Hitting The Milky Way Analysis

This passage takes place right after Chris learns of his mother’s affair. Chris, who simply wanted to find Wellington’s killer, is found to be in a situation that proves to be much more afflictive. Christopher suffers from Asperger 's syndrome, and has trouble with social interaction and sees his environment reasonably and observantly. Maths is a subject that is very straightforward and logical, and requires no emotion. It follows sets of rules, which clearly suits Christopher’s logical view of life. “I said I liked things to be in a nice order. And one way of things being in a nice order was to be logical”(Haddon, 24). There is a clear contrast to the “straightforward” and logical math than his fuzzy life situation, which shows the conflict between uncertainty and

This passage also represents the way Chris responds to life situations that perplex him. Whenever Chris is in a dire situation, he uses subjects such as math, physics, and astronomy to seek a sense of security and safety. On his journey to London, Chris would solve various math problems when too much information was encountered. Conway’s Soldiers, solving quadratic equations, and counting to fifty and doing the cubes were all efforts to maintain a clear mind. As a matter of fact, after the policeman arrested Chris for hitting him, he diverted to discuss the Milky Way Galaxy. “ Some people think the Milky Way is a long line of stars, but it isn’t. Our galaxy is a huge disk of stars million of light-years across, and the solar system is somewhere near the outside edge of the disk” (Haddon, 9). Christopher wants his life to be filled with absolutes but finds trouble managing and maintaining a purely logical life. The subjects he enjoys have an a order and stability that Christopher doesn’t have in his own