Faith

Faith can be a substitute to “belief”, “hope” or “trust”.
These are all verbs that are missing in the relationship between Paul and Sarah. However when we are introduced to Brian, a football passionate who starts camping on their rooftop, we are also introduced to a confidence and certainty of a cause. This is one of the main themes in the story “faith” by Nick Hornby, which proves to us, the readers, just how important believing in yourself, and realizing how great an impact your surroundings might have.

The story takes place in a flat in London where the couple Paul and Sarah lives.
This is where the husband and father Brian invades the roof and life of Paul and Sarah’s. We suppose it takes place in the 21’st century at least build on the mentioning of TV-programs (l. 2, p. 50) and an open-top bus (l. 42, p. 50) for an example. Even though the story has a 3rd person omniscient narrator, we learn mostly about Sarah’s thoughts and a big part of the story is also through her point of view. It is also generally her that changes throughout the story.

Sarah feels stuck in her life (l. 21, p. 46), and perhaps that is why she considers the thought of having a baby in the first place. But then she has doubts whether, she is ready to the commitment: “What about work? What about money? What about sleep and friends and smoking and drinking and travelling and what about eating curry, for God’s sake […]” (p. 46 l. 12).
As said, Sarah feels stuck and sees her life as one big spin-dryer.
To her, there is too many choices to make and too much to deal with.
She envies the people with: “[…] religions and careers that mean everything, love affairs that consume them, hobbies that dominate their every spare moment, children that suck them dry, football teams that drive them on to wind-blasted rooftops…” (l. 3, p. 50). In other words she wishes her life was not this so-called spin-dryer, but instead a vigorous, substantive one.

The desire of the exciting life is also noticeable by the sentence: ““[…] it would be nice if you wanted to screw for other reasons occasionally. It used to be about lust, not ovulation.”” (l. 11, p. 47.)
This makes the reader questioning her wanting a baby, or her wanting a baby with Paul. This might also be one of the sign of a not-working relationship between the two of them.

Sarah is rather inspired by the sudden presence of Brian in her life, and by the fact that he is so much more different from Paul. Brian is spontaneous, dynamic and brave and knows what he wants (this is mentioned at l. 27, p. 50), which might be what inspires her to leave Paul, to untangle her life, and not be stuck anymore.

Furthermore she also was rather quick to get over the ending of the relationship, which is showed by how rapidly she was, to end it just a few days after the purchase of Roy Keane (l. 18, p. 51), but also by the fact that she does not tell Paul about her new relationship as well as her pregnancy (l. 23, p. 51).
All she was in need for was courage to take the step for achieving faith.

But this life-style, which she is so eager to get out of, is in some way what, she runs into with her new boyfriend. You would get the feeling that after she finally comes to the conclusion that she is not happy, and that Paul is not the one to fill this emptiness, she feels inside (l. 19, p. 51), Sarah would do something completely different, than get pregnant and move in with her friend’s brother.

Paul on the other hand is very different from Brian, and is not as optimistic of his presence, as Sarah. However he also gets accustomed to have him in his life. Both Sarah and Paul actually grow rather found of having Brian on their roof (l. 22, p. 49).
Compared to Brian, Paul is rather wimpy and cautious.
“”Not much point in doing it, though, is there?” he says. “What with your period and everything. If I haven’t got many sperm, I don’t want to waste them.” […] “Anyway, it would be nice if you wanted to screw for other reasons occasionally. It used to be about lust, not ovulation.””.
By this quote, we clearly see that Paul is ready for this simple life, and Sarah is trying to escape.

Paul also takes the ending of the relationship a bit tougher, than Sarah: “”It’s just that it was all a bit quick. I couldn’t really… get a handle on anything. You were there, and then you weren’t there, and… “” (l. 14, p. 51).
By this sentence of Paul, we get the feeling that he is not yet accustomed to be without Sarah in his life. This might also be the reason he asks her to his Championship party (l. 1, p. 51).

The synonyms of “faith” are both “confidence” and “reliance”.
Sarah is lacking the “confidence” to step out of line and follow a new path in life, while Paul perhaps has too much “reliance” in the relationship, to notice the flaws.

Besides those synonyms, “faith”, as said in the beginning, means “belief”, and according to Hornby’s story, you will achieve your goal if you believe in it.
With enough faith, Brian eventually reached his one goal.
Sarah believed in a better life, and after the meeting of Brian she finally found the earlier mentioned “confidence”, and achieved it.