Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in It’s Kind of a Funny Story, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Mental Health
Art and Self-Discovery
Peer Pressure vs. Self-Empowerment
Friendship and Romance
Summary
Analysis
Joanie is a smiling lady with a lot of bracelets who leads the art class. Craig finds the room depressing because it’s for adults but looks like a preschool. Humble teases Craig and Noelle that they must have been late because they were kissing, but Noelle insists that nothing happened. Craig doesn’t know what to draw, so everyone else in the room shouts out suggestions. Craig eventually draws a map that looks like a brain, which impresses all the other patients. Noelle leaves a note saying she wants a break to avoid getting too attached to Craig, but she wants to see him again later.
At the beginning of the class, Craig seems to write Joanie off as an eccentric woman who doesn’t understand him. But before long, he realizes that art actually does have a lot of power to help him cope with and understand his depression. The maps that Craig draws represent how he is still at a point in his life where he is trying to find his way and how his own brain can be a confusing place to “navigate”—but he wants to try.
Themes
