An important factor in the TFIOS novel is that of the (sadly nonexistent) book, An Imperial Affliction. Hazel constantly reads this book and when she meets with the less-than-pleasant author, Peter Van Houten, who reveals one of the characters, the Dutch Tulip Man, to be an embodiment of god. What's interesting is that Hazel and Augustus disagrees on the existence of a god. Augustus argues that there is a superior being somewhere, it's just that he's not sure about it yet. Hazel doesn't agree at all. They constantly talk about the Dutch Tulip Man, questioning his motives; when they do this, they are essentially discussing god and his motives. Green comments in an interview, the underlying question at hand is really, "Is God (or the Dutch Tulip Man) a con man, a kind but powerless benevolence, a savior, a mirage, or what?" What really enthralls me is the idea of the author himself, Van Houten, being an embodiment of god, or at least a prophet, for Hazel, who admires Van Houten for his esteemed literary work on the subject of cancer. Hazel even calls Van Houten's book the "closest thing ... [she] had to a Bible" (Green 13). It seems that divine cameos are intertwined throughout the TFIOS novel.
I created the graphic down there, hope you like it! (:
I created the graphic down there, hope you like it! (: