The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time Analysis

Imagine a world where you can't understand emotions, feelings and facial expression. When most of the time while interacting with someone, you'll feel afraid and insecure. " " explores the....

"The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" is an award-winning book written by Mark Haddon. It is one of the international bestsellers and has won many prestigious prizes for both children's and adult literature. Mark Haddon intrigued his reader by the use of narrative conventions, such as character and language. Written from Christopher Boone's perspective, he narrates how he finds a dead dog in his front yard and his desperation of finding out the murderer.

Christopher is a 15-year old boy that is born with a medical condition called Aspergers Syndrome and he also has photographic memory. Due to his mental disability, Christopher is emotionally detached and he has behavioral problems. He has difficulty with reading people's emotions and hates lies as he feels that it threatens his sense of security. Christopher also doesn't like to be touched because he has difficulty interpreting whether someone is nice or wants to be violent with him. Due to Christopher's photographic memory, he struggles with controlling his thoughts, which results to him often getting stressed out with information overload. In the book, Christopher sees that a human mind is like a complicated machine but his mind is pure logic. His world is so orderly that he makes up coloured car systems, timetables and daily routines for his life. His world is carefully constructed and he hates the complexity and unpredictable chaos that other people bring, Christopher often implies that he longs to live in peace and alone. Christopher Boone's logical mind highlights the emotive and illogical world we live in. we realise how complex our world is like, the many different emotions people have and the many facial expressions we'll come across in one day.

As Christopher begins his investigation on the murder of Wellington, he assures us that everything he tells in his book is true. "I do not tell lies. Mother used to say that it was because I was a good person. But it is not because I am a good person, it is because I can't tell lies." Christopher Boone also indicates that he can't tell lies because it will threaten his sense of security; it creates a reaction in his brain of ''thoughts stacking up'. Christopher particularly has a liking for dogs because he says that dogs cannot lie, that is why he has a lot of concern for Wellington's murder as he feels that he can relate to animals. Because he has an even less understanding of the society than most 15 year-old teenagers, he cannot understand emotions, lies and the intriguing adult world. Mark Haddon has made us feel guilty, as we seem to take advantage of this social skill. Christopher's orderly world becomes all too real as soon as we start to read this book. Although Christopher's world is so structured and non-emotional, he explains his world in a way that makes perfect sense to us.

The entire novel is based on Christopher Boone, so the search for stability is a crucial theme. The novel is about how his world is overturned by chaos- the death of Wellington and the deterioration of trust between him and his father. For someone like Christopher who has a mental condition, trust and stability is an important necessity in his life. Stability helps Christopher to cope with the society and it makes him feel calm that everything goes to plan. Christopher feels safe and happy with an ordered and stable life. If something doesn't go according to his plan, Christopher will feel uncomfortable and it will threaten his mental state and not only will it be a mental problem, but he will also feel physical pain. The author tries to convey