To be extremely hilarious WHAT THE? What about a teakettle?

What if the spout opened and

closed when the steam came out, so it would become a mouth, and it could whistle pretty
melodies, or do Shakespeare, or just crack up with me? I could invent a teakettle that reads in
Dad's voice, so I could fall asleep, or maybe a set of kettles that sings the chorus of 'Yellow
Submarine', which is a song by the Beatles, who I love, because entomology is one of my
raisons d'etre, which is a French expression that I know. Another good thing is that I could train
my anus to talk when I farted. If I wanted to be extremely hilarious, I'd train it to say, 'Wasn't
me!' every time I made an incredibly bad fart. And if I ever made an incredibly bad fart in the
Hall of Mirrors, which is in Versailles, which is outside of Paris, which is in France, obviously, my
anus would say, 'Ce n'etais pas moi!' What about little microphones? What if everyone
swallowed them, and they played the sounds of our hearts through little speakers, which could
be in the pouches of our overalls?

Googoplex times
Reconnaissance expedition
Make a relevation
Perpetual nuisance
Mediocre people
Universal need
Circumstantial evidence
Irrefutable evidence
Dote on sb
To retrieve ones character
Reasonable assumption
Inevitable question
Perseptive person
Recede from smth
Acceptable compromise
Feel like one hundred dollars
Bend down
To detain sb
Crawl back
Tp be up ones sleeve
A bit of row
To face the music
To be hand and glove with sb
To be off-hand
At the sight of smth
To be embittered
To overlook the street
To assuage ones curiosity

To be at liberty to do smt
To be up to smth
On second thoughts
To agitate oneself
To solve the riddle
To be a scapegoat
Out of the blue

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a 2005 novel by Jonathan Safran Foer. The book's narrator is a nine-year-old boy named
Oskar Schell. In the story, Oskar discovers a key in a vase that belonged to his father that inspires him to search all around New York for
information about the key.
Oskar Schell is a nine-year-old boy whose father, Thomas Schell, died in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September
11, 2001. The novel begins after the tragedy, with Oskar narrating. Since his fathers death, Oskar struggles with insomnia, panic attacks,
and depression. He often describes the feeling of depression as wearing heavy boots, and deals with this by giving himself bruises.
While looking through his father's closet, Oskar finds a key in a small envelope inside a vase he smashed; on the outside of the
envelope the word "Black" is written in the top left corner. Curious, Oskar sets out on a mission to contact every person in New York City with
the last name Black, in alphabetical order, in the hope of finding the lock that belongs to the key his father left behind. One of the first people
Oskar meets in his search for the key's origin is a 48-year-old woman named Abby Black. Oskar and Abby become friends instantly, but she
has no information on the key. Oskar continues to search the city,

What The?
the narrator introduces us to himself and to his world.
It begins with him dreaming up a bunch of wacky
inventions. Here's a quick sample:
A teakettle that whistles melodies
Little microphones that broadcast everyone's heartbeat
A birdseed shirt
Training your own anus to talk (Who's narrating this
book? Ace Ventura?)
Our narrator tells us about his first time in a limousine: with
his mother, grandmother, and Gerald the limo driver.
They're heading to Oskar's dad's funeral. Kind of. "It's not
like we were actually burying him anyway" (1.9).
Mom's a little irritated that the narrator, her son, gave the
mailwoman a key to their apartment, and the narrator wonders if
she still loves him. "I've never loved you more," (1.16) she says.
The narrator talks about a scavenger hunt through Central
Park his Dad sent him on once.
He's not sure why his Dad sent him out digging. He says that
the more he found, the less he understood.
From there, he tells us about all the letters he started sending
after "the worst day" (1.33) (i.e. the day Dad died) to famous
people, like Stephen Hawking, who replied with a form letter.
Oskar (that's our narrator, not the Grouch) tells us about the
last story his Dad told him (a story of New York's sixth borough)
and that the last time he heard his Dad's voice was on the
answering machine.
The last time he called was 10:22:27.
Why I'm Not Where You Are 5/21/63
We must have a different narrator here, as this chapter is set
in '63 (1963, we're assuming) and it's a letter starting with "To
my unborn child."
The narrator tells us about how he lost his speech, word by
word, starting with the word "Anna."
To communicate, he had the words YES and NO tattooed on
his palms. YES on the left, NO on the right.
He carried a notebook around to write in if he needed to say
more than YES or NO.
By the end of the day, he'd usually run out of pages and have
to flip back and recycle phrases from earlier in the day.
He'd save the notebooks all over his apartment.
Then, whoever's writing this letter tells us about "when I met
your mother" (2.1). (Ted? Is that you?)
When she wonders why our narrator doesn't talk, he writes
"I don't speak. I'm sorry"
She writes in his notebook "Please marry me" (2.1).
He tries to protest, but she persists.
He wonders about how he lost the love of his life, how he's
hopeless and helpless, and he flips to a page in his notebook and
puts her finger there: it says "Help."
Googolplex
We're back to the narrator from chapter one, Oskar.

He's been upset that his mom has been spending time with
her new "friend," Ron, after Dad's death.
Since Dad's death, Oskar has had trouble getting in
elevators, crossing bridges, taking showers, and being around
Arab people.
One night, he decides to rummage around his Dad's closet,
and he knocks over a blue vase and it breaks.
He's both relieved that his mother didn't hear it, and upset
that she's having a good time and not checking on him, so he
gives himself a bruise.
There's an envelope inside the vase and a key inside the
envelope (and a little old lady who swallowed a spider to
swallow a fly) and Oskar wonders what it goes to.
He tries it in all the locks in the apartment, but it's not for
any of them.
The next morning, he fakes sick to skip school and heads
down to the locksmith's store to inquire about the key.
Frazer, the locksmith, says it could be for a safe-deposit box,
but he's not sure.
Oskar does some quick mental calculation and concludes
that there are 162 million locks in New York City. It must fit in
one of them, right?
Back at home, Oskar notices that the envelope the key was
in says "Black" on it, but his Dad's handwriting looks weird, like
he wrote it in a hurry.
The next day, Oskar skips school again to go to the art
supply store, because someone there must know about colors.
The employee there thinks it's interesting that the person
wrote "Black" in red pen. Maybe he's designing a brain training
game
Also, Black is capitalized, which means it's probably a
name, not a color.
Oskar flips through a little book next to the pen display,
where people have tried out different pens and markers.
He notices one of the pages has his Dad's name written on it:
Thomas Schell.
"His name was everywhere" (3.36). He's tested out pretty
much every marker and pen in the store.
The confusing thing is that Dad died over a year ago, and the
pads of paper haven't been sitting around that long.
Back at home, Oskar searches for people named Black in
New York, and finds 472 people with that name.
He writes a sneaky letter to his French teacher saying that
Oskar won't go to French lessons, but they'll still pay him, and he
signs his Mom's name.
So Oskar decides to spend his weekends finding every
Black.
He radios his Grandma with a walkie-talkie and wonders
why her mysterious renter is out running errands at 4 in the
morning (even though he's not supposed to ask questions about
her new renter).
He tells Grandma that he misses his Dad, and he asks her
why Grandpa wanted to leave.

Grandma tells Oskar that he had to leave, but she doesn't say
why.
My Feelings
Looks like we have another narrator, and another letter, this
one dated 12 September 2003 and addressed "Dear Oskar."
Whoever's writing this letter is an old woman talking about
her childhood.
Once, she got a letter from a man in a Turkish Labor Camp,
but most of the text has been removed by the censor.
Our writer tells us that she had everyone she knew write her
a letter: her father, a prisoner, her best friend, Mary.
She ended up with over a hundred letters.
Seven years later, two months after moving to America, she
runs into a childhood friend, a man who used to date her sister,
Anna.
This is the silent man with YES and NO tattooed on his
hands.

Her story is a little different than his. (She leaves out the
"Please marry me" part.)
She leaves the caf, and he gets her attention by following
her and clapping his hands.
He asks her, through a series of elaborate hand motions, to
come to his apartment so that he can sculpt her.
She agrees, and he works on the sculpture every day, which
begins to look more and more like her sister, Anna.
They end up making love one day, as our narrator stares at
the sculpture of her sister.
After, they go to the bakery where they met. This is when,
our narrator says, she writes "Please marry me" in the notebook.
They agree to never have children. That was the first of
many rules in the marriage.

towards the end of his journey Oskar meets an old man he calls "the renter" because until the point of meeting, Oskar
had only heard of the old man's existence from his Grandmother who referred to him as the new tenant in her apartment.
(We learn towards the end of the book that "The renter" is actually Oskar's grandfather.) [1]
The book spans many months of Oskar's journey, some of which he was accompanied by his elderly neighbour, Mr. A.
Black. Eight months after Oskar initially met Abby, he finds a message from her on the answering machine. Oskar had not
touched that phone since his father died because his father's last words had been on an identical answering machine
which Oskar had kept hidden from his mother. Oskar finds out that Abby called him directly after his visit, saying she
wasn't completely honest with him and might be able to help. Oskar returns to Abby's apartment after listening to this
message, and Abby directs him to her ex-husband, William Black.[2]
When Oskar talks to William Black, he learns that the key once belonged to William's father. In his will, William's father left
William a key to a safe-deposit box, but William had already sold the vase at the estate sale to Thomas Schell. Then,
Oskar tells William something that he "never told anyone" the story of the last answering machine message Oskar
received from his father, during the attack of 9/11. Oskar then gives William Black the key. Disappointed that the key does
not belong to him, Oskar goes home angry and sad, not interested in the contents of the box. After Oskar destroys
everything that had to do with the search for the lost key, Oskar discovered that his mother knew about his activities the
entire time and was contacting everyone with the name Black in New York City. After the first few visits she called every
Black that he would meet and informed them that Oskar was going to visit and why. In response, the people Oskar met
knew ahead of time why he was coming and usually treated him in a friendly manner.
The novel has a parallel narrative that eventually converges with the main story. This narrative is portrayed through a
series of letters written by Oskar's grandfather to Oskar's father Thomas, and by Oskar's grandmother to Oskar himself.
The letters written by Oskars grandfather explain his past in World War II, his first love, and his marriage to Oskars
grandmother. The letters written by Oskars grandmother explain her past in meeting Oskars grandfather, the trouble in
their relationship, and how important Oskar is to her.

Characters[edit]
Oskar Schell is the nine-year-old protagonist of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. He is an eccentric, intelligent, and
clever young boy who self-identifies as a number of things including inventor, amateur entomologist, origamist, and
amateur archaeologist. He often contemplates deeper topics and shows great empathy beyond what the average 9-yearold might have. His thoughts have a tendency to trail off into far-flung ideas, such as ambulances that alert passerby to
the severity of their passengers' conditions and plantlike skyscrapers, and he has several assorted hobbies and
collections. He is very trusting of strangers and makes friends easily, though he does not have many friends his own age.
Oskar's mother, Linda Schell, referred to as "Mom" by Oskar in the book, cares for her family greatly. After Thomas's
death, Linda tells Oskar "I won't fall in love again."[4] Though it is implied that she knows Oskar is running around the city
meeting strangers, she nevertheless allows him to do so in order to discover more about his father.
Oskar's grandmother is a kind woman who is very protective of Oskar. She calls out to him often, and Oskar always
responds with "I'm okay" out of habit. When she arrived in America, she read as many magazines as she could to
integrate herself into the culture and language. As Annas (Oskars grandfathers first love) younger sister, she enters into
a tumultuous marriage with Oskar's grandfather, and the couple breaks up before the events of the novel.

Mr A. Black is an elderly man of questionable age (he claimed to have lived every day of the twentieth century,) who lives
in the same apartment building as Oskar, and joins him for some of his journey. Prior to meeting Oskar, Mr. Black had not
left his apartment in twenty-four years, after having had a rather adventurous life.
Oskar's grandfather, Thomas Schell Sr. (also referred to as "the renter") is an important character in the story, even
though he does not physically meet Oskar until the book's end. After the death of his first love, Anna, Oskar's grandfather
loses his voice completely and consequently tattoos the words "yes" and "no" on his hands. He carries around a
"daybook" where he writes phrases he cannot speak aloud. He marries Anna's younger sister, Oskar's grandmother.
Anna is an absent character. She is Oskar's grandfather's first love. Oskar's grandfather falls in love with her instantly.
She dies in the Dresden firebombings of World War II after telling Oskar's grandfather of her pregnancy. She is Oskars
grandmothers sister.
Abby Black is William Black's ex-wife. She is forty-eight years old and lives by herself. She is friendly and welcoming to
Oskar when he arrives at her house, though she does decline Oskar's offer of a kiss.
Oskar's father, Thomas Schell, dies before the events of the book begin. Oskar remembers him as caring, smelling of
aftershave and always humming the song "I Am the Walrus" by The Beatles. Thomas Schell organizes several
expeditions for Oskar, such as a game to find an object from every decade of the past century. These adventures with his
father are one of the reasons Oskar begins his journey about the key.
Stan is the doorman in the building Oskar lives in.
Buckminster is Oskar's cat.

Themes[edit]
Major themes of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close include trauma, mourning, family, and the struggle between selfdestruction and self-preservation. Sien Uytterschout and Kristiaan Versluys have examined the specific types of trauma
and recuperative measures that Oskar's grandmother and grandfather go through after the Dresden bombings and that
Oskar goes through after the loss of his father. They argue that Oskar has a simultaneous death wish and extreme need
for self-preservation: This theme is echoed in Thomas Schell, Sr.'s pronounced survivor guilt and Oskar's grandmother's
well-disguised inability to cope with her trauma.[4] They also argue that though Oskar's journey to "find" his father does not
help him get over his traumatic experience, it does allow him to grow closer to his mother.[4] Foer provides a parallel
between WWII and the 9/11 attacks to not only show the timelessness of trauma and tragedy how it affects people
unbiasedly, but also how coping with trauma also means to revisit the trauma.
It is also important to note the impact of the child narrator on the effectiveness of the theme of trauma. In the novel, Oskar
never directly addresses through his narration the trauma he faced. Only through his journey through the city and through
his grandparents' letters does he mimic the journey one must take when coping with trauma.

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