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Chapter 16
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
Craig goes to the emergency room and signs in. He tells a nurse that the suicide hotline sent him, and she reassures him that things will be fine but that he can’t stop taking his medicine again. She leads him to a bright room and says the doctor will be in shortly. In the room, a police officer named Chris introduces himself and says he’s there in case Craig needs help. Chris is reading a newspaper, which he technically isn’t supposed to do in an area with patients, but he soon gets called away.
Once again, this passage emphasizes how getting help for depression is not necessarily a dramatic process and involves a lot of mundane activities like filling out paperwork. This establishes how, although the hospital is an important turning point for Craig, ultimately, Craig’s recovery will involve learning to live with depression in his everyday life rather than taking some dramatic step to turn his life around all at once.
Themes
Dr. Data comes into the room and Craig explains his situation yet again. She makes a plan for him to see the psychiatrist Dr. Mahmoud. She warns him that he’ll have to call his mom and dad and get them to sign some forms. Craig says they live nearby, and he picks up a phone to call.
Note that the doctors Craig meets all act like normal people and like professionals. The novel does not portray them unrealistically as some other stories do by turning them into saviors or into oppressive forces who try to imprison or torture their patients.
Themes
