time together with his girlfriend Lara. They end up making out and even trying oral sex, but he is still not sure how to talk with and her and ends up leaving to go hang out with Alaska and Chip. The love triangle only gets worse the night of when Miles and Alaska play truth or dare and end up making out, “I laughed, looked nervous, and she leaned in and tilted her head to the side, and we were kissing. Zero layers between us... I pulled away 131 for a moment, to say, ‘What is going on here?’” (Green 130-131). This confuses Miles as to what their relationship is within this strange love triangle. He tells Alaska that he loves her after this, and she does not say anything about her boyfriend. After she dies, he does not talk to Lara for quite some time because of that night. In the book it states “But when I plowed right into her left shoulder... “I’m sorry,” I blurted out, … First two words I’d said to her in a month” (Green 188-189). This messed up their relationship together and brought Miles's pain as she was angry at him. Miles never wanted to get out of bed and talk to Lara because of the death of Alaska. He was so closely rooted with her that he did not even see his own girlfriend. This made things very strained for him after the death of Alaska and contributed to his labyrinth.  

This guilt that Miles held after her death is also a part of his labyrinth that is Alaska. When she first died, he did not believe that she was even dead. He did not want to believe that she was dead because that would mean it was his fault. He let her go the night that she got drunk and started crying. Right after he vomits Miles thinks to himself “She’s not dead. She’s alive. She’s alive somewhere” (Green 140). He could not believe it until the Eagle came up to him and told him that she was indeed dead. He needed somebody to convince him that she was dead. That is how much he did not want the guilt on his soul. In his mind he was the one that killed her and let her die. The labyrinth of guilt quickly took hold of him as stated in the book “. That night I let her go because she told me to. It was that simple for me, and that stupid.” (Green 149). He feels stupid for letting her go so easily instead of telling her she's drunk and should not drive or that things can always wait until tomorrow. Instead, he let her go and now he hates himself for it. The hate that he has for himself for letting her go is a part of his labyrinth. He has a lot of feelings for her as Miles says to himself in his head “I didn’t know what to say to her—I was caught in a love triangle with one dead side.” (Green 147). As stated, before he does not see Lara for quite some time because of Alaska and still feels like he is in this triangle that he cannot get out of. He also gets so fixated on Alaska that he does not want to talk to her boyfriend because he thinks it will ruin his perspective on her. This causes him to suffer a lot because he needs to talk to him to try and figure out why Alaska did what she did. He also gets into an argument with Chip about which causes him to question a lot of things including this labyrinth of suffering. Miles does understand his labyrinth at the end of the book as he knows that everything “We are all going, I thought, and it applies to turtles and turtlenecks, Alaska the girl and Alaska the place, because nothing can last, not even the earth itself” (Green 196). He knows now that everything will eventually end and that ‘we are all going.’ He understands his labyrinth, his emotions toward Alaska and the guilt of letting her go. 

Miles’s labyrinth slightly changed over the course of the book and stayed relatively the same. His emotions towards Alaska were always on his mind before and after her death. In this way it caused him to suffer because he could never have her. What you should take away from this is, do not overly fixate on one specific person or thing. You also need to keep realistic standards and understand when something is not going to go your way. Like Miles at the end of the book you need to be able to expect that it will not always go your way and not to distort your perspective on life.