Analysis: The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time

Words: 487
Pages: 2

Charlotte Foote
Mrs. Nalbandian
BritLit/Block G
30th August 2016 Christopher’s analysis ( LAP, Prompt #1)

In Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Christopher’s difference of comprehension for human tropes contrasts the majority’s tolerance for it. For example, he views metaphors as lies due to the shapes they take on in his mind, “I think it should be called a lie because a pig is not like a day and people do not have skeletons in their cupboards. And when I try and make a picture of the phrase in my head it just confuses me because imagining an apple in someone’s eye doesn’t have anything to do with liking someone a lot and it makes you forget what the person was talking about”(p.15). Through his own perspective,
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God knows, I try, Christopher, God knows I do, but… Life is difficult, you know. It’s bloody hard telling the truth all the time. Sometimes it’s impossible” (p.120). Christopher’s father represents the ‘majority’; the general population and their standpoint on deceit. Regardless of the extremity of the fib, Christopher will not swallow its’ being. Playful figurative vernacular is even seen as a possible threat towards him, “And he pointed and said, ‘Through those doors there. But I’ll be keeping an eye on you, understand?’ And I said, ‘No,’ because I knew what keeping an eye on someone meant but he couldn’t look at me when I was in the toilet”(p.162). The bulk of society would find familiarity in the phrase and form an image in their minds of the childish pun and its’ humor, while Christopher studies is literalness. For instance, Christopher’s brain lacks common frivolity compared to the average person, and has no interest in imagining fantasy situations, “Other people have pictures in their heads, too. But they are different because the pictures in my head are all pictures of things which really happened. But other people have pictures in their heads of things which aren’t real and didn’t happen” (p.78). While those around him may have acceptance