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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.

Explanation and Analysis:

This passage occurs during the novel’s climax, as Marcus and Ellie travel via train to visit Marcus’s dad in Cambridge. They have both just learned of Kurt Cobain’s suicide, which rattles Ellie’s world and plunges her into an emotional spiral. ...

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Original

Romeo

(aside) She speaks.
O, speak again, bright angel! For thou art
As glorious to this night, being o’er my head,
As is a winged messenger of heaven
Unto the white, upturnèd, wondering eyes
Of mortals that fall back to gaze on him
When he bestrides the lazy-puffing clouds
And sails upon the bosom of the air.

Juliet

O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art though Romeo?
Deny they father and refuse they name.
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,
And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.

Modern

Romeo

(to himself) She speaks. Speak again, bright angel! For tonight you are as glorious, there up above me, as a winged messenger of heaven who makes mortals fall onto their backs to gaze up with awestruck eyes as he strides across the lazy clouds and sails through the air.

Juliet

O Romeo, Romeo! Why must you be Romeo? Deny your father and give up your name. Or, if you won’t change your name, just swear your love to me and I’ll give up being a Capulet.

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