Author: Mark Haddon
Title: The curious incident of the dog in the night-time
Publisher & number of pages: Vintage, 271 pages
1. TEXT
If a friend asked me what this book dealt with, I’d tell him the book was about an autistic boy of fifteen years old: Christopher John Francis Boone. He lives in Swindon with his father and has been told that his mother died of a heart-attack. He likes math, physics and puzzles very much. He loves his rat Toby and the colour red, but hates the colours yellow and brown. He also hates to be touched, and cannot understand any metaphors or jokes or other human beings (that’s why he likes dogs more). When one day, he passes the house of their neighbour, Mrs Shears, he finds her dog, the poodle named Wellington, in the garden. It’s dead. It’s lying on the lawn with a garden fork sticking out of it. Because Christopher thinks the dog was killed, he starts to play detective and tries to solve the murder by asking everyone in his neighbourhood if they might have seen something. Christopher can’t tell or write anything that isn’t true, but he wanted to write a book, so he decided to write about something that happened to himself: the murder on Wellington. But during his search, he discovers a few things about his father…
2. CHARACTERS
- The main characters are, Christopher, of course, and his father. Christopher is confronted with the problem of the murder on Wellington, his neighbour’s dog. After a long searching, Christopher has discovered the solution, which was actually closer then he’d ever would think: His father had killed the dog. Then there’s another problem raising: Christopher found out that his mother is still alive and that his father has been hiding her letters from him. Because of that, and killing Wellington, Christopher gets scared. He decides to go to London to live with his mother. Christopher succeeds getting to London, so this problem also had been solved.
His fathers problem is, more at the end, that Christopher doesn’t like him anymore and is much more likely to go and live with his mother. Christopher’s father knows that he has made some mistakes, but he really, really loves him, and doesn’t wants to lose him, what’s now apparently going to happen. It’s not told if the band between Christopher and his father is back like before, but at the end Christopher’s father tried to win a little faith by buying him a dog. Christopher named him Sandy.
- My favourite character is Christopher. I found it very interesting to read his mind, it’s so much different with an autistic boy. Before, I knew it was hard to autistic people to fit in the world and to stay ‘normal’ when the situation is changing, but because of this book, I understand autism much better. You get a very close view to an autistic mind.
3. TIME / SETTING
- The time that is covered in the story is not really clearly said, but it takes place in the autumn of 1998.
- Mostly the story is set in Swindon, at Christopher’s house and school, and at the end also in London, where his mother lives. Swindon is a calm village. The house has got a garden, where Christopher likes to be, and sometimes also likes to hide himself. Mrs Shears, one of the characters in the book lives slant compared with Christopher’s house. Next to Christopher’s house live people who’re taking drugs, so Christopher’s father forbade him to have contact with them. London and the way to London with the train, is much different. Christopher didn’t like it because there was so many noise and people.
4. A QUOTE
…, and I groaned to cover up the noise because I had taken my hands off my ears, but not so loud that other people would hear me groaning and come and talk to me. And then I tried to think about what I had to do, but I couldn’t think because there were too many other things in my head, so I did a maths problem to make my head clearer. Page Number: 181
This passage shows very well the atmosphere like it mostly is in the book: Every time Christopher gets angry or doesn’t feel well because of the situation, like when there are too many people around, he has the inclination to groan and to make a maths problem to forget about everything around. So this situation frequently happens. The story is about an autistic boy, and shows in different ways how his world and life is like. The passage is one example. For Christopher maths and physics are very important, it means really a lot to him. Therefore he always thinks about it when he can’t take the situation anymore.
5. APPRECIATION
I liked the book very much. Firstly I planned to read the book ‘About a Boy’, but when I started to read, the book was so boring that I decided to change and that’s when I have chosen this book. From the beginning to the end, there were only one or two moments when i was bored . That was when Christopher explained in a very long way why he likes the book ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’. The book is about an autistic boy and describes his world and his view on the outside world. This theme interests me very much, because nobody can really know how those people think, because they won’t tell themselves. The best thing about this book was definitely that the author wrote the book from the view of an autistic boy, and the way he did that, touched me enormously. The writing style is excellent! It almost seems as if he is autistic himself! What I also thought was funny and well found was that the book is said actually to be written by Christopher himself: The boy wanted to write a book, but can’t tell false things, so he wrote a book about what happened to himself. And believe it or not: the book has even been a little instructive in the field of maths. I read the book because I liked it and not specifically because I had too. So my conclusion is that everybody who wants to learn something about autism in an amusing way, should read the book.
Title: The curious incident of the dog in the night-time
Publisher & number of pages: Vintage, 271 pages
1. TEXT
If a friend asked me what this book dealt with, I’d tell him the book was about an autistic boy of fifteen years old: Christopher John Francis Boone. He lives in Swindon with his father and has been told that his mother died of a heart-attack. He likes math, physics and puzzles very much. He loves his rat Toby and the colour red, but hates the colours yellow and brown. He also hates to be touched, and cannot understand any metaphors or jokes or other human beings (that’s why he likes dogs more). When one day, he passes the house of their neighbour, Mrs Shears, he finds her dog, the poodle named Wellington, in the garden. It’s dead. It’s lying on the lawn with a garden fork sticking out of it. Because Christopher thinks the dog was killed, he starts to play detective and tries to solve the murder by asking everyone in his neighbourhood if they might have seen something. Christopher can’t tell or write anything that isn’t true, but he wanted to write a book, so he decided to write about something that happened to himself: the murder on Wellington. But during his search, he discovers a few things about his father…
2. CHARACTERS
- The main characters are, Christopher, of course, and his father. Christopher is confronted with the problem of the murder on Wellington, his neighbour’s dog. After a long searching, Christopher has discovered the solution, which was actually closer then he’d ever would think: His father had killed the dog. Then there’s another problem raising: Christopher found out that his mother is still alive and that his father has been hiding her letters from him. Because of that, and killing Wellington, Christopher gets scared. He decides to go to London to live with his mother. Christopher succeeds getting to London, so this problem also had been solved.
- My favourite character is Christopher. I found it very interesting to read his mind, it’s so much different with an autistic boy. Before, I knew it was hard to autistic people to fit in the world and to stay ‘normal’ when the situation is changing, but because of this book, I understand autism much better. You get a very close view to an autistic mind.
3. TIME / SETTING
- The time that is covered in the story is not really clearly said, but it takes place in the autumn of 1998.
- Mostly the story is set in Swindon, at Christopher’s house and school, and at the end also in London, where his mother lives. Swindon is a calm village. The house has got a garden, where Christopher likes to be, and sometimes also likes to hide himself. Mrs Shears, one of the characters in the book lives slant compared with Christopher’s house. Next to Christopher’s house live people who’re taking drugs, so Christopher’s father forbade him to have contact with them. London and the way to London with the train, is much different. Christopher didn’t like it because there was so many noise and people.
4. A QUOTE
…, and I groaned to cover up the noise because I had taken my hands off my ears, but not so loud that other people would hear me groaning and come and talk to me. And then I tried to think about what I had to do, but I couldn’t think because there were too many other things in my head, so I did a maths problem to make my head clearer. Page Number: 181
This passage shows very well the atmosphere like it mostly is in the book: Every time Christopher gets angry or doesn’t feel well because of the situation, like when there are too many people around, he has the inclination to groan and to make a maths problem to forget about everything around. So this situation frequently happens. The story is about an autistic boy, and shows in different ways how his world and life is like. The passage is one example. For Christopher maths and physics are very important, it means really a lot to him. Therefore he always thinks about it when he can’t take the situation anymore.
5. APPRECIATION
I liked the book very much. Firstly I planned to read the book ‘About a Boy’, but when I started to read, the book was so boring that I decided to change and that’s when I have chosen this book. From the beginning to the end, there were only one or two moments when i was bored . That was when Christopher explained in a very long way why he likes the book ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’. The book is about an autistic boy and describes his world and his view on the outside world. This theme interests me very much, because nobody can really know how those people think, because they won’t tell themselves. The best thing about this book was definitely that the author wrote the book from the view of an autistic boy, and the way he did that, touched me enormously. The writing style is excellent! It almost seems as if he is autistic himself! What I also thought was funny and well found was that the book is said actually to be written by Christopher himself: The boy wanted to write a book, but can’t tell false things, so he wrote a book about what happened to himself. And believe it or not: the book has even been a little instructive in the field of maths. I read the book because I liked it and not specifically because I had too. So my conclusion is that everybody who wants to learn something about autism in an amusing way, should read the book.
REACTIES
:name
:name
:comment
1 seconde geleden