Analysis Of Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night

“Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts.” Mark Haddon’s “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time” explores the ideas of a boy named Christopher, who writes a book as a detective in England discovering the murder of a dog named Wellington. Christopher liked Wellington, but on a particular morning, he found him dead; this caused him to write a book on who killed him. Father and Mother, Christopher’s parents, help the reader’s understand how he is different. Christopher may have Autism and Hyperthymesia, so he uses math equations, puzzles, and smiley faces to escape reality. His mind is constantly racing,

Hyperthymesia is when you can remember what you smell, taste, feel, touch, hear, or see without thinking about it. Autism is a difficulty in communicating and forming relationships with other people in using language and abstract concepts. Christopher is very good at memorizing things he sees when he goes places; maybe memorizing these kind of things is a talent but he hates to go to new places. New places causes him to remember even more words and directions. When he goes to new places with too much going on for him, he gets extremely frustrated and starts to scream or groan. He also uses math equations and puzzles that he sees in his head to calm him down. Haddon sometimes even shows the reader’s how Christopher feels with smiley faces. Although math equations are his favorite, he loves to count as a way to calm down as well. “I want to hit someone in school and I counted 50 breaths and did cubes of the cardinal numbers as I counted, like this…. 1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, 343, 512, 729, 1000, 1331, 1728, 2197, 2744, 3375, 4096, 4913.. etc.” Christopher’s math equation and counting method is most used, so it works better for him. You had to have a special of touching or greeting Christopher. “He held up his right hand and spread his fingers out in a fan. I held up my left hand and spread my fingers out in a fan and we made our fingers and

In Mark Haddon’s book, the audience can see this particular language in the letters Christopher’s mom had written him. Christopher’s mother uses words like “centre, colour, and mum” These words indicate that the story takes place in a European country, which is England. Although these words are spelled differently, they do mean the same thing; centre means center, colour means color, and mum means mom. The language is what establishes the setting. Haddon lets the reader use their critical thinking to infer, instead of coming out and saying where the story takes place. “There are huge bins for three differant colours of bottles and cardboard and engine oil and garden waste and household waste and larger items (that’s where we put the old fridge and cooker).” In addition of her region language, she also uses run-ons show the connection between Christopher and herself; she is the mother. Christopher most likely gets his diction from his mother, acknowledging his father’s diction. It also shows that there are different names for the same things in England to the United States; cooker means stove. In conclusion, this helps the reader understand more about Christopher’s mother and how her diction influenced his use of