Curious Incident Essay

Literary Essay

        Narrators are not authors. The author writes the story, and the narrator tells the story. The reader only knows what the narrator knows. In Haddons’ The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time, the main character, Christopher Boone, has autism. Christopher’s perceptions of the world are different than those of non-autistic children. Those perceptions help us understand how he copes with his world. Choosing Christopher as the narrator was an excellent decision because the reader can see how he demonstrates his difficulties understanding his feelings, prioritizing their importance, and expressing them to others.

        Christopher spends more time validating his feelings because of his difficulty in understanding them. He uses arbitrary cues to determine how he feels. Since Christopher has trouble determining how he feels, he lets aspects of his day decide what the immediate future holds for him when he says, “ In the bus on the way to school next morning we passed 4 red cars in a row, which means that it was a Good Day, so I decided not to be sad about Wellington” (27). Since Christopher is indecisive about how he feels, he reveals to the reader that he allows the colour of cars to control the way his day is going to play out. This information improves the readers’ understanding of Christopher’s mood. Christopher despises the colours yellow and brown. To strengthen his hatred towards these colours, Christopher points out the negatives to justify his dislike of the colours yellow and brown: “These are some of the reasons why I hate yellow and brown: YELLOW 1. Custard 2. Bananas (bananas also turn brown) 3. Double Yellow Lines 4. Yellow Fever 5. Yellow Flowers 6. Sweet Corn. BROWN 1. Dirt 2. Gravy 3. Poo 4. Wood 5. Melissa Brown.” (84) People in the novel think Christopher hating the colours yellow and brown is odd. They do not understand that this is an arbitrary cue to determine how he feels. Immediately after reading this quote, the reader is able to see how Christopher proves his point by relating plenty of the revolting aspects relating to the colours yellow and brown. The above’s quotations demonstrates that using Christopher as the narrator allows the readers to see the thought process he uses to understand his feelings, thus improving the novel.

        Christopher has an inability to categorize his feelings. To compensate, he obsesses over uncovering the mystery of the dog’s death. Christopher shows this obsession when he narrates, “ And Father said, You are to stop this ridiculous bloody detective game right now.” (50) Christopher, as the narrator, shows how it is easier for him to dwell on one big issue at a time instead of multiple small issues. Similarly, Christopher is more disturbed by the outcome of the case involving Wellington’s death, rather than finding out that his mother had been alive all this time. Christopher displays this obsession when narrating, “ I had to get out of the house. Father had murdered Wellington. That meant he could murder me, because I couldn’t trust him, even though he had said “Trust me,” because he hd told a lie about a big thing.” (122) Christopher avoids thinking about his mother because he is incapable of comprehending his feelings about her being alive. For Christopher, it was easier to focus on the outcome of the case he had been working to solve all of this time, rather than processing the fact that his mom was still alive. As the narrator, Christopher is distinctly unable to prioritize his feelings. A traditional narrator would not be able to demonstrate this trait.