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The curious incident of the dog in the night-time character essay
Autism annotated bibliography
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time character essay
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Society has labelled mothers with autistic or schizophrenic children as a ‘refrigerator mother’ or a ‘refrigerator parent’. In ‘The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” written by Mark Haddon, Christopher’s mother, can easily fall into the ‘refrigerator mother’ stereotype because she is not able to cope with the responsibility of having a son with Asperger syndrome. Haddon also focuses on the every day struggles that people with Asperger’s or Autism face. However, disabilities come in many forms, and are partly genetic, they can also have a significant environmental aspect like mother care.
Asperger’s and Autism are hardly ever portrayed correctly in literature, especially in novels. The author guides his novel into a direction that, ultimately, must be enjoyable and of interest to the reader. This makes it common for the author to deviate from what is ‘real’ or scientifically and psychologically correct. Christopher is described to be a young, very bright 15-year-old boy, who is utterly confused by how he should act in social interactions with other people in his community and his family. He feels content when he does math problems, especially if they include prime numbers. When Christopher says: “Prime number are what is left when you have taken all the patterns away. I think prime numbers are life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spend all your time thinking about them.” (Haddon, 12) In some ways Christopher sees himself as a prime number. He has grown up to believe that he is different that the others. Prime numbers don’t mix, they are singular, and cannot be factored. A similar understanding has developed with the view on autism. Haddon’s portrayal of Asperger’s Christoph...
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...rs too. Haddon allowed the reader to form his or her own opinion as to why the family dynamic is the way it is, and why Christopher behaves the way he does. This is a critical for a novel, especially if it is written about such a controversial topic like Autism and Asperger’s.
Works Cited
Haddon, Mark. The curious incident of the dog in the night-time. New York: Vintage Contemporaries, 2003.
McGowan, Patrick O., et al. "Broad Epigenetic Signature Of Maternal Care In The Brain Of Adult Rats." Plos ONE 6.2 (2011): 1-11. Academic Search Complete. Web. 3 Apr. 2014.
Champagne, Frances, Josie Diorio, and Michael J. Meaney. "Naturally Occurring Variations in Maternal Behavior in the Rat Are Associated with Differences in Estrogen inducible Central Oxytocin Receptors." PNAS, 23 Oct. 2011. Web. 4 Apr. 2014. .
With every decision one makes. There will always be consequences. In Haddon’s, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, the character Christopher and his parents find that their bad decisions could lead to a negative outcome. Mrs. Boone’s choice to leave home and Mr. Boone’s choice to lie to Christopher lead to him leaving home to search for his mother. A common theme of the actions of the characters is acting before thinking. The theme of decisions and consequences reveals the imperfections of each character, ultimately demonstrating the quintessential impatient need for growth.
Christopher is a fifteen-year old boy with Aspergers Autism whose life is full of uncanny surprises. His main focus is on school, and his ability to take the maths A level exams. Unfortunately, that was his focus until he finds Wellington dead on Mrs. Shears’ lawn. Christopher wants to know who killed Wellington and why. He investigates and finds out not only who killed Wellington, but he discovers secrets about his mother and father. In the book “The Curious Incident of the dog in the night-time”, the author, Mark Haddon, shows us how courageous Christopher is throughout his journey. According to Aristotle, a man is courageous when he sets himself free from his fears, pain, and poverty instead of running away from it. According to Aristotle’s theory, Christopher profusely shows courage when he investigates Wellington’s murder and travels to London to find his mom.
Point of view can greatly affect the way a reader feel about a novel. Point of view affects how the characters are perceived and how well the readers know them. It also provides a means for readers to feel connected with characters, or to better understand what a character is going through. The author’s way of thinking also has a very large impact on the point of view based on how they themselves see a situation. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time is narrated in a very diverse way, by being narrated by a boy with a disorder, it could be very different if told by a different character, and it would change drastically if narrated by someone without autism.
To conclude, Mark Haddon’s novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time uses distinctive qualities to enhance the reader’s understanding of coping with difficulty and accompanies appropriate language and prose action to express
Anger is one of the hardest emotions to control. Often, people hold it in, allowing it to build until it bursts, causing damage. In Mark Haddon’s novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, the parents of a child with autism struggle to keep their cool around their son. Christopher’s mother fails to mask her emotions around her son, leaving his father to take care of him. Although his father tries to maintain calm, he often yells at Christopher as his son watches on in careful concentration. Haddon’s authorial choice of making Christopher’s parents lash out reveals irony in that Christopher is the one with the disorder yet is calm, analyzing situations objectively.
Christopher Boone is a 15 year old male young-adult, of British descent. Christopher describes himself as a machine, We have reports of him saying “I sometimes think of my mind as a machine” (Haddon 7). Christopher is currently living with his mother, who has asked not be named, and his father, Edward Boone. Christopher comes from Swindon,UK, where he was born and grew up, until the divorce of his parents were his mom moved away with Roger Shears (Christopher’s former neighbor and ex-husband of his father's former girlfriend). Christopher Boone suffers from many behavioral/emotional problems such as being irritable, unstable, and not talk to people for a long time. He also has problems like not eating or drinking for long periods of time and refusal to being touched. Christopher is currently in High School, enrolled in Level A math. Christopher’s father, Ed Boone, has been renowned for killing his neighbor's dog, Wellington. On page 1, (at midnight) Christopher walks into the neighbor's backyard after looking out his window to see Wellington stabbed with a pitchfork. Christopher says “I stroked Wellington and wondered who had killed him, and why”. Christopher cared deeply for Wellington, and loved dogs. We have a hypothesis that Christopher had abandonment issues after his mother leaving. Christopher’s trust in his father diminished, but after buying Christopher his own puppy, he started to gain Christophers trust back (“he bent down and put his hands inside the box and he took a little sandy-colored dog out”) (Haddon 219). Christopher also tends to perform poorly in social situations/a school environment. Some examples would be; not interacting with other kids, getting bullied, and acting aggressively when being touched. Some of ...
...though Christopher functions more like a computer than a human, but he possesses the ability to think independently, which over all else represents a human characteristic. No machine can operate efficiently without being instructed and following exact orders. Christopher also needs to be told exactly what to do because the vagueness of common phrases is confusing to him, but knows that people break rules and also knows that he can make decisions for himself. On his journey to find his mother, Christopher makes the decision to break away from all of his rules in order to find her. He is able to go to London against almost all odds, and does so by stepping out of his comfort zone and into a world of uncertainty. Even though he uses computer-like thinking to come to the conclusion of going to his mother, it is his underlying human qualities that make the trip possible.
Every individual's mind functions in a different and unique way. We all have idiosyncratic behaviours and functions. These distinctive characteristics are what make us who we are. But not all neurological differences help us in our day -to-day lives. Every individual also possess some psychological defects. These issues are clearly portrayed in the novel, The curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon. In this story the protagonist is an autistic boy who faces many challenges in his life. Both his parents also face some complications in coping up with their son. Therefore the central theme in the novel, the curious incident of the dog in the night-time, delineated by Christopher (the autistic boy), the father, and the mother, is that everyone has psychological problems that they need to overcome.
How far would a parent go to ensure the comfort of their child? What if the child had a mental disability? Children with autism can be difficult to deal with and it can be easy to misconstrue a parent’s intentions toward their disabled child. According to Petra Kuppers’s essay “Dancing Autism: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime and Bedlam,” an autistic child has a, “distanced view of the rules that make up love, relationships, need, and care,” and therefore can be more challenging to raise (Kuppers 193). Christopher is one such example of an autistic child. In Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Christopher’s father is portrayed in a negative light, but actually proves himself to be an outstanding father.
The biggest reconnection Christopher encounters is with his mother. It begins when he finds a series of letters addressed to him in his father’s closet. Upon reading the letters, he makes the shocking discovery that his mother is alive, not dead, as his father previously tells him. Later, in trying to explain why he hides the truth, his father confesses he kills Wellington. As Christopher comes to these revelations, he immediately decides, “‘I had to go to London to live with Mother.’” (Haddon 131). This is a very powerful example of adapting. Christopher decides on the spot to go live with his mom despite not seeing her for years. The attitude of ‘sudden decisions’ without thinking long and hard about the full outcome is uncommon for him, and yet he comes to this solution in almost no time at all. Also, the wording of the sentence is very specific. He uses the word 'had' instead of 'can', which proves the idea is already set in his mind. As a result, this proves he already trusts his mother and is willing to adjust to go to her. Besides Christopher, his mother also expresses a likewise characteristic of adaptation to renew
It has become paramount that composers utilise various techniques in order to influence an individual’s perception of the world. As seen through the eyes of an Aspergers sufferer, Christopher Boone, Mark Haddon’s inventive novel entitle ‘The Curious incident of the Dog in the Night Time’, skilfully portrays how the decisions of significant characters and their relationships shape the overall message about the difficulties of living with a limiting social condition. This is challenged from the unique perspective of Christopher and explicitly seen through the relationship between the protagonist and both his parents. Haddon employs a myriad of techniques through the concepts of the conflicting nature of love, the desperation for a world of order and stability, and the value of truth. Along with the reoccurring allusions to mathematics and science in order to display the complexity of human interaction, as he skilfully depicts how both relationships attempt to deal with the issue in their day to day lives.
Talge, N. M., Neal, C., & Glover, V. (2007). Antenatal maternal stress and long-term effects on child neurodevelopment: how and why?. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 48(3/4), 245-261.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time chronicles of Christopher Boone of Swindon, England. The book is written by Mark Haddon, who formerly worked with autistic individuals, describes the world through the eyes of Christopher, who is self-proclaimed “special needs”. The novel never explicitly says what Christopher’s diagnosis is, but from the text it is apparent that he would fall on the higher functioning end of the Autism Spectrum.
Mark Haddon’s novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, is an autobiographical murder mystery narrated from the perspective of an autistic teenager, Christopher Boone. Throughout the text, Haddon cleverly positions the audience to experience life through the perspective of one who cannot hope to grasp the subtle nuances of human interactions and societal norms. Christopher’s autism spectrum disorder (ASD) shapes not only what we the audience are able to experience, but also subverts the structural features of the text itself, thereby openly flouting the rules of conventional storytelling. In doing so, Haddon is able to explore everyday settings and events through the perspective of a highly unconventional narrator, thus allowing
In Mark Haddon's contemporary novel, "The curious incident of the dog in the Night-Time", the protagonist, Christopher Boone, does seem completely unsuited to narrating a novel, as he takes on his authorial voice, thus demonstrating symptoms of his disability, 'Asperger's Syndrome.' This is a syndrome that enables him to see the world only through his limited perspective, which is closed, frightened and disorientated - which results in his fear of, and inability to understand the perplexing world of people's emotions. His description of events can be somewhat unreliable as he is unable to see the real truths that lie before him. As he narrates, readers are confronted with his peculiarities - whether it is not liking to be touched, his fear of germs, strangers and crowds to his inability to eat foods with particular colors. However, through Christopher's authorial voice, his description of events in his life, and in particular, his description of his oddities those seem completely 'normal' to him, make him an interesting and fascinating narrator. As he can be proven to be an unreliable narrator as he is incapable of lying (and understanding lies) and this limits his ability to perceive the full reality of the world, thus providing him with a strange combination of credibility and unbelievability. Again, this is what makes him a wonderful narrator - at times readers can mistrust his interpretation of such events, or they can believe him.