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Chapter 19
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
One of Will’s favorite pastimes is driving around London. He enjoys feeling like a “normal” person, dealing with traffic every day. He also loves blaring music and singing along as loudly as he can—especially Nirvana, which he considers a “guilty pleasure.” Although Will doesn’t feel he can relate to the pain and the angst in their music, he screams along to it anyway, using this as a substitute for genuine feeling and emotion.
This paragraph reveals key aspects of Will’s character and coping mechanisms. Will enjoys driving around London and dealing with everyday traffic as a way to feel normal and escape his otherwise aimless lifestyle. His love for loudly singing along to Nirvana, despite not relating to the angst, shows his need for an emotional outlet. This behavior acts as a facade for genuine emotional expression, highlighting Will’s difficulty in confronting his true feelings. Nirvana, as his “guilty pleasure,” symbolizes the contrast between his external persona and internal struggles.
Themes
On one of these drives, Will sees Marcus wandering around town during school hours. Realizing the boy should be in school, Will feels conflicted. He knows the right thing to do would be to pull over and find out what happened or at least let Fiona know that her son isn’t where he should be. However, he also recognizes that Marcus isn’t his responsibility, and frankly, he’d rather not get involved. By the time Marcus rings Will’s buzzer at exactly 4:15, Will has already resolved not to answer the door. As Marcus rings repeatedly, Will blasts Nirvana’s In Utero album on his speakers, hoping to drown out the obnoxious buzzer. Eventually, though, Marcus wears Will down, and he finally lets him inside.
Will’s hesitation to check in on Marcus speaks to his reluctance to disrupt his responsibility-free lifestyle by taking accountability for the teenage boy. When Will is unable to drown out Marcus’s relentless doorbell ringing with Nirvana’s In Utero, he realizes, perhaps for the first time in the novel, that maintaining emotional distance is an impossible feat when the emotion itself is able to break through his numerous defenses, marking the beginning of Will’s reluctant acceptance of a more active role in Marcus’s life.
Themes
Unfazed by Will’s hour-long avoidance tactic, Marcus promptly asks if Will will take him and a friend to see a soccer game to watch his favorite player, Kirk O’Bane. Will, a sports fanatic, tells him no such player exists and switches the topic, attempting to get Marcus to confess that he skipped school. When Marcus doesn’t confess, Will confronts him and advises him to tell his mum about what happened with Mrs. Morrison. Marcus wants Will to handle it instead, a request Will quickly shoots down. Finally revealing to Marcus that “Kirk O’Bane” is actually Kurt Cobain, it becomes clear to Will what kind of help Marcus really needs: he needs to learn to “be a kid, not an adult.”
Marcus’s request to see a fictional soccer player he mistakenly believes to be Kurt Cobain revealing that, despite his sudden maturation, Marcus is still just an innocent, confused kid deep down. The fact that Will is capable of properly identifying Kurt Cobain impresses Marcus, telling him all he needs to know about Will’s usefulness. Will’s attempt to steer the conversation toward the skipped school incident and his advice to Marcus to talk to his mother reflect his growing understanding of accountability and communication, while Marcus’s preference for Will to handle the situation rather than Fiona emphasizes his shifting allegiance to Will’s influence.
Themes
