The protagonist of Sophie's world is unfortunate in that not only is her closest friend a clueless, vapid individual but also that a crack squad of philosophy ninjas have seen fit to send her random questions along with a syllabus in philosophy, just to give her headaches. Such questions are thrown at her to make her see reality in an unusual light. To be honest, it all seems a little bit unfair, that this poor girl, who while gifted with with an unusually sharp mind in this time and age, has to deal with such an idiotic mother and stupid friends, as while as an existential crisis. I would be quite daunted, were I a "typical" American, to be confronted with a question of who you are, when to be honest, you are what you believe and think, what you enjoy and hate, not your blog, not your job, not your name, nor grades and accomplishments. While I may sound like a certain individual(as played by Brad Pitt), I don't believe in purposefully throwing chaos into the system, its already there. Then on top of a personal crisis, he returns with the question of where the world comes from, which is, to be the most precise within discoverable history, a hyper-dense point of all matter within the universe.
From the second chapter, you can sense some underlying questions, like what is truly important, not what we are convinced by societal pressures and parental mandates we "need" to accomplish. Also evident is what is philosophical truth. Is it what can be proved by years of study? reason? faith? Is it universal or is it only true on personal cases? What can we truly believe? What we can sense? No, at least if you believe in scientific studies or religious doctrine. What we are told? No for people make mistakes, if not lie outright. What we deduce? No, for reason cannot stand on its own? Or what we intuit? Only if you believe you are the only one alive.
Then he mentions a trait, held in common amongst children and philosophers (and those who are truly religious I guess(and I mean the thousandth of a percent that actually believes)) which he calls the Faculty of Wonder. The ability of looking at the world as if it is continuously new, continuously remade, and never taking anything for granted. To, as a way of saying, live and work in the real world but think apart from said world, making what we believe to be true and reality entirely uncommon.
These things are just a combination of things that would greatly succeed to make anyone’s life a living hell, so... I feel sorry for Sophie
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