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The Dead Duck Day
Throughout the novel, Kurt Cobain and Nirvana symbolize the characters’ longing for connection and understanding as they seek to establish a sense of personal identity. Ellie’s parasocial relationship with Cobain and Nirvana best exemplifies this longing, as the 15-year-old only feels truly understood through their music. Ellie intimately identifies with Nirvana’s grunge, anti-mainstream ethos, viewing the band as revolutionary. She wears her Kurt Cobain sweatshirt to school every day, despite knowing she’ll get in trouble for violating the dress code. It is likely no coincidence that Ellie’s and Marcus’s first conversation is about her sweatshirt and Cobain. In this moment, the mere image of Cobain’s face is enough to bridge all of the perceived gaps between them—gaps in age, appearance, and truancy record—unexpectedly bringing together two teens in need of a friend.
Whenever Kurt Cobain is mentioned, his well-documented struggles with depression and mental illness also come to mind. For many, Nirvana remains the epitome of the grunge scene and Cobain the quintessential “tortured artist.” Numerous characters remark on the honesty in Cobain’s voice and his willingness to confront darkness and truth in a compelling way. Even Will, who admits he doesn’t understand the emotional complexity of Nirvana’s music, listens to it in order to feel something. In the end, Cobain’s death becomes the emotional climax of the story, bringing together numerous characters to grieve together and connect over their shared love of the musician. This illustrates how community and chosen family can often be forged in moments of great loss and uncertainty.
Kurt Cobain/Nirvana Quotes in About a Boy
The About a Boy quotes below all refer to the symbol of Kurt Cobain/Nirvana. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 16
Quotes
[...] it could reasonably be argued that reality was not in his genes. He liked watching real stuff on EastEnders and The Bill, and he liked listening to Joe Strummer and Kurt Cobain singing about real stuff, but he’d never had real stuff sitting on his sofa before. No wonder, then, that once he’d made it a cup of tea and offered it a biscuit he didn’t really know what to do with it.
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Chapter 22
Quotes
He gave Marcus a vinyl copy of Nevermind, because they didn’t own a CD player, and a Kurt Cobain T-shirt, so he could keep in with Ellie; he gave Fiona a pretty groovy and pretty expensive plain glass vase, because she’d complained after the hospital business that she didn’t know what to do with the flowers. Marcus gave him a crossword-solver’s book to help him with Countdown, and Fiona gave him The Single Parent’s Handbook as a joke.
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Chapter 29
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‘How do you know? How do you know he wasn’t just messing about? I’ll bet you he never does anything like it again.’
‘You don’t know him,’ Ellie said.
‘Neither do you,’ Marcus shouted at her. ‘He’s not even a real person. He’s just a singer. He’s just someone on a sweatshirt. It’s not like he’s anyone’s mum.’
‘No, but he’s someone’s dad, you little prat,’ said Ellie. ‘He’s Frances Bean’s dad. He’s got a beautiful little girl and he still wants to die. So, you know.’
Marcus did know, he thought. He turned around and ran out.
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Chapter 33
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‘You don’t know anything.’
‘I know some things. I know about that. I’ll tell you, Ellie, you don’t feel anything like my mum, or Kurt Cobain. You shouldn’t say that you feel like killing yourself when you don’t. It’s not right.’
Ellie shook her head and laughed her low nobody-understands-me laugh, a noise that Marcus hadn’t heard since the day they met outside Mrs. Morrison’s office. She was right, he hadn’t understood her then; he understood her much better now.
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Chapter 34
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Some of these people he hadn’t known until today; some of them he had only known for a little while, and even then he couldn’t say that he knew them well. But here they were anyway, one of them clutching a cardboard cut-out Kurt Cobain, one of them in a plaster cast, one of them crying, all of them bound to each other in ways that it would be almost impossible to explain to anyone who had just wandered in. Will couldn’t recall ever having been caught up in this sort of messy, sprawling, chaotic web before; it was almost as if he had been given a glimpse of what it was like to be human.
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Get the entire About a Boy LitChart as a printable PDF.
Kurt Cobain/Nirvana Symbol Timeline in About a Boy
The timeline below shows where the symbol Kurt Cobain/Nirvana appears in About a Boy. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 2
...spends his days shopping, wandering, and consuming various forms of popular media—currently, it’s music by Nirvana and Snoop Doggy Dogg.
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Chapter 19
...except more modern and with bleached hair.” Ellie tells him the man’s name is “ Kirk O’Bane ,” a famous footballer, but Marcus notes that the man looks more like a musician...
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Chapter 20
...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...
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...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,...
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...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,...
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Chapter 21
...play soccer, then proceeds to tell Ellie about a “friend” who listens to all of Nirvana’s music. Marcus, meanwhile, admits to the girls that he’s still unsure about the “grunge” scene....
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...When Mrs. Morrison appears and orders Ellie to her office for once again wearing her Kurt Cobain sweatshirt instead of her school uniform, Ellie casually defies the headmistress. Marcus is amazed by...
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...other students in the 10th-grade form room, Ellie declares that he is the only other Nirvana fan in the whole school. Though everyone laughs and Ellie and Zoe treat Marcus somewhat...
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Chapter 22
For Christmas, Will gifts Marcus a Kurt Cobain t-shirt and a Nevermind vinyl copy, and he gifts Fiona a “groovy” and expensive vase....
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Chapter 29
...friendship, he shouldn’t get involved in this kind of drama. “I can tell you who Kurt Cobain is and what trainers to get, and that’s it. Understood?” Will explains, and Marcus nods....
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...usual self; she’s tearful and quiet, holding hands with Zoe. They tell Marcus the news: Kurt Cobain overdosed and had to have his stomach pumped. Ellie believes that one day, Cobain will...
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...bathroom stall. Soon, Ellie comes looking for him to apologize for what she said about Kurt Cobain ; she hadn’t considered the connection between Kurt and Marcus’s mum. She sits next to...
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Chapter 31
...stranger reading the newspaper, Marcus can see that the front page features a photo of Kurt Cobain along with the headline, “Rock Star Cobain Dead.” Suddenly, Marcus is overcome with a mixture...
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...King’s Cross, Ellie seems like her typical self, so Marcus assumes she doesn’t know about Kurt Cobain yet. He quickly takes charge, leading them to their platform to prevent Ellie from noticing...
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Chapter 32
...On the way back to Fiona’s, the cabdriver informs them of the big news, that Kurt Cobain has killed himself. Immediately worried about Marcus and Ellie, they check to see if he’s...
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Chapter 33
...“someone quieter [...] who liked reading and computer games.” Ellie tells Marcus she’s depressed because Kurt Cobain “understood” her in a way no one else does, and she “loved” him. These ideas...
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...dad, Marcus hesitantly follows. They walk past a record store with a cardboard cutout of Kurt Cobain in the window display, which Ellie views as a cheap commodification of his death. In...
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Chapter 34
...something few adults can actually accomplish. Will also notes the unlikely connection between Marcus and Kurt Cobain : both are able to meaningfully bring together people who would otherwise have no business...
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...the store’s window, and Ellie argues it was a protest against the store’s “exploitation” of Kurt Cobain ’s tragic death. Ruth clarifies that the cutout has always been a staple of her...
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