The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Themes
Versions of Reality
Christopher Boone sees the world much differently from the rest of us, that's for sure. He notices much more of what's going on around him – he's quite the observer, after all – but he can't qu...
Isolation
In The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Christopher is isolated, and so totally psyched about it. He doesn't like being around people, really doesn't enjoy talking, and absolutely hat...
Order and Logic
Christopher likes for things to be in a very particular order. He doesn't mind the lady who lives next door moving in after his mom dies, just as long as she keeps the jars in the kitchen ordered a...
Fear
The world is a dangerous place – at least according to Christopher Boone, who sees danger in anything and everything that's unfamiliar to him. Most of the time he's okay since he makes sure to st...
Language and Communication
Think of the most frustrating conversation you've ever had. Maybe it was with a customer service representative, or the voice on the loudspeaker in the drive-thru. The times when it just seemed lik...
Lies and Deceit
You might not notice how often Christopher mentions lying in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – until he's hit with one very big lie that turns his world upside-down. He can't he...
Love
It's not so easy to talk about love in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, mostly because its narrator really doesn't understand the concept the way most people do. He has defined a...
Freedom and Confinement
We're dealing with a lot of different factors of freedom and confinement in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: physical, mental, emotional, and even spiritual. At times, these facto...
Identity
We're not quite sure how to describe Christopher's self-identification in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Self-centered? Self-involved? Self-obsessed? None of these seem quite ri...
Truth
Truth can mean a lot of different things. There's "the truth," as in the opposite of a lie, and then there's "Truth" (yes, with a capital T), like the ultimate truth in the universe. In The Curious...