Pages 50-80
Anthony's high school friend, Adrian, has committed suicide. Unlike when their previous classmate committed suicide, Adrian leaves a letter which explains why he did it. Anthony explains that unlike everyone else Adrian did not let life "happen to him", which is a very interesting way of looking at it and interpreting life. Despite this people continued to say that his death was due to a lapse in judgement and a sudden "crazy-ness", even though we know that this is not true. Anthony later says "It's more the memories of the survivors, most of whom are neither victorious nor defeated." This relates back to the discussion with their high school teacher, but what he is saying is that if you survive (like Tony did but not Adrian), then it does not mean you won or lost but instead you let your life happen to you. Which seemed to me like a very depressing statement, although somewhat true.
Throughout the entire novel (and especially towards the middle or part two) Tony keeps bringing up the idea of memories and how they manifest themselves. There is one quote where he says "Who was it said that memory is what we thought we'd forgotten? And it ought to be obvious to us that time doesn't act as a fixative, rather as a solvent." I think this relates to many of the events that follow this paragraph. Many times people remember things differently then how they occurred and not on purpose, but rather something that their mind just does. When he emails Jack, Jack acts completely differently to how he remembered him. Instead of acting better then him, or poking fun at him he is actually helpful. Tony also says he pictured him playing golf, or sitting at home but instead he is doing the opposite. He is traveling the world, and carefree and helpful.
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