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Chapter 9
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
The house party has thinned out, but Ronny is still there playing PlayStation on Aaron’s couch. Aaron comes back, and Ronny teases her about Nia, who is asleep in the other room. Aaron persuades Craig and Ronny to go on a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. Aaron tells Craig on the walk that he can tell Nia likes sex, even though they didn’t go all the way.
The Brooklyn Bridge is a famous example of New York City architecture, but it also has a darker reputation as a “suicide bridge” due to the high number of people who jump from the bridge with intentions to die by suicide. The Brooklyn Bridge’s frequent appearance in the story helps to establish the New York setting as well as showing how Craig can’t escape the topic of suicide at this point in his life.
Themes
As they’re walking over the Brooklyn Bridge, Craig suddenly says he wants to stand out over the water. He starts climbing onto the parts of the bridge only meant for workers to repair cables. Aaron thinks he’s crazy. Craig goes up to the top, where there’s nothing to stop him from falling off. He shouts “Eulalia,” a battle cry from the Redwall fantasy novels. He closes his eyes, later realizing that he could have died right there.
When Craig goes out to the dangerous part of the bridge, he considers it a moment of triumph and feels exhilarated. It’s only later that he realizes that what he was doing was foolish and that his life was in danger. This sums up the seeming appeal of suicide to Craig and also foreshadows how he’ll realize that suicide isn’t the solution he’s looking for after all.
Themes
