OTHER LITERARY ELEMENTS

FORESHADOWING

There are several other literary devices that pop up at various times in the story. One of the most prevalent ones is foreshadowing which frequently presents clues of something that will happen later in the novel. Some examples of foreshadowing include:

1.) When Landon opens the story with the words that his life changed when he was seventeen years old, he is preparing us for profound events that he's never forgotten.

2.) When Landon warns us that we will laugh and we will cry, he foreshadows the loving relationship that will develop between him and Jamie and the fact that she is dying.

3.) When Landon relates that Hegbert believed that if you put your trust in God, you'd be alright in the end, he remarks that he would learn this lesson very well, but not from Hegbert. This prepares the reader for how Jamie will change his life.

4.) Landon observes in Chapter One that he learned when his evil grandfather died an easy death, that life isn't fair.

This foreshadows his anguish that such a wonderful person as Jamie could be dying so young of such a terrible disease.

5.) Jamie pointedly tells Landon she's glad he's in the Drama Class. He doesn't learn until later that she had planned all along to make him the lead role in the play.

6.) When Jamie tells Landon she'll go to the homecoming dance with him as long as he doesn't fall in love with her, it foreshadows that he actually will.

7.) Jamie says she wants this Christmas to be the most special one of all for the orphans, but she won't say why. This foreshadows that she is hiding a secret about her cancer.

8.) In spite of the fact that Jamie will probably be class valedictorian and should go to college, she says that her greatest wish is to walk down the aisle on her father's arm and marry the man she loves amidst all the people she loves. This resonates so much with Landon that it prepares us for how he will fulfill this wish at the end of the novel.

9.) Jamie's greatest wish is to do something more special for the orphans this year than any other. This prepares us for her belief that she doesn't have long to live.

10.) Landon is stunned by the sparseness of the orphanage which prepares us for his later generous gift.

11.) Jamie insists she would lie on her back and look at the stars if she ever went to the cemetery at night. She says all this just a little wistfully as if it's something she'll never get to do. This prepares us for the fact that she is dying.

12.) Jamie tells Landon that she often wishes she had her mother around to talk about things she and her father can't. Landon assumes she means girl stuff and boys. It will only be later that he realizes that's not what she means at all. This comment foreshadows that Jamie will have a hard time talking to her father about her approaching death.

13.) When Jamie gives Landon her mother's Bible for Christmas, it foreshadows that as many dying people do, she is giving away the things she loves to those she loves the most.

14.) Hegbert seems to be very much unlike himself. Even during his sermons, Landon has noticed that he'll sometimes pause in the middle and just have this strange look come over him, almost like he's thinking of something sad. This foreshadows the secret Jamie has been keeping about her approaching death.

15.) Jamie says that her father worries about Landon, too, for the same reason that she does. When he asks her why, she has no answer. She just appears sad and Landon notes that he would only understand why later when he learned her secret.

16.) There is foreshadowing of her death in Jamie's question to Landon about why things have to turn out the way they do.

17.) Landon notes a few times after Christmas that Jamie seems tired and listless. They even have to leave their visit to the orphanage early, because she is running a fever. This foreshadows that the leukemia is beginning to take its toll on Jamie's body.

18.) Landon begins to pray for a miracle, because as he has already admitted, only a miracle will save her now. He knows that miracles are possible, because he saw Old Man Sweeny, the baker, healed of his deafness at a revival meeting. This foreshadows one possible interpretation of the ending of the novel.

19.) The fact that Jamie has underlined one particular Psalm in her Bible foreshadows that she knows Landon will need those words to carry on in the face of her death.

IRONY

Another element that is important to note is irony - when something happens, or is seen, or is heard that we may know, but the characters do not, or that appears opposite of what is expected. Some examples of irony include:

1.) Landon promises Jamie that he won't fall in love with her if she'll go to the homecoming dance with him, but that's exactly what happens.

2.) Landon thinks at the end of the homecoming dance that Jamie Sullivan can drive a guy crazy. He means it in an uncharitable way, but the truth is she is beginning to drive him crazy into love.

3.) Landon is the least likely boy in Beaufort to be part of God's Plan as practiced by Jamie, but he is the one she chooses and he finds himself changing because of her.

4.) When Landon relates to his mother that he saw Hegbert cry, she has a perfectly sensible explanation for the tears: he just realizes that his daughter is growing up and that he is slowly losing her to Landon. The truth is that Hegbert is crying, because his daughter is dying.

5.) Landon assumes that Jamie is also a seventeen year old with the same hopes and doubts as he has. The truth is her only doubts are about how she will face her own death and she has no hopes for the future.

6.) As winter begins to turn into spring, Landon is struck by how life comes back even as Jamie lays dying.

CREATIVE LICENSE

Another literary device used by the author is creative license. This device allows the author to imagine obviously impossible things and make the reader suspend his disbelief. Nicholas Sparks uses creative license when he has his main character, Landon, see anthropomorphic changes take place in his body and in the town he lives in, so that he is no longer imagining his past; he is actually there.