Philosophical Blog Post - Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Philosophical Blog Post - Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

By Jonathon Safran foer

           The book, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer is mainly composed of the journey of a nine-year-old named Oskar Schell. His father, Thomas Schell, died in the September 11 attacks and Oskar didn’t really know whether or not he could live without him, which is why Oskar searches through his father’s things in order to find out about what was going on in his life before he passed away. Oskar finds a small, mysterious key after tipping over a vase in his father’s closet and decides to set out on a journey to see if he can find out anything about him. Along the way, Safran Foer attaches new ideas, lessons, as well as many new characters that connect to his philosophy.

            One of the most critical terms of philosophy, is ethics. Safran Foer most probably thought that it was ethical for a nine-year-old to search the five boroughs for more guidance. It makes sense for a young human to be so determined for the goodness of his own life. Moving on, “Optimist or Pessimist?” appears a few times in this book and it is a question that should be taken into consideration in real life. Optimists are positive and hopeful while pessimists are negative and doubtful. In the book, this question appears while Oskar’s father tells him the story of the “sixth borough,” where a jumper would leap between two islands every year on front of an audience until one year the gap between the two islands had been so large that he couldn’t reach the other side at all. However, the New Yorkers hadn’t given up on the Sixth Borough; they put large hooks on it and reeled it in to where Central Park now exists. Oskar’s father most likely told this story to show Oskar how the New Yorkers didn’t give up when they were about to lose something.

            In conclusion, the key ended up belonging to a man named William Black. It opened an important safe deposit box of his. The Author’s lesson to the reader was most likely that you should look for happiness if you lost something by not giving up and look to making a point. Oskar’s life was full of contradictions where he felt opposite emotions at one time or thought that his life was over after his father passed away. He ended up proving himself wrong at the end by moving on after his long journey. All of this connects to philosophy in its own way; the book is about how Oskar decides how he will live and think and at the end of the book he finds his own philosophy.