The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time as a Postmodern Novel The promising and celebrated British Writer, Mark Haddon’s mystery narrative, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the NightTime explores the story of a 15 year old boy who manages to scrutinize the murder of his neighbour’s dog. What is special and particular about the book is that it features the first-person standpoint of the hero who has a social disability. The hero, Christopher appears as an autistic individual who lacks central coherence and executive function that impairs the individual’s ability to develop a structured narrative.
Autism is defined as “markedly abnormal or impaired development in social interaction and communication and a markedly restricted repertoire of activity and interests” (American Psychiatric Association 70). The novel definitely establishes the influence of postmodernism through narrative strategies and cultural representations. The present paper attempts to explore the diverse ways in which the narrative of autism through a perfect melding of textual components that contributes to a novel form of metaphysical postmodern narrative style in literature. Postmodernism is marked by the distortion and fragmentation that represents disorder.
The postmodern fiction attempts to define order through chaos. In Lyotard’s opinion, the postmodern art searches for new presentations, in order to present the sense of unacceptable (46). Moreover, the postmodern studies play a definite role in shaping the development of disability studies. Christopher displays difficulties in expression, communication and social interaction. In Christopher’s case, autism materializes as a transient infirmity and a racial metaphor. The novel provides the reader an exceptional autistic lens so as to distinguish and decipher the alienated world.
The novel definitely explores the tussles encountered by the humans while attempting to tackle the quotidian trials of fashioning a life style, maintaining a family together, and learning life’s simple lessons of affection, tolerance, and magnanimity. Despite his disabilities, Christopher manages to live a normal life and desires to experience the challenges of life. Autism, here, serves as an allegorical and selfreferential scheme to express the fear, anxiety and towards the growing influence of computer technology and consumerism in postmodernity.
The chapter seven of the novel reserves an element of surprise as Christopher declares that he is the author of this particular novel. He includes the murder mystery for arresting the attention of the readers and the book is actually his work. The writing of the novel within the novel makes the book metafictional which is again one of the prominent elements of postmodernism. The novelist tries not only to bring in the difficulties of autism, but also charts out many positive aspects associated with such individuals. Christopher, despite his difficulties, is goal oriented and determined.
His mathematical virtuosity and his fortitude in finding the dog Wellington’s murderer define his endurance and resilience. The author attempts to detach the autistic raconteur from personal and emotional relationships that enable him to genuinely express his inner emotions and feelings. Haddon takes every care to polish the writing style that befits the emotional state of the narrator, Christopher. The following lines indicate the technique of narration that copies the speculations of Christopher: Then the police arrived. I like the police. They have uniforms and numbers and you know what they are meant to be doing.
There was a policewoman and a policeman. The policewoman had a little hole in her tights on her left ankle and a red scratch in the middle of the hole. The policeman had a big orange leaf stuck to the bottom of his shoe which was poking out from one side. (6) Christopher finds unreal things like metaphors really confusing and in his opinion the imaginary things make him “shaky and scared” (19). Postmodern fiction usually follows a non-linear plot and most of the times discard the conventional writing style that includes metaphorical language.
Here, the hero’s aversion to metaphors can be taken in this sense. Every literal phrase lands him at jeopardy and he prefers proper and concrete word choice that gives him sense and exact meaning. Christopher cannot withstand too much details and information which certainly results in a blackout of his mind. He equates this to the shutdown of a computer: It is like when a computer is doing too many things at the same time and the central processor unit is blocked up and there isn’t any space left to think about other things.
And when I am in a new place and there are lots of people there it is even harder because people … can talk to you and do things that you don’t expect. (143) Postmodernism favours virtual reality and supports the scientific reason. The power of mathematics and reasoning is evident in the text. Christopher displays astonishing abilities in mathematics and memory skills. He shows significant intelligence beyond his age and incredible memory in processing information. Christopher can clearly say all the countries of the world with their capital cities and also knows prime numbers up to 7,057.
But his vulnerability makes him uncommunicative, rigid, and logical. He is a convoluted fellow who takes the literal meaning of things and he frustrates people most of the times with his bizarre behaviour. Haddon carefully designs him to be an attractive narrator. The keenness persuades Christopher to discover the mystery behind the dog’s death. He is a keen observer of things just like his hero, Sherlock Holmes. There is a tendency to give more significance to trivial things in postmodern fiction. The petty things thus receive diverse hues.
His detailed analysis of the dead Wellington clearly points out this. Suellen Alfred and Linda Null explain: After Wellington is killed with a garden fork, Christopher is one of the first people on the scene of the crime. He pulls the fork out, lifts Wellington into his arms, gives him a hug, and then notices blood “leaking” from the fork holes. He notes that Wellington has “curly black fur, but when you got close you could see that the skin under- neath the fur was a very pale yel- low, like chicken” (2).
Like his hero, Sherlock Holmes, Christopher “see[s] everything” (140), so he has a large supply of details from which to choose as he searches for Wellington’s murderer (106). The noble and epic heroes are absent in a postmodern fiction. Christopher is a simple person who manages to lead a normal life. Christopher mentions that he finds it difficult to understand humour. He also astonishes at peoples funny remarks. He is purely visually oriented and this permits him to think in terms of visual images. He loves order in everything and therefore likes people like policemen who bring in order.
He cannot stand periphery clouding or uncertainty, and consequently he dislikes having diverse foods tapping each other on the same plate. He finds it disturbing to be touched by a stranger and in such cases he groans or howls and shows his discomfort. There are a wide stretch of themes that appear in the novel. Another important aspect that comes in postmodernism is the quest of the individual for independence. Christopher’s life also can be taken as a struggle to become independent. He wants to reserve a definite space for him. His disability stands as a hindrance in many ways.
He disobeys his father which gives him some sense of liberation and the desire for individuality offers him, selfconfidence. His final trip to London re-establishes his great leap towards freedom and distinctiveness. Christopher’s unhealthy condition makes him perceive world in a different way. The novel provides a more subjective analysis of the hero and the murder mystery actually supplements this. As the novel progresses, the plot shifts from the murder mystery to the delineation of Christopher’s character. Loss is yet another theme that discusses the realities of the postmodern period.
Haddon discusses the theme of loss in the novel quite extensively right from the beginning. The novel opens with the death of the dog, Wellington and here the loss is evident. This incident persuades Christopher to remember the death of his mother and he also adjusts with and understands the fact that his mother is gone forever. The denouement also projects the loss of Toby, Christopher’s pet rat. But Christopher tries to take an optimistic approach when he acknowledges the fact that Toby survived a rather long life for a rat, and he celebrates the arrival of the puppy, Sandy.
The other characters in the novel find it hard to adjust with Christopher as the communication with him is really troublesome. He finds metaphors like “He was the apple of her eye” (15) dubious. He also misunderstands body language, facial gestures and sometimes the tone of a person’s voice. The unstable collective conditioning affects Christopher’s social skills that make him survive in a crucial and puzzling ambience. But Christopher’s skill of mathematics makes him a stronger individual in many ways.
