59 pages • 1 hour read
Hank GreenAn Absolutely Remarkable Thing
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2018A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Fame and Its Consequences
April’s experience with fame tells more about its consequences than of anything positive that might come from it. Her obsession with and addiction to her overnight rise to fame changes April into a person she herself no longer recognizes. She is willing to sacrifice anything to maintain her status and even throws away what could have become a meaningful relationship with a person who truly loves her, Maya, for the collective attention of the masses. Even at the height of her popularity, April hungers for more and fears the day that she might just be someone that once did something or was once famous. Her every foolish deed in relation to the Carls is almost always for the sole purpose of feeding her fame. Unless something can feed her status, it is less than useless to her.
At first, April’s wholesome message and quirky demeanor attracts more fans than haters. Nothing she has to say is inherently harmful, and her popularity is linked to the Carls. However, the public’s attitude towards her drastically changes when she takes up arms against Petrawicki and, rather than preaching her original message, becomes motivated by hatred and anger. Her obsession with staying in the spotlight blinds her to the fact that it is her own interaction with the Defenders that gives their movement legitimacy and traction. By having an opinion that she loudly voices on news outlets, she is bound to make herself enemies—some that would go as far as to attempt to murder her.
The truth about fame, which April reflects on, is that you can never expect what a person thinks of you. Your audience cannot see your thoughts, your daily life, and oftentimes even the things that make you human. Fans idolize you to the point that being vulnerable is off-putting, while enemies see you only as a voice and an opinion. Even those who knew and understood April as a person start seeing her as the brand she has crafted for herself. To be famous makes it difficult to be human in the face of the world, especially when maintaining a carefully crafted persona. To keep the fuel running, one is sometimes forced to voice opinions that many might not agree with simply for attention.
Social Media and Carefully Crafted Personas
Deeply intertwined with the consequences of fame is the existence of carefully crafted personas on social media. One’s every choice is shown to be a part of their persona, including what they say, who they say it to, how they say it, and when they say it. When pretending to be something as one would with an internet persona, it is easy to become that thing you pretend to be. Other times, as with April, it becomes difficult to maintain a persona when aspects of your true self begin to show themselves.
It is easy to lose sight of oneself when curating such a persona, just as April does when she dives headfirst into the “April May” brand. April is willing to change her entire persona and make herself into a brand for the purposes of fame. Her experiences and efforts to maintain that persona often contrast the insecure person that she actually is. She hides her vulnerabilities and other truths, like her bisexuality, to protect the image she wants people to have of her. When she eventually starts to doubt her belief in the goodness of the Carls, she has no choice but to stick to her original message because it is what her followers expect. Even when faced with a near-death situation both during her stabbing in the warehouse, she turns to social media to keep her persona alive and relevant.
Social media is a critical part of the world’s social landscape, and the way that people interact with social media relies on, and can drastically shape, what people believe and desire themselves to be. Often, people with insecurities use their online personas to make themselves feel better and increase their self-esteem. Even people who claim to dislike social media are making a choice about their personas in a society that is heavily intertwined with social media and identities on it. Each choice made on the internet is in service of being the person you want others to see you as rather than the person you actually are. As a result, one’s social media presence can often put a person at odds with their own selves, especially when attempting to appease a particular audience. It can also force a person to say and do things they don’t necessarily believe in to maintain a particular image.
The Nature of Humanity
Though An Absolutely Remarkable Thing is about the arrival of alien life forms, it aspires to tell more about the nature of humanity than of the aliens themselves. Where the Carls are foreign and no one knows anything about them, humanity is forced to take a look at itself in comparison. In the face of otherness, what is it that makes us human? Is each human doomed to being separate and alone, or do the unique skills and knowledge of each individual need to work together to be truly efficient? Even without the Carl’s elaboration about the purpose of the Dream, it is clear by its nature that it is meant to bring people together and show them that they cannot truly achieve anything without collaboration. One person alone cannot achieve great feats, as one person alone can never have all the knowledge and skill needed to complete any great task. Beyond collaboration, the Dream forces people to combat the desire to selfishly work alone for full credit, encouraging an appreciation of the beauty of humanity functioning as a collective whole.
