The protagonist of the story is Oskar Schell, a nine-year-old intelligent, eccentric, and clever boy who manages to self-identify numerous things, which includes origamist, inventor, amateur archaeologist, and amateur entomologist. As a narrator, he contemplates topics at a deeper level and has a high level of empathy. He trusts strangers, makes friends, and keeps assorted collections and hobbies. The search for the key’s lock is, in fact, the search for the purpose of life, which reflects on the theme of mortality, where dying is inevitable, and the real question is the way we are supposed to live when we actually have this life.
Oscar finds a key that drives the plot of the story within an envelope labelled ‘Black.’ The key is in the blue vase of his father’s closet. Oscar’s father dies in the 9/11 attacks, and the key drives the storyline from character to character, unravelling the plot. The protagonist begins an expedition around New York, travelling to different corners of the city to meet in person with different people whose last names are ‘Black.’ He does so in the alphabetic order of first name, and the search is actually not for the mysterious lock that matches the keys of Oscar; instead, the object of the search for Oscar is the purpose and meaning of life, and the key is a metaphorical device for pursuing the search.
In the process of overcoming the fear of riding subways and crossing bridges, Oskar’s quest is to learn about the lives of people who are associated with each other in some way. Key provides Oscar with a sense of purposefulness and personal growth when things go out of control or become chaotic. Physically, for forty years, the key to the apartment stayed with Oscar’s grandma, and it belonged to Oscar’s grandpa. She gives the keys to Oscar’s grandpa when he returns, but eventually, the key resides in (Oskar) Dad’s coffin, while Oscar’s grandpa buries the key, coupled with letters to his unborn child. In the film adaptation of the novel, the psychological condition of Oskar is Asperger’s syndrome, and the aesthetic dimension to his discussion when he interacted with Abby for the first time states, “…Tests weren’t definitive” (Foer 35).
The driving force behind the quest to find the lock remains Oskar’s Dad. Oscar finds himself in an existential crisis like the melancholy Prince of Denmark, which he manages to resolve with the quest for the key’s lock, although the lock itself is symbolic of the chaos around the lives of Oscar’s family. Like his father, Oscar’s grandpa also lost his unborn child and wife during World War II in the 1945 Dresden firebombing. Mortality is also an underlying theme, and Oscar encounters mortality in multiple parts of the storyline, which includes his relationship with Grandma, who is in her old age. Death is a major part of the storyline, and sometimes death comes unnaturally with unexpected brutal force. The literal and figurative usage of mortality is extensive, which includes Oscar’s school production of Hamlet.
The ‘key’ in “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close” reflects Oskar Shell’s quest for the deeper meaning of mortality and the way of living. He learns that living with compassion for others is important, and the way we live matters the most. After all, death is inevitable and can come unnaturally and take the life away, as it did in the case of Oscar and Oscar’s Grandpa. The key and the lock both metaphorically indicate Oscar’s quest for meaning in life. Due to the key, Oskar manages to meet different people whose names end with Black and eventually finds his answers. The search for the key’s lock is figuratively used to seek life’s purpose.
Works Cited
Foer, Jonathan Safran. Extremely loud and incredibly close: A novel. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013.
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