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Chapter 1
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in About a Boy, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Chosen Family
Coming of Age and Maturity
Alienation and Mental Illness
Identity, Pop Culture, and Fitting In
Summary
Analysis
Taking a questionnaire in a men’s magazine to determine his level of “cool,” Will Freeman’s results indicate that he is “sub-zero” and “Frosty the Snowman”-cool. He has seemingly constructed his whole life around this concept: he spends ridiculous amounts of money on clothes, haircuts, and other frivolous purchases; he takes trendy drugs like Ecstasy with cool people in clubs; he maintains a steady living without having to work for it; and he has both the ability to grow trendy facial hair and the good sense to shave it off once the trend has passed. Will considers his score of 66 points one of his life’s more impressive accomplishments and decides not to throw out this particular magazine just yet.
That Will values receiving a high score on a trivial (and, notably, self-graded) magazine quiz highlights both his superficiality and how he has meticulously crafted his life around maintaining an image of coolness. A “high score” on such a quiz doesn’t actually prove much of anything, outside of Will’s apparent materialism, shallow priorities, and lack of deeper awareness and ambition. Will’s dedication to surface-level, fleeting trends underscores his desire to fit in with what he perceives as society’s standards, demonstrating his reliance on external validation to achieve security and fulfillment.
Themes
At 36, Will is unbothered by the fact that he has yet to “[find] a life for himself.” He contemplates how different his life might have been 60 years ago, in a world with fewer distractions and less noise, and he concludes that he likely would have had to find a job to avoid complete boredom. Fortunately for him, the modern world offers endless avenues for escape. Rather than seeking employment or a purpose, Will spends his days shopping, wandering, and consuming various forms of popular media—currently, it’s music by Nirvana and Snoop Doggy Dogg.
This section establishes Will’s deep-seated complacency with his purposeless, meaningless existence. This provides crucial context so readers understand his eventual need for change, as well as the internal conflicts he faces, as the novel progresses. His comparison of life now to 60 years ago delineates his reliance on modern conveniences and pop culture, emphasizing how these distractions effectively prevent him from confronting his lack of ambition. Will’s reliance on consumerism and popular media for fulfillment highlights his escapism and the emptiness of his pursuits.
Themes
During an unenthusiastic, reluctant visit to meet his friend John’s newborn baby, Will is annoyed by the home’s chaos and repulsive “clutter.” As John and his wife Christine talk about their kids and not-so-subtly urge him to start a family of his own, Will can only focus on his total disregard for children and babies, and how “unhappy” they inevitably make parents. To someone like Will—who views children as unnecessary burdens that transform formerly happy couples into miserable, brainwashed shells of themselves—there is no real benefit to having or raising kids.
Here, Will’s lifelong aversion to traditional family life and responsibilities is established. His disdain for children and the domestic chaos they inevitably invite reflects his desire to avoid any form of commitment, and his perception of parents as unhappy and burdened speaks to his primary fear of losing his freedom and independence. A significant barrier to Will’s personal growth throughout his life has been his emotional immaturity, as it has prevented him from engaging meaningfully with the world. This section establishes a direct contrast between Will’s self-interested bachelor lifestyle and the more conventional path of family life, which becomes a pivotal theme in his development.
Themes
Reflecting on the time before his friends had children, Will thinks about Jessica, an ex-girlfriend. When Jessica told Will that she wanted something more serious out of their relationship—something Will could not (and would not) provide—he had no choice but to end things with her. After privately resolving to be done with John, Christine, and their kids forever, the couple asks Will to be the godfather of their newborn baby girl, Imogen. They believe Will has “hidden depths” that would make him a good father figure. Will tries to turn them down, but they smile at him as though they are able to see something he cannot.
Will’s reflection on his ex-girlfriend and their failed relationship characterizes him as commitment-phobic. John and Christine’s request for Will to be their daughter’s godfather is jarring for him because it challenges his own self-perception as cool, unattached, and aloof, and he wonders what “hidden depths” they could possibly see in him. This brief moment in the beginning of the story foreshadows the journey Will’s character will inevitably take.
Themes
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