The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time By Mark Haddon

Christopher’s character expands throughout the novel by becoming an open-minded thinker and a risk-taker. In the novel, “The curious incident of the dog in the night-time” by Mark Haddon, Christopher John Francis Boone is portrayed as a high-functioning autistic, 15-year-old boy. His character relates closely to animals however, he is still learning how to navigate through the world. He is very fond of maths and is a highly intelligent being. The novel is based around Christopher solving the mystery of who killed his neighbor’s dog. As the reader follows Christopher through the winding road of running away and having to face uncertainty, he is met with many eye-opening moments.

Christopher grows as a thinker as his mind opens to new possibilities.

Being a Risk-Taker means approaching unfamiliar situations with courage, and having the independence to explore new ideas. Christopher is placed into an unfamiliar environment during his trip to London as he is forced to converse with strangers; “And I didn’t want to talk to either of them because… I had already talked to lots of strangers, which is dangerous… But I didn’t know how to get to 451c Chapter Road… So I went up to the man in the little shop and I said, ‘Where is 451c Chapter Road?’” (Haddon, 186). When he details that talking to strangers is dangerous he is referring to the fact that when something is dangerous it is likely to cause harm or consequences for the parties involved in the act. Christopher, being the singular party involved was faced with the decision to have these conversations or not to have them. He makes it clear at the beginning of the novel that it takes him a long time to trust people and adjust to them; “when there is a new member of staff at school I do not talk to them for weeks and weeks. I just watch them until I know that they are safe” (Haddon, 35). Safe, the antonym of danger means to be protected from and not put in harm's way. As Christopher waits to see if a stranger is safe, he is protecting himself from the danger of talking to said person. Overall, Christopher develops as a character in the Risk-Taker department when he starts by rarely talking to strangers, and by the end of the novel he is talking to them and gathering the information he