This book is twisted in a way that appeals to a lot of people and leaves them wondering as they go to sleep. “Is it really
possible?”, “How would I react?”…. This is the famous
short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald published during the 1920’s, it is not like the other books that you read for days and days but it is a fairly simple material that you can finished in less than thirty minutes, or an hour give or take but the impact the curiousness of the story will definitely last for more than a day.
I will just give an overview of the book and will try my best not to comment much on the movie, I want to focus on the different aspects of
Benjamin Button’s travel through his life. Being born in a well to do family, Benjamin Button’s family was really excited to finally have a son, someone who could continue the work of his father: Mr. Roger Buttons. His father went to the hospital awaiting any news on his wife and son, excited and clearly having been a man lost for words and wit the father is greeted by their doctor who is getting worried about the hospitals reputation, with a hospital in an uproar he rushes to see the commotion and was struck to find out that the talk of the day was the unexplainable vision of his child wrapped in a blanket and crammed in a crib. A seventy year old man, most likely not to survive the day, up and about talking to his own father who is younger than him, how would you react to that? Well the story does not stop there as Benjamin Button then travels through his life in an absurd but intriguing way.
His life does not start as a youngster but lies in the verge of fear that he will not survive the next day because of his brittle bones and his age, but as he travels through his life he suddenly moves down the scale and finds himself having more zest for life, having more energy than anyone could have and becoming younger. Now as he went through the phase he suddenly realizes that he is not growing older but younger, still happy that he will not be dying soon he goes about living his life with the energy of a youngster as he lives his life to the fullest. Soon enough he gets married and has a family, but the problem thus sets in when his wife is growing older and him younger, more trivial questions but nobody really finds out what is happening to Benjamin Button. Basically as he grows older he grows younger, and up till now it really brings more and more curiosity to my mind.
Imagine yourself thinking at the start of your existence that you might actually die any second, or any day, or any minute. Living in a fear that you have not started living out your life and you could actually die is a notion that doesn’t seem so appealing, but finding out through the years that life seems to go back in time for you as you grow older makes you very thankful that you get to live your life, not just awaiting death because of the state that you were born into. But the problem sets in when as you get familiar with friends, family and love ones you have to leave them behind as you bound with so much energy and they slowly succumb to the inevitable state of old age, how will they come to understand this phenomenon? Then as you grow older your appearance become that of a youngster, robust and full of energy but in turn the curiousness of the world hungers you to more information and simple things seem a big deal for you to learn. Until one day, you will need the help of adults to feed you and change you, till you no longer can comprehend the language that they are talking about because at your old age you succumb to infancy, where you are helpless and no longer remember anything that has occurred in your life, you merely are happy to feel someone’s touch as they pick you up and cuddle you. Until one night you close your sleepy eyes and flow away to a dreamless void, not remembering anything and being plainly happy for the day events of feeding and cuddling.
This is the amazing and mind boggling short story of Fitzgerald, it will leave you thinking and imagining things. I have the opportunity to say that this is the best one of his time, to leave his audience to react to the moment of birth and death in a whole new pattern, how you would choose to be born and slowly emerge full circle is entirely up to you. You can live as if it is your last day, or be carefree as a new born when it comes to the last day. It’s what they say to us every single day: Life is too short, live it to the fullest.