Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close Theme

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Love is significant for the characters in Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close. Each character went through their own hardships and struggles because of the way love treats them. Jonathan Safran Foer conveys the characters through their experiences of love that destroys them. Their devastated love brings them ultimate pain and grief in which they try to confront. Their confrontations lead them to have conflicted feelings and causes them to have huge changes, resulting in them to heal. Moreover, the characters experiencing grief, pain, and trauma because of love, ultimately end up okay in Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close. In the past, Thomas Schell Sr. and Anna have loved each other very much. The bombing of Dresden caused him to lose her and their unborn baby. From the tragic event, he suffers unimaginable pain and trauma, causing him to lose his words. He writes in his daybook, and the daybook is empty like him. The blank pages are filled with his unspoken words. Some of the pages have a few words, “I don’t speak. I’m sorry”(262). However, pages like 281 have words piled up on top of another. …show more content…

Love, in a strange and cruel way, makes them go through trials of hardship only for them to end up, ironically, healed from it. Oskar’s grandmother is right when she said “It’s always necessary”(314). Their experiences of pained love made them realize the true hidden meaning and agenda of love. Love is not easy, it’s quite the opposite. That’s the idea I got when I finished reading the chapter about the grandmother’s feelings. I had a revelation that maybe Foer wanted his readers to know that there’s a specific reason why he made the characters experience the pain and healing of love. Maybe that’s the whole point of Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close. Who knows? Just like what Louise Hay says, “Love is the answer to any sort of

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