Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time

In the novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon presents the idea that there are different levels of lying and the lies affect relationships. In the story, the reader learns that Christopher does not believe in lying and in turn he refuses to lie. Even though, Christopher says that he does not believe in lying, he tells white lies many times in the novel. However, Christopher’s father does not tell white lies, he tells more severe lies that have a strong effect on Christopher. Both Christopher’s lies and his father’s lies have a strong effect on their relationship and this causes a drift.
In the novel, Haddon brings up the issue of lying and how different people tell different lies. Christopher Boone does not believe …show more content…
“He said, ‘Where have you been?’ And I say, ‘I have been out.’” (48). When Christopher comes home from investigating the death of the neighbor’s dog, his father asks him where he has been. Christopher does not want his father to know about his investigation, so he does not disclose exactly where he has been. He says he was “out”, which is the truth, however he does not tell the whole truth about where exactly he had been. This reveals how Christopher rationalizes what lying is, and it sets the standard of what is a lie and what is the truth in the book. Christopher believes this type of lying is justifiable, because everyone omits the truth. He believes that everyone does not tell the whole truth and he considers this as not lying. This conflicts with what a lie is. For instance, in Stephanie Ericsson’s “The …show more content…
When Christopher starts lying about his investigation, he starts lying and sneak around. This causes a drift in his relationship with his father. In the beginning of the book, Christopher wanted to talk to his father about the dog. Take for instance, when Christopher says “I like Wellington and I went to say hello to him, but I didn’t know that someone had killed him…I am going to find out who killed Wellington” (20). In the quote, Christopher wants to talk about Wellington, since he likes Wellington. But his father tells Christopher not to talk about or investigate the death of Wellington. Christopher continues on with the investigation and he does not tell his father about it. Seeing as the investigation is the most important event that is happening in Christopher’s life and he does not want his father to know about it, he does not talk to his father about it like he did before. This might have caused a drift in their relationship considering they are not talking as much as they used to. Correspondingly, Christopher sneaking around and continuing with the investigation might have also caused a drift in their relationship. For example, when Christopher’s father discovers that Christopher had continued his investigation. Christopher’s father found Christopher’s book about the investigation. Christopher’s father become angry: “Father… grabbed hold of my arm really hard. Father had never