Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2012

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

Download PDF

Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1, Chapters 1-6

Part 1, Chapters 7-12

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4, Chapters 1-15

Part 4, Chapters 16-31

Part 5

Part 6, Chapters 1-10

Part 6, Chapters 11-21

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Symbols & Motifs

Names

In the novel, names form a significant part of the characters’ identities. They shape them and partially determine how others perceive them. When they first meet at the swimming pool, Aristotle and Dante instantly connect over their unusual names. They laugh about their eccentric names, but deep down they both have issues with their names.

For Aristotle, his name feels like a burden. He thinks about how he is named after his grandfather and shares the same name as “the world’s most famous philosopher” (84) He feels he can never live up to the expectations his name has burdened him with.

Dante’s issue with his name is connected to his difficulties over his Mexican heritage. Dante’s expresses frustration over Mexican people’s use of nicknames, particularly because his name does not easily lend itself to a Spanish nickname. He tells Ari that he feels he doesn’t belong anywhere because he isn’t “a real Mexican” like Aristotle (88). Later on, when Dante sees Ari’s truck for the first time, he says “You’re a real Mexican, Ari.” Ari replies, “So are you, you jerk,” to which Dante says, “Nah, I’ll never be a real Mexican” (245). Ari knows that Dante is bothered by his disconnection from his identity and that it matters deeply to him, even though he does not have the same issue.

When Dante finds out that his mother is pregnant, he makes a list of names for his baby brother: “I like Diego. I like Joaquin. I like Javier. Rafael. I like Maximiliano.” Ari tells him, “Those names sound pretty Mexican,” and Dante replies “Yeah, well, I’m shying away from ancient classical names. And besides, if he has a Mexican name, then maybe he’ll feel more Mexican” (269). Dante doesn’t want his younger sibling to face the same obstacles that he does with his racial identity, and he believes that giving the child a traditional Mexican name will alleviate this problem.

Birds

When the boys bury a bird and stand in silence, Ari asks “why do birds exist?” Dante replies, “[T]o teach us things about the sky” (54). Later that day, when Ari thinks about Dante’s answer, he realizes that birds can teach humans “to be free” (55). Dante loves birds because they represent freedom. His love for birds and desire to save them causes him to nearly get in a fight with boys who shot a bird and later leads to the severe accident that breaks Ari’s legs. Dante is willing to risk everything in order to be free, while Ari doesn’t yet understand what it means to be free. The symbolic significance of birds and sparrows in particular is explored through Aristotle’s frightening dreams. His dreams of sparrows covering him in blood are prophetic. These violent visions foreshadow the accident that will change Aristotle’s and Dante’s lives, forever connecting them through a bond of self-sacrifice and love. The author creates a symbolic connection between Dante’s freedom and birds, and Ari learns to be free himself through his relationship with Dante.

Dreams

Ari’s dreams are symbolic and even prophetic at times. He has “this idea that the reason we have dreams is that we’re thinking about things that we don’t know we’re thinking about—and those things, well, they sneak out of us in our dreams” (178). When he has a high fever, Ari experiences a rapid transformation: His illness is a symbolic event signaling his growth from childhood into young adulthood. He wonders if “maybe a part of you died when you were sick” (64). These dreams give him greater awareness of his relationships with the males in his life. Ari dreams that he sees “millions and millions of sparrows falling” and Dante carrying Richie Valens’ dead body (60). He has a dream of searching for Dante and then his father. His dreams contain potent visual metaphors symbolizing his emotional distance from his father, his older brother, and Dante. His dreams of searching for his father visualizes the divide between his father and his brother as similar to the divide between the U.S. and Mexico. More broadly, his dreams literalize the chaotic, confusing feelings Ari cannot express verbally. He sees himself and Dante similarly divided.

Dante asks Ari about his bad dreams, but Ari doesn’t tell him because Ari fears that his dreams will reveal too much about his feelings toward Dante. When he is in the hospital, he dreams a pleasant dream of the surgeon, Dr. Charles, healing Dante’s bird and setting “it free into the summer sky” (119). Ari’s dreams offer layered symbolism that hints at his deep feelings toward Dante and the complex emotions he experiences but is hesitant to share. He compares the bad dreams he can’t escape to “air […] leaking out” (180-81). Ari thinks that maybe when he’s older he’d like “to study dreams [… and] help people who have bad dreams” (178). He figures out that the dreams he has of his brother “have a direct connection” to his life because in his dreams he is four, and the last time he saw his brother was when he was four (182). By paying attention to his dreams and the meanings they reveal, Ari learns things about himself that he was not consciously aware of.