The Quest to find the Quest; Chapter 1- Every Trip is a Quest (Except When It's Not) Ilana Lemack

     In this first chapter of the novel, Foster is simply explaining that event in movies or books or plays do not just happen for the heck of it, but rather because it is a part of something greater, a Quest. Quests are seen commonly in literature and while they all may have different ways of showing how the quest progresses, they all have the following components: a quester, a place to go, a stated reason to go there, challenges and trials en route, and a real reason to go there.
    The quester is typically a young boy or girl and more times than not, is unaware that he/she even started on a quest. The quester is sent to go to a particular location (a place to go) usually to retrieve something or someone (a stated reason to go there), however frequently never makes it to the place they intended to go. It eventually becomes clear that the real reason for the quest is self-knowledge. Along the way the quester endures difficult tasks that they must overcome (challenges and trials en route) to ultimately discover new things about themselves (real reason to go there). The quester is normally a young age because the majority of self-knowledge and self-learning take place at around sixteen or seventeen. A naive teenage is likely to discover a lot more about themselves than if an adult were to go on a quest.
      Although the above characteristics may be true the majority of the time (a young quester or the quester not making it to the intended location), it is not appropriate to say that they are always true. Foster says " 'Always' and 'never' are not words that have much meaning in literary study." I agree in the sense that any theory that a person has or any statement a person makes can be proven wrong. There will always be an instance where a widely known belief or pattern can be proven wrong. For example, when Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492, he made the statement that the earth was flat. (I'm guessing) he probably said that it had always been flat and therefore will always be flat. However, someone was there to prove him wrong and it was scientifically discovered that Earth is, in fact, round.
     Now that I've described what the traditional quest looks like, it's only fair that I give an example, right? I hope we've all seen The Parent Trap (Lindsay Lohan version of course). There are 2 questers in this movie; 11 year old twins, Annie James and Halle Parker who were separated at birth. While one twin lives in London with the mother, Elizabeth, the other twin lives in Napa Valley, California with the dad, Nick. Both twins were sent to the same sumer camp where they met for the first time. Because they are identical, they decided to switch places. Halle went to London and Annie to California. While on separate sides of the world they both come into several difficult tasks. For instance, Halle's dad is getting remarried (to Cruela Devil) which completely ruins the twins' plan to reunite their parents. Although the twins' said reason to split up at the end of summer camp is to reunite their parents, along the way they realize the relationship they missed out on with either their mom or dad. Once the truth comes out and Elizabeth realizes his daughter is in London, a meeting to switch them back is arranged. Although it is necessary to switch Annie and Halle back, they became closer to their parents and each other in the short time they were switched. It ends happy though because Nick's fiance turns out to be a brat and Nick and Elizabeth get married again. The point is, even though the intended reason for the quest was to reunite their parents, the true reason turned out to be becoming closer as sisters and finding out new things about not only themselves, but the life that they missed out on on opposite sides of the world.
     Basically, quests are everywhere and Foster makes them easily identifiable by listing out the characteristics. Once you know what you're looking for, identifying a quest won't be so much of a quest.