OConnell 1

Jessi OConnell
English 114B
Professor J. Rodrick
9 May 2016
Raging Fires
In the book Every Day by David Levithan, the main character is a bodiless, and
genderless, soul that goes by the name of A. Throughout the book, A endures a challenge that
can be considered similar to that of Romeo and Juliet. A falls in love with a girl, Rhiannon,
whom he cannot ever stay with. The two of them share a hopeless relationship that was doomed
from the start. Through this riveting tale though, Levithan forces A into a position to choose a life
of safety or danger; Levithan makes A think of his own fate, or follow the one that was laid out
before him, and A chose to fight for his love much like how Romeo chose to fight for his love,
Juliet. A helps to form his identity throughout the book through free will that is driven by his
love for Rhiannon for love is an all-consuming, raging fire that never ceases to burn.
According to Kerri Smith, author of Neuroscience vs. philosophy: Taking aim at free
will, she writes about how free will is a matter of the mind. As humans, we like to think that
our decisions are under our conscious control that we have free will, (Smith, pg.1). Free will
is, to A, a matter of the mind, as well as a matter of the heart. In the book, love is seen as matter
of free will with A, and is a huge trial for the soul as A finds entanglements with Rhiannon. A
met her while inhabiting her ex-boyfriend, Justin, while A was a 16 year old soul in Annapolis,
Maryland. Before Rhiannon, A used to live a life full of rules, containment, and order. Yet, just
like love usually does, it came into As world and ruined lines that were once black and white and
blurred them grey. In Levithans book, A thought of love as a great honor, and thinks of it with
the utmost respect, when lying down next to Rhiannon on the beach the first day that he met her:
Its one thing to fall in love. Its another to feel someone else falling in love with you, and to

OConnell 2
feel a responsibility toward that love, (Levithan, pg. 24). Love is this idea that is double-sided;
one can always give it, but to receive it is such a treasure that it must be kept safe and secured; it
must never be broken even though it is as fragile as glass; and thus Romeo fell in love with his
Juliet from the instant they met one another.
Love has always been a tricky idea to the mind, but it tends to get even more messed up
when destiny and free will come into play. Some
believe that love is destined, that the right person is
the soul mate and the two people were separated, and
once they found each other they never realized how
they ever lived apart. Yet, in As experience, it was
more likely free will, due to the fact that A chose to
be with Rhiannon despite the difficulties that having a relationship with her would exhibit. Some
days, A would wake up four hours away from Rhiannon, like on day 5996; other days A would
wake up 15 minutes away from Rhiannon, like on day 6007. One day, day 6015 to be exact,
possibly fate screwing with their love, tried to really throw a bump in the road for the young
lovebirds when A woke up in the body of Rhiannon. I wake up and Im not four hours away
from her, or one hour, or even fifteen minutes. / No, I wake up in her house. / In her room. / In
her body, (Levithan, pg. 188). Perhaps in this instance though, fate did have a name and a face;
the soul of David Levithan throwing his readers off from the path and adding a detour. Yet,
through this difficult challenge of distance, A still remained ever hopeful that he could make it
last with Rhiannon. Rhiannon was shaky at some moments throughout the book, but A never lost
hope. A kept pressing on to make the love last; he chose to trudge on and hold onto his love for
her, to hold on to his free will and decide for himself.

OConnell 3
Order used to be the key to life to A before Rhiannon entered with all of her
complications. Prior to Rhiannon, A would never disrupt a persons life, implant memories, or
even start to remember past inhabitants from more than 48 hours previously to the moment A
was currently in. A tried not to forget who he was, no matter
how insignificant it might seem or if nobody even knew who A
was; to the young soul, order used to be key. Yet with the
unrequited love for Rhiannon, disobedience became his new
favorite pastime. Order was something that A chose to do with
with each body

he inhabited. A chose not to ruin any lives, but then also he

disobeyed the rules that was set out by himself alone when it came to Rhiannon, which ties back
into the whole love thing. Its hard being in the body of someone you dont like, because you
still have to respect itSo I try to be careful, (Levithan, pg. 2). One single slip up could destroy
the inhabitants life forever possibly. A tried to be respectful to the bodies where he took up
residency for the short 24 hours, but he did choose to go chasing after Rhiannon wherever she
was and escape to be with his love, much like how Romeo and Juliet sneaked out during night
hours to be with one another during their forbidden love.
Chaos is a beauty in a disastrous disguise. In Levithans book, Every Day, chaos was
derived from the love that was sprung from too much order in As life. From order came chaos,
and through this chaos free will was found. As Dr. Normand Holland wrote in This is Your
Brain on Culture, there is no stability in life. Reality is continuously changing, and its changes
perturb our mental functioning which is also continuously changing, (Holland, par. 8). Life
never stops, it is ever-changing and continuously moves on without halting, just like time.
Through this book, As life evolves and adapts and eventually the soul finds itself entangled in

OConnell 4
chaos; stranded far away from the order it once used to live in. A simply decided to live his life
as he deemed fit and worthy, he gave up on being the obedient child, like how Juliet forfeited her
role of being the good Capulet daughter to maintain her life the way she wanted to.
Of course, like every great book should have, there was a mischievous thing that loved to
stir up trouble. For Romeo and Juliet, their familys rivalry was the devil in disguise. For A and
Rhiannon though, it was the fact that A could never obtain his own body, and truly call it his
own. That is, until the Nathan and Reverend Poole arrived to stir up As love life. Nathan was a
boy A had inhabited and took control with serious measures. A drove an hour and a half in
Nathans body to get to a party to see Rhiannon for a few hours. Through this dangerous task, A
could not get back to Nathans home before midnight and ended up pulling over on the side of
the road to safely depart from Nathans body. When Nathan was woken up by police officers
asking if he was drunk, he swore he was possessed by the devil, but not just any devil spirit; this
devil was the actual angel who was thrown out of heaven, the Morningstar Lucifer devil.
Through this fiasco being blown out of proportion, and through Nathans own choice
which was free will Reverend Poole got sucked into the chaos as well. The reverends part in
this was the fact that he also was a bodiless, genderless soul like A, but the difference was that
Reverend Pooles invader could inhabit beings for more than 24 hours at a time. It freaked out A
and forced the young soul to be think of a decision with free will; A could either provoke more
chaos into the world, or run from the chaos and destruction that is being dragged out among the
humans unwillingly and unknowingly. Reverend Poole stated, on day 6028, You have no idea
the power you possess, (Levithan, pg. 289). A, and others like A, have so much control within
their bodiless selves, the damage that could be done by them is unsurmountable and
unimaginable. As Juliet faked her death and fooled her beloved, Romeo committed suicide to

OConnell 5
remain forever with his love, and when Juliet awoke, she too killed herself so that their love
would forever remain untouched. Unfortunately, that is not the case for these star-crossed lovers.
Rhiannon did not fake her death, but A did leave her for good, or so that is what the readers are
supposed to believe since it is not written as to what happened to the soul. A chose, though, to let
Rhiannon be free of him since the two could never live a life together, nor ever truly be as one. It
was through love that helped lead A through his choices of free will, and fight fate during his
brief time of knowing, and being with, Rhiannon.
Though all is fair in love and war, or as
Francis Edmund Smedley wrote it originally,
the rules of fair play do not apply in love and
war (Lyly, pg. 24), free will and destiny have
always been one for the books. It is a classic theme, and is a war that has no end. In David
Levithans book Every Day, the main character, or soul, A, proves that every day is worth
fighting for a love that seems impossible to maintain consistently, the destruction of order, and
the provoking of chaos in daily lives, yet A chose free will in order to keep his love alive with
Rhiannon, even if they both knew it was impossible from the instant they met. There is always a
choice to be made with a voice who decides it all, and that is what David Levithan gave to A: the
freedom to choose its own path. Sometimes all it takes for person, or a soul, to step away from
the marked path is to fall in love; a love so consuming and intriguing that it takes everything
away except for the thought of keeping that love alive, a fire that continuously burns through the
darkest and coldest nights. And just like the story of Romeo and Juliet, Every Day ended upon a
sad note that left readers distraught and filled with grief over the star-crossed lovers.

OConnell 6
Works Cited
"Department of Computer Science - College of Arts and Sciences." Department of Computer
Science - College of Arts and Sciences. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.cs.miami.edu/>.
(Multimodal Source)
"Forever Fatimah." Forever Fatimah. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2016.
<http://foreverfatty.blogspot.com/>.
(Multimodal Source)
"Get Motivated." QuotesGram. in the Pursuit of Happiness. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2016.
<http://quotesgram.com/>.
(Multimodal Source)
Holland, Norman N., PhD. "This Is Your Brain on Culture." Psychology Today. Sussex
Publishers, LLC, 31 Aug. 2010. Web. 18 Apr. 2016.
<https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/is-your-brain-culture/201008/how-you-arewho-you-are-in-chaos->.
Levithan, David. Every Day. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012. Kindle.
Lyly, John, Morris W. Croll, and Harry Clemons. Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit: Euphues & His
England. New York: Russell & Russell, 1964. Print.
Smith, Kerri. "Neuroscience vs philosophy: Taking aim at free will." Nature 477.7362 (2011):2325. Web.