About a Boy 1

I was listening to the soundtrack to the movie About a Boy this weekend, which got me thinking about the movie. In the beginning of the movie, John Donne is quoted as saying “No man is an island”, and the main character disagrees. He supposes that every man is an island, and that the modern age is the best time to be an island. Focusing on the first half of the statement, is every man an island? On the one hand, no one will ever see into another’s head totally. No one will ever know exactly what another is thinking all of the time, and one will never be able to relate to anyone else completely. One is always alone in one’s own head, so how is one not an island? On the other hand, one cannot live without others. One cannot come by everything that one needs to survive without interacting somehow with others, and many of the joys of existence cannot be experienced without others. So how can one be an island?
I believe that every person is an island, but that every person is defined largely by the things they do when they visit other islands.