Conflicts In The Story

There are different forms of conflict in Thirteen Reasons Why. One conflict in the novel is an internal conflict between Clay Jensen and himself: man vs. self. He is devastated on the inside about Hannah’s suicide. Throughout the book, he keeps on mentally fighting himself on what he could have done differently to save her. Clay has to learn throughout Hannah’s story that he needs to move on and that he cannot rewind the past with what he knows now. Clay is struggling to accept that he played a part in her suicide and could have prevented it. Like Clay, Hannah Baker also experiences an internal conflict. She is mentally fighting with herself over the reasons why she should kill herself, and throughout many parts of the story, she cannot even bring herself to say the word “suicide.”  Hannah has conflicting emotions as she records the tapes and considers suicide. There are also conflicts between Hannah and the people on her list that caused her to commit suicide: man vs. man conflict. Another conflict in the book is an external conflict: man vs. society. Clay strongly dislikes the people on the tapes that had a part in Hannah’s suicide. He struggles with communicating with others while listening to Hannah’s tapes because he is so overwhelmed with the truth that is brought out in the tapes. Hannah also has many external conflicts since she struggled to find acceptance in a school that rejected her because of untrue rumors. Hannah wanted to have friends in her new school, but people rarely gave her a fair chance because of what they heard from others, and many people at school continued to hurt her through bullying and gossip.