How old is oskar in extremely loud and incredibly close

This human tragedy was aired on media all over the world, and later became the spotlight of the art community attention. Foer further elaborates on this, when he mentions how the boy has to use a dictionary to learn more about different ways to die on Google.

The overwhelming feeling of personal loss in this situation has roots deep in the public sector — his father was a victim of a terrorist act, which had no specific targets, and thus Oskar suffered the loss twice — as his father died unexpectedly, and he had no possibility to know how it happened, as well as he could not see him for the last time during the funeral — and he had no clue why.

This is essentially how the young person, who does not yet possess enough expertise about the international politics, and enough levels of influence, is looking for the way out of the depression: instead of blaming the American politicians for mingling abroad, and the Islamist attackers for choosing this extreme punishment for the United States, Oskar is looking for his personal solution to fill in the hole in his soul Foer, He became the victim of the conditions, his father — a casualty of the bigger chess game.

Complimented by the possibility to explore the tragedies in Hiroshima and Dresden, and thus the consequences of the U. The story of Oskar allowed the author to explore the emotional, personal side of the trauma, received in a large public tragedy.

Oskar, the main narrator, had become the centerpiece of the novel with a very sensitive content, which needed appropriate medium to be clearly articulated to the reader. Foer created the nine-year old, who possessed outstanding intelligence, and was able to communicate to the reader in the coherent vocabulary.

His precocious and inquisitive nature allowed the author to present a very entertaining tone of the story, which compensated for the gruesome nature of the book Saal, But to understand the power of Oskar as the main narrator, one needs to look in the formative factors, which influenced his image in the book, and the functions that he covered in it.

The relationship between Oskar and his father is absolutely one of the determinative moments for the behavior of the boy. The father is ranked 1 in the list of his favorite things Foer, 73 , and Oskar greatly cherished the moments they spent together.

Although later in the narrative Oskar makes an assumption that the last phone call that Thomas made ended at the exact moment the tower collapsed ibid. At first, Oskar was tightly embedded in the family relationships, but as the trauma comes in, the boy drifts apart in some kind of anger that they survived. One of the most significant moments is when Oskar tells his mother that if he had an ability to choose, who would die, he would choose her Foer, The boy was driven by the process of anxiety and inability to control death, which resulted into him trying to demonstrate, what would happen if he could.

Generally said, it was one of his attempts to create something, but this time, instead of a curious gadget, it was a way to hurt his mother, who was trying somehow to move on from this tragedy together with her son. But with the flow of time and realization that his relatives were trying to make the transition in the new life, without one of the parents, less stressful, he starts feeling respect and love for them again.

Having reconciliated with his family, Oskar opens up a link between three tragic events of the human history recited in the Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close — the stories of Dresden, Hiroshima and New York. Repeatedly characterized by his mother and grandmother, as the reminder about Thomas Schell Jr.

Therefore, the boy essentially represents three generations and acts as the guide in the novel, establishing the link between the fragmented narratives of verbal and visual information.

This makes his main function, foreseen by Foer, and delivered by the precocious, detailed-oriented and slightly obsessive-compulsive nature of the boy. Another thing I decided was that I would be as secretive about my mission as I could at home, and as honest about it as I could outside home, because that's what was necessary.

And he is honest. He's extremely open and candid with the people he meets and manages to get pretty close to some of them. Despite all of his anxiety, he keeps contacting people because:. And even though what he finds isn't exactly what he's looking for, it's not for lack of trying.

This search kind of mirrors his Reconnaissance Expeditions; it forces him to be resourceful and independent, just like his father wanted him to be. Oskar's always been an odd, eccentric kid with a zillion obsessions and anxieties, but since his father's death, everything's much worse.

His father was always the one who could comfort him. He's a nervous wreck now, honestly, although he's found ways to cope with his anxiety. He carries a tambourine, which acts as a sort of musical stress ball, and he makes up inventions to calm himself down.

He only wears white, which he had read reflects light in the event of a nuclear attack. Even after a year, I still had an extremely difficult time doing certain things, like taking showers, for some reason, and getting into elevators, obviously.

There was a lot of stuff that made me panicky, like suspension bridges, germs, airplanes, fireworks, Arab people in […] public places, scaffolding, sewers, […] smoke, knots, tall buildings, turbans. He's anxious and fearful much of the time, and is always scanning the environment for possible danger. He's afraid of anything that triggers memories of that "worst day.

His self-harm is a little call for help, as we see when Oskar writes that he wants his Mom to notice his bruises,. Even though I knew the view was incredibly beautiful, my brain started misbehaving, and the whole time I was imagining a plane coming at the building, just below us.

I didn't want to, but I couldn't stop. I imagined the last second, when I would see the pilot's face, who would be a terrorist. He's angry at the world and sometimes just gets overwhelmed. But Oskar would probably tell you that he isn't an emotional person; he thinks he's rational and scientific.

The one thing he does know is that he's really depressed. He calls this having "heavy boots. He has an interesting image for how this feels. In this passage, he's feeling distant from his mother after she criticizes him for giving the mailwoman a key to their apartment:. She could tell that I was zipping up the sleeping bag of myself, and I could tell that she really didn't love me.

Oskar meets tons of people with the last name Black over the course of the novel. We don't even Abby is the second Black. She lives in "the narrowest house in New York" 5. Oskar's Dad was a jeweler who always tried to encourage his son to do something other than the Parents Home Homeschool College Resources. Study Guide. By Jonathan Safran Foer. Previous Next.