Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (2005) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

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Summary edit see section history

Characters edit see section history

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• Oskar Schell: Nine-year old, mature for his age. Inventor, seeker of knowledge and life
• Thomas Schell: Father of Oskar. Jeweler by profession, but scientist by choice. He is Oskar's best friend and creates challenges for him.
• Mom: Seems uncaring and thoughtless. Seems too lost in her own grief to notice Oskar's pain
• Grandmother: Grandmother to Oskar, of whom she is very protective. Communicates with Oskar via walkie-talkies. One of Oskar's best friends
• Mr. Black: Oskar's elderly neighbor, Abe. He befriends Oskar and aids him on his quest.
• Stan: Friendly doorman at Oskar's building.
• Grandpa: Other narrator of the book, besides Oskar, only communicates via writing because he mysteriously 'lost' his words.
• GERALD THOMPSON: The driver of the limousine
• Masako: Caring, Adventerous
• Mr. Goldberg: German Jew who disappeared during the war but was remembered by those that knew him
• Dr. Fein: Oskar's therapist.
• Buckminster: Oskar's cat.
• Peter Black: Father and son in NYC
• Stephen Hawking: Famous astrophysicist. Oskar writes him numerous letters
• Ruth Black: Woman living in the Empire State Building
• Abby Black: One of the people Oskar talks to in his search.
• William Black: Abby Black's husband.
• Ron: Oskar's Mom 's friend.
• Aaron: Add a description of this character.
• Grandma
• Gail
• Anna: Grandmother's sister.
• Manuel Escobar
• Allen Black
• Frazer
• Abe Black: one of the many Blacks' that Oscar reaches out to. Acompanies Oscar on his search.
• Mohammed Atta: Cab driver that Oscar sends money too.
• Mrs. Schell: Oskar's mother
• Agnes Black
• Mrs. Rigley
• TOMOYASU
• Alice Black
• Jake Riley
• Simon Goldberg
• Larry
• Ada Black
• Mr. Keegan
• Farley
• MARGIE CARSON
• Jimmy Snyder
• Mrs. Minch
• Howard
• Jose
• Mr. Richter

Quotes edit see section history

• “Does it break my heart, of course, every moment of every day, into more pieces than my heart was made of, I never thought of myself as quiet, much less silent, I never thought about things at all, everything changed, the distance that wedged itself between me and my unhappiness wasn't the world, it wasn't the bombs and burning buildings, it was me, my thinking, the cancer of never letting go, is ignorance bliss, I don't know, but it's painful to think, and tell me, what did thinking ever do for me, to what great place did thinking ever bring me? I think and think and think, I've thought myself out of happiness one million times, but never once into it.”

• “Deja mi-e dor de tine Oskar.Mi-era dor chiar si atunci cand eram cu tine.Asta a fost mereu problema mea.Mi-e dor de ceea ce am deja si ma inconjor de lucruri care-mi lispesc.”

• “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? When you skateboarded down the street at night you could hear everyone's heartbeat, and they could hear yours, sort of like sonar. One weird thing is, I wonder if everyone's hearts would start to beat at the same time, like how women who live together have their menstrual periods at the same time, which I know about, but don't really want to know about. That would be so weird, except that the place in the hospital where babies are born would sound like a crystal chandelier in a houseboat, because the babies wouldn't have had time to match up their heartbeats yet. And at the finish line at the end of the New York City Marathon it would sound like war.”

• “We need enormous pockets, pockets big enough for our families and our friends, and even the people who aren't on our lists, people we've never met but still want to protect. We need pockets for boroughs and for cities, a pocket that could hold the universe.”

• “Why didn't I learn to treat everything like it was the last time. My greatest regret was how much I believed in the future.”

• “Sometimes I can hear my bones straining under the weight of all of the lives I’m not living.”

• “If I’d been someone else in a different world I’d have done something different, but I was myself and the world was the world, so I was silent.”

• “When I was a girl, my life was music that was always getting louder. Everything moved me. A dog following a stranger. That made me feel so much. A calender that showed the wrong month. I could have cried over it. I did. Where the smoke from the chimney ended. How an overturned bottle rested at the edge of a table. I spent my life learning to feel less. Every day I felt less. Is that growing old? Or is it something worse? You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness.”

• “I cried some more. I wanted to tell her all of the lies that I'd told her. And then I wanted her to tell that it was OK, because sometimes you have to do something bad to do something good.”

  Oskar Schell

• “If I had been alone, I would have given myself the biggest bruise of my life. I would have turned myself into one big bruise.”

  Oskar Schell

• “Anyway, the fascinating thing was that I read in National Geographic that there are more people alive now than have died in all of human history. In other words, if everyone wanted to play Hamlet at once, they couldn´t, because there aren´t enough skulls!”

  Oskar Schell

• “I watched the fireflires of his thoughts orbit his head. He said, "We exist because we exist." "What the?" "We could imagine all sorts of universes unlike this one, but this is the one that happened."I understood what he meant, and I didn't disagree with him, but I didn't agree with him either. Just because you're an atheist, that doesn't mean you wouldn't love for things to have reasons for why they are.”

  Oskar and his father

• “"Do you have any coffee?" I asked. "Coffee!" "It stunts my growth, and I'm afraid of death." He slapped the table and said, "My boy, I have some coffee from Honduras that's got your name on it!" "But you don't even know my name."”

  Oskar and Mr. Black

• “I did not feel that he owed it to me. And I did not feel that I owed it to him. We owed it to each other, which is something different.”

  Grandma

• “It was one of the best days of my life, a day during which I lived my life and didn't think about my life at all.”

  Grandfather

• “The books had been buried, so I hid this time behind a group of trees, I imagined their roots wrapped around books, pulling nourishment from the pages, I imagined rings of letters in their trunks”

  Grandfather

• “That secret was a hole in the middle of me that every happy thing fell into.”

  Oskar Schell about the hidden answering machine

• “Everything that's born has to die, which means our lives our like skyscrapers. The smoke rises at different speeds, but they're all on fire, and we're all trapped.”

  Oskar

• “I made a difference, I am God (Thomas) you're an atheist, (Oskar) I don't exist.”

  Oskar

Setting & Locations edit see section history

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• New York City: Main location of the book.
• Dresden: Dresden has a long history as the capital and royal residence for the Electors and Kings of Saxony, who for centuries furnished the city with cultural and artistic splendour. The city was known as the Jewel Box, because of its baroque and rococo city centre. A controversial Allied aerial bombing towards the end of World War II killed thousands of civilians and destroyed the entire city. The impact of the bombing and 40 years of urban development during the East German communist era have considerably changed the face of the city. Some restoration work has helped to reconstruct parts of the historic inner city, including the Katholische Hofkirche, the Semper Oper and the Dresdner Frauenkirche. Since the German reunification in 1990, Dresden has regained importance as one of the cultural, educational, political and economic centres of Germany.
• Manhattan
• Central Park
• Staten Island
• America
• Brooklyn
• The Sixth Borough: An imaginary sixth borough of New York.

First Sentence edit see section history

Glossary edit see section history

• heavy boots: This is a term Oskar uses to describe his sadness. When something makes him depressed, he says it gives him heavy boots.
• Jose: This is a term Oskar uses to mean 'no way'

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

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• Being sorry: Describe this theme.
• Heavy boots vs. Bruising: Oskar constantly says he has "heavy boots" whenever in situations of high stress, sadness, or anger. During these times, he feels the need to give himself a bruise. It's his way of dealing with his emotions.
• Father-Son Relationships
• Life and Death

Series & Lists edit see section history

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Jonathan Safran Foer (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Awards edit see section history

• American Place Theatre's Literature to Life Award
• International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award (Finalist, 2007, Short list)

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
• Dewey: 813.6

Notes for Parents edit see section history

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16+

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Literature & Fiction › Contemporary

Movie Connections edit see section history

• Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (IMDb): Stephen Daldry, 2011