Humour In The Curious Incident

The Curious Incident. The Mark Haddon’s the curious incident of the dog in the night-time is written in first person through the eyes of a fifteen-year-old, Christopher, a high functioning, literal individual whom readers have been known to portray as being an individual scaled on the autistic spectrum. If you appreciate the author’s interpretation of Christopher, as nothing more than a fictional teenage character, it is appropriate to find humour in this novel.

Source cite: (Singh, Anita. 2015).

Mark Haddon himself has highlighted his reservations about this novel being used as a source to understand autism. The main character is “mathematically gifted but unable to interpret human emotions or countenance being touched” (Singh A 2015).

“This story will draw you in, make you laugh and cause you to see the world through different eyes.” (Miller 2017). This notion draws the reader in and holds interest. Some of the behaviour that Christopher portrays is literal, which may partially reflect traits of autism, but it is important to know that an individual’s humour evolves from an individual’s personality, having autism does not necessarily restrict the ability to understand humour, “sense of humour has nothing to do with autism itself” (Moran. 2015). Situations that appear amusing to the reader are not encouraging direct laughter at Christopher but rather the situations and depiction of certain incidents that happen in the novel. The situation of the policeman losing Christopher on the train is one such example. The description used when Christopher is silently looking down at the policeman while curled up on the baggage shelf outside the toilet “I could see his walkie-talkie and his truncheon on his belt and I could smell his aftershave, but he didn’t see me” (Haddon. 163.), is amusing due to the policeman’s confusion and complete panic. The detail Haddon uses to describe the proximity of the two character’s initiates humour for the reader due to the situation, rather than the direct amusement of Christopher’s behaviour. Haddon has not channelled humour directly at Christopher’s behaviour, but around decisions made,

The thought process and unpredictable actions of Christopher, creates amusing circumstances throughout the book, rather than the belief that the story portrays typical behaviour shown on the autistic spectrum. It is a myth that individuals diagnosed to be on the autistic spectrum do not understand humour. Triggers of humour for these individuals may be extreme or recognised as ‘extrovert’ by persons who do not take the time to understand the wide spectrum of behaviour traits that autism can have, but such people on the autistic spectrum do possess the ability to react to amusing situations in their own way. I feel that the portrayal of Christopher as a fictional character is one of an extreme introvert, with his own view of the world around him, which causes confusion to the characters he interacts with, which in turn instigates amusement to the reader. This wonderful novel creates an amazing ability for the reader to see the world from a new prospective which creates empathy for people around us, an emotion which is sometimes lacking. Haddon creates humour in what could be dire situations that occur on a daily occurrence in society. It is appropriate to recognise the humour that Haddon has