Study Guide: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (A BookCaps Study Guide)

By BookCaps

The perfect companion to Jonathan Safran Foer's "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," this study guide contains a chapter by chapter analysis of the book, a summary of the plot, and a guide to major characters and themes.

BookCap Study Guides do not contain text from the actual book, and are not meant to be purchased as alternatives to reading the book.

We all need refreshers every now and then. Whether you are a student trying to cram for that big final, or someone just trying to understand a book more, BookCaps can help. We are a small, but growing company, and are adding titles every month.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookCaps
• Release date: Dec 6, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465831354

BookCaps

We all need refreshers every now and then. Whether you are a student trying to cram for that big final, or someone just trying to understand a book more, BookCaps can help. We are a small, but growing company, and are adding titles every month.Visit www.bookcaps.com to see more of our books, or contact us with any questions.

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Jonathan Safran Foer’s

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

By BookCaps Study Guides

© 2011 by Golgotha Press, Inc.

Published at SmashWords

www.bookcaps.com

Historical Context

Jonathan Safran Foer was born in Washington DC in 1977. Foer attended Princeton University where he majored in philosophy and literature. Foer is not the only writer in his family; one of his two brothers is an editor, and the other is a freelance science writer. While attending Princeton, Foer received many rewards and prizes for his writing. While working on his undergraduate degree Foer starting penning his first novel, Everything is Illuminated. With this first novel, which was very well received by readers but had mixed reviews from critics, Foer explored time-warps and post-modern methods. Whether critics loved his book or hated it, there was a clear consensus that Foer was one up-and-coming writer who would be worthy of keeping an eye on.

In 2005, Foer achieved success once again with his second novel, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Critical reviews were much more favorable for this second foray into the literary world and were intrigued by the autobiographical details that Foer included in his sophomore novel. The protagonist of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a nine-year-old boy named Oskar who has a life-altering experience; Foer also had a life changing experience when he was nine which left him with badly burned hands just as Oskar’s grandfather has in the novel. Foer is becoming wildly successful in the literary world, with his first two novels achieving success and being adapted to movies. He continues to write and lives with his wife in Brooklyn, New York.

Plot

Oskar Schell is a nine-year-old boy who had lost his father in the September 11 attacks. His father had left progressively panicked messages that morning as the damage became more devastating and the fires raged on; though Oskar is the only person who ever heard the messages because he hid the phone and bought a new, identical one to trick his mother. In grieving for his father, he tries to find as much information as he can about him and recalls conversations that they had. When he finds a mysterious key in an envelope marked Black he decides to search for every person with the last name Black in New York City, hoping to find someone who can tell him about the key and about his father. Along the way, he befriends an old man who lives upstairs from him, Mr. Black, and meets the renter who lives with his grandmother, named Thomas. Between Oskar’s