My World, Through the Eyes of Others

Josh Cheng
Nov 5 · 14 min read

Note: Please read with caution as mentions of rape are present.

Ever thought about the power and beauty that language can bring. It’s that limitless power that sent a man to space and is the power that you hold by simply reading this. It is the foundation for the basis of life as we know now. Think of the word ‘language’, it’s just one word that leads to an indefinite amount of words that bonds us as humans. This is obviously written in English, but this is my language, not yours. Your language is your own, it’s an extension to your DNA, something that is special to you and ONLY you. Sure, English statistically is a language that 20% of the world speaks, that’s 1.5 billion people, but when you speak it, when you write it then it becomes yours. It becomes your words, your voice, your language.

I could get all technical now and say that language is created through words, sentences, syntax, punctuation etc., but you know what I’m saying. The thing is, language goes beyond grammar, beyond what is taught in an English class. Those things create English, but YOU create your language. Your language is your own, it’s inspired from the life you live and more importantly the way you see what I see. You have the decision to shape your own language, the powerful thing that you can call your own, that’s your own unique language.

“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is perspective, not the truth”

-Marcus Aurelius (Roman philosopher)

Each author has their own language- William Shakespeare and J.K.Rowling both wrote in English but they are far from the same language. No author writes the same, no person speaks the same, if I were to read just one paragraph of yours, of your language then I’ll be seeing the world in another person’s view. People always have told me to put myself into another’s person’s shoes before I judge them, that you need to understand what they’ve been through. Each time I open a book I’m instantly put into another person’s shoes. Every book I read gives me a new perspective on the world around me, each author opens another window into the world that I thought I knew so well. This is what I’ve been exploring in the books that my 2019 reading journey has led me on. To discover how other people see, what I see, after all, perspective isn’t the truth. My reading journey this year has been a journey through other people’s eyes, through the language of authors, the voices of the characters and eventually my own voice. After all, this is my journey.

2019 has brought one hectic year for me, but reading gave this year so much more value. Every book I read this year eventually made me question something simply because of being able to see from someone else’s point of view. Intertwined between endless words and hidden behind someone’s language is their own views. Subconsciously we as humans think and write based off our own views but understanding someone’s view makes us question our own. There’s no better way to understand their views than in their shoes or more specifically in their minds. Pages of paper bounded together with ink sprawled across each page is just the perfect way to see and even live within someone else’s mind.

I’m a teenage boy still trying to figure out life so the story of Five Feet Apart resonates with me. I’m not talking about the movie, (movies are always worse than the books) I’m talking about the novel written by Rachael Lippincott and contributed by Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis. The story revolves around two teenagers: Stella Grant and Will Newman. Most of you would have heard the story but for those who didn’t (which was me till the moment I opened the book), it’s a complicated love story between 2 teenagers who aren’t allowed to touch each other because of their rare disease called cystic fibrosis (CP) which affects the lungs. It follows the two teens who try and figure out what life is, which generally meant rebelling against parents, doctors and nurses. Honestly, that is every teen’s life (minus the medical condition for me).

As both Stella and Will are under the age of 18 their parents still can make the choices with their lives especially how they are treated for their disease. Their lives are controlled by a series of wires, tubes and pills. One slip, one wrong tube or one wrong dosage and that may be the end for them. Both teens have little control over their lives, but they voice their opinions while the adults also make clear their point of view through both their perspectives.

The adults feel like it is their responsibility to ensure that the two teenagers survive even if they are tangled with wires. On the other hand, the teenagers just want to live as they believe that eventually they’ll die, and they want to do something worthwhile. It’s a story about perspectives and one that explores perspectives from multiple views.

“Just because you’re breathing, doesn’t mean you’re alive.”- Carew Paprtiz

This quote is generally meant to be taken figuratively, but for both Stella and Will it’s the harsh reality of their world, a world where breathing means surviving not living. With CP it means that their lungs can only function at 70% or so, and both Stella and Will need to be consistently hooked up to a portable oxygen tank.

I’m not a parent and I am definitely not an adult but there are people out there that I care about, like really care about and love. So, I know what it’s like to want someone who you love to stay alive to keep breathing, to keep living. But when I do, I also begin to question whether I am doing it for myself rather than them. Beneath the lies I tell myself I find that I generally do it for myself, I do it because I can’t imagine life without that person I love so deeply. On the other hand, I know how frustrating being controlled by rules that adults make that I personally have little control or say about and it can drive me insane. It makes me want to rebel and that is essentially what both Stella and Will experience. Through the characters, Lippincott emphasizes that “If I’m going to die, I’d like to actually live first”. Although spoken by her characters it is still her voice and her language that stresses that life is beyond breathing.

Lippincott’s language has opened another window into my life, another set of eyes to see with. I can relate to both Stella and Will and although I don’t have a deadly disease, the novel Five Feet Apart has increased my appreciation for my parents. The novel focuses on the teens but that’s not to say the parent’s views aren’t included. The actions and words of the parents shows the extent that my loving parents will go to ensure that I live the best life or at least have that opportunity. By the end of the novel, I’ve begun a new habit of mine that is always questioning what a person’s perspective is and I question what they have had to deal with. Having this mindset has positively benefited me as now I have gained a newfound appreciation and gratitude to those who have authority over me especially my parents.

How a book is written gives a new perspective on the ideas about perspective. I know it’s confusing but let me explain, take Five Feet Apart for example. It is written by Lippincott’s language, gives the perspective of 2 teenagers and their perspectives have helped me understand more about the power that perspectives hold. Legend, by Marie Lu is just like that, it unravels another mystery around the powerful theme of perspective through Lu’s own unique language. Legend is a dystopian novel set in the Republic of America (which we know to be the USA). In the world of Legend, there is a test called the Trial that every 10-year-old is required to take, and the score achieved at the end dictates the rest of that individual’s life.

The novel revolves around two teenagers: Daniel Wing (aka Day) and June Iparis who can be described as polar opposites. The blurb describes their relationship perfectly and sets up my point. Both Day and June are 15 but that is where the similarity ends. June scored a perfect score on her Trial with a score of 1500/1500 (which has never been done before). On the other hand, Day scored 674/1500 which means he failed, and this was the lowest ever recorded Trial score. That already is a significant difference, but June and Day also live on opposite sides of the spectrum in terms of wealth, June is living a dream whereas Day is homeless.

“Neither knows the other’s past”

Personally, this is the most powerful and influential message from the whole book. From the start of the novel, June was told that Day killed her brother. Blinded by her hatred of her killer she goes to any extent to kill Day. The book takes an interesting turn where Day saves June’s life and the 2 begin a complicated friendship where neither one knows anything about the other, not even their names. However, this friendship builds, and June quickly realises about Day that there is ‘something comforting about hanging around… this boy’. Dramatic irony is used to add to the mystery behind how one person can feel so comfortable sitting next to the alleged murderer of her brother. I’ll tell you why it’s simply perspectives (and government lies, but unfortunately that's a norm now).

‘Neither knew the other’s past’, this was the basis of an incredible friendship that was built with open minds and open hearts. You see, both Day and June changed their perspectives because of what was at hand. They pushed aside any hatred they had for each other and instead saw the best in one another, or at least they chose to see the best. Seeing the best in someone and ignoring their mistakes and flaws is far from easy. I wish I could say it was second nature for me that my every person I look to I see something good. But it isn’t, I look around and I see how cracked they are, the mistakes and flaws that they’ve made. Majority of the time I’m left questioning why things didn’t work out, why a relationship didn’t work out? But then I realize that maybe I should be questioning myself, questioning the way I see people because I know I’m not perfect.

Legend taught me 2 things: to always see the best in others and to go into anything with an open mind (okay, maybe not everything but most). Nowadays, I remember what happens if I follow those 2 things, maybe a friendship will last, maybe I’ll meet a new friend. The possibilities are endless, but all are positive, and honestly, I need that positivity, we need the positivity in the world we live in now.

Ironically feminism has intrigued me ever since I stepped into an all-boys school. Maybe it was because I was surrounded by similar perspectives, perspectives from boys. I wanted this to change so I started to read about feminism and who better to read than Clementine Ford, a fellow Melbournian. I read Boy will be Boys earlier this year but before I reached halfway I gave up, maybe it’s the way Ford writes or maybe it was the mental state I had before reading, regardless I was too uncomfortable when reading and I just stopped. Not long after I read Legend and learnt the two truths that came with the simple sentence: ‘Neither knew the other’s past’. I remember thinking back to Ford and at the point, I remembered the positivity achieved through having an open mindset.

So, I went to the school library and found Boys will be Boys, I borrowed it and before I opened it, I reminded myself to have an open mindset. That open mindset got me through, but it also allowed me to learn so much about another individual’s perspective. This time the language was so wildly different, unlike most of the other novels I read, it held an aggressive tone.

The novel was written mainly for females and some of the concepts I couldn’t understand due to me being on the other side. Although re-reading the novel with an open mindset I was still uncomfortable when reading certain chapters. As a 15-year-old male teen I’m pretty new to the world especially when it comes to things beyond schools. I generally think I know life pretty well and honestly; I think I know a lot at times. Then at other points in time, I realize just how stupid and ignorant I can be every time I think I know everything.

This way of thinking played a significant role in my reading and overall understanding of the novel Boys will be Boys. One chapter of the book made me very uncomfortable but also made me question everything I thought I knew about my whole gender and the way we think, act and behave. That chapter was called ‘Not all Men’.

If you are a male reading this, you could quite easily relate to the phrase ‘not all men’. For those who are males think about your first response if a female approached you and said male were rapists and abusive to women. I bet your response would be something like ‘not all men’, the same can be said about what my first response will be.

Now, if you aren’t a male reading this then the same could still be applied just in a slightly different context. Now for those of you, imagine a man approaches you and talks about women being gossipers and he clearly is directing at you, then a similar response will be triggered. I can bet that response goes something along the lines of ‘not all women’.

Ford is known for her aggressive tone in her novels and she describes the phrase ‘not all men’ as a plea from men essentially saying, ‘stop making me feel bad, you bitch’. Most of you reading this likely haven’t read the book so it may just be my interpretation, but it still makes me, a male teenager, quite uncomfortable. This discomfort lasted throughout the whole chapter until the very end. The last 3 sentences of the chapter made me feel slightly better about myself and half the population of the planet.

No, Not All Men are a threat to women.

But we know that any man could be.

And that right there is the difference.

It was definitely an interesting way to end a chapter especially after reading several other chapters of Ford’s novel. This is because she has dialled down her aggressive tone (slightly) and instead she expresses her understanding to the male readers. Not many of her chapters include such an aspect let alone finish with an understanding point of view. I know it still sounds aggressive but that is where perspective comes in, or at least the power of perspective. Ford describes herself as a ‘hard-line feminist’ in fact she has t-shirts that say hard-line feminist. Many teenage boys honestly don’t feel comfortable knowing that there are feminists out there and yet alone an aggressive and hard-line feminist. This has caused her to be called a bitch, slut, whore etc., and she has constantly been trolled online through various social media platforms.

Clemetine Ford and her t-shirt

What encouraged me to find out more about Ford and her past was the novel Five Feet Apart. I remembered that we can’t simply judge a person based on what we see, we also need to know what they see. After all, both Will and Stella seemed arrogant and rebellious first but through their thoughts and experience we understand more about them and we see less of their arrogance and rebelliousness.

Understanding what Ford has been through makes it slightly easier as a reader to understand her point of view because she’s been there and she’s talking from experience. Now not all men including me will call her a bitch, but will I keep quiet? Just before she ends the chapter, she inserts a quote from a twitter user that goes by @thetrudz.

Not all men are actual rapists. Some are rape apologists. Some tell rape jokes. Some are victim blamers. Some are silent.

‘Some are silent’, this completely changed the way I see the world, it was a brand-new set of eyes to see the world in. The simple truth made me question everything I thought about men and myself as a whole. I'm not going to pretend I know what it is like to be raped but maybe being silent is just as bad for someone else.

The phrase was a simple truth that was buried under all the other facts. But Ford’s aggressive language in her novel really helped me realise just how much truth was behind that simple statement. If Ford was to write Boys will be Boys in a less aggressive tone and rather a sympathetic and understanding tone than the novel would lose all sense of its meaning. The phrase ‘some are silent’ and ‘not all men’ would simply be another list of words that are added to the novel with no real intention behind them. Ford’s language is unique, it’s hostile and although a hostile tone leads to a certain level of discomfort, it also helps the novel bring its purpose and meaning clearly to the reader.

I’m not saying all books should be written in an aggressive tone, imagine what that would look like in Five Feet Apart. Five Feet Apart relies heavily on evoking sympathetic responses from the audience and let’s just say that if all the characters were yelling at each other the whole book would be meaningless. Instead of Ford’s aggressive language, Lippincott uses a softer tone, something that is unique to her and only her. I can guarantee that if Lippincott was to write Boys will be Boys or if Ford was to write Five Feet Apart it won’t nearly be as popular as they are now.

Those three books: Five Feet Apart, Legend and Boys will be Boys have all influenced my idea of the world and each book has given me another pair of eyes to read, to think and to see. I would consider myself a book worm and 3 books in a year are never going to be enough for me. I’ve read plenty of other books, each again was something new but if I was to include it all here, I might as well write my own book about books.

Books are endless opportunities to learn something new, something that isn’t taught in class. Books taught me to be open-minded, to value others, to see the best in anything, to understand what a person has been through, the list goes on and all that was done simply in 2019. The ability that novels have, to teach something so unique it what encourages me to keep coming back to them over and over again.

Honestly, reading added to a complexion and wild nature of this year but that’s not to say it didn’t help. It helped beyond the obvious vocabulary, grammar and skills needed in English. It taught me life skills that I’ll cling onto till the day I die. Five Feet Apart taught me to understand someone before I judge, Legend taught me to have an open mind and a habit of looking for the best in people and Boys will be Boys taught me to question myself. To me that knowledge from books provides me with infinite more ways to see the world and more importantly to grow as an individual.

Are you growing when you read?

Josh Cheng

Written by

An inspired student who writes

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