The family conflict founded on disability creates the conflict of the theatre adaptation of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time. The strain of a child with cognitive disabilities on the parental relationship places Christopher in a world where he wants to solve mysteries because the given circumstances of the play immerse him in lies. The unraveling of the plot complicates the sense of morality a reader would feel toward family separation of this kind, in that Christopher transgresses the helpless, abandoned child trope and goes after his mother on rationalized grounds. In this way, Christopher’s story demonstrates a person with cognitive disabilities can “overcome” their disability, for the story comments on Christopher’s success with disability.
At the point of peripeteia, Ed admits lying to, and hiding the truth from, Christopher, an action previously explained as incomprehensible to Christopher (Stephens 4; 44). This deceit stems from Judy’s infidelity, her subsequent eloping, and Mrs. Shear’s rejection of Ed. The revealed truths vilify Judy for being unable to help provide for the disabled family but also compel Christopher to seek her out in fear for his life, because “Father had murdered Wellington. That meant he could murder me” (48). It is unclear whether this juxtaposition of Christopher’s life and the life of the dog seeks to animalize Christopher, but it complicates the audience’s emotional reaction to the circumstances of the play as the reader follows Christopher’s action and thought process.
Christopher goes off on his own to find his mother in London. We see his interactions with strangers challenge him, but his reasoning to leave his father because his father is capable of murder supersedes his discomfort in order to help him achieve his goal. While this is not quite a “supercrip” representation, it resembles the diminishing of one’s disability trope throughout the narrative that is inherent to narrative prosthesis. Christopher becomes more comfortable with these interactions.
However, this is not Christopher’s only achievement of the play. He additionally passes the A level maths exam and in the final line of the play explains, “…that is how I got an A*” (101). This line could have a few meanings; is it the entire narrative, or is it the mathematical proof he has just presented, that leads him to succeed? The latter postulate is something that he couldn’t have performed had he not been given the life experience to manage his stress during the exam: an ability he learned throughout the course of the play’s action. The former encompasses all that leads Christopher to succeed, and living with disability through his circumstances allows him to reach his goals. The success may not stem from his own disability but from navigating a disabled family structure, by which a person with a disability confronts interfamilial struggles to accommodate that disability and must consequently accommodate the ideology of ability.
Works Cited:
Stephens, Simon. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. London: Bloomsbury, 2012. Print.
Snyder, Sharon and David Mitchell. “Narrative Prosthesis.” The Disability Studies Reader. Routledge. Print.
