A life less ordinary

‘I know it sounds arrogant but I think it’s undeniable that it has become fixed in the culture like a stately home,’ says Mark Haddon of his book The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.  

Arrogant or not, he is probably right. Haddon’s novel about an autistic boy’s attempt to solve the mystery of who killed his neighbour’s dog has sold more than two and a half million copies since its publication in 2003 and seems to have been read by everyone.

As we chat in the basement of the Ashmolean Museum in his hometown of Oxford, Haddon doesn’t come across as an egomaniac. When he discusses Curious Incident he’s more like a proud parent marvelling at his child’s success. He takes particular delight in telling me that the book has been sold under the counter in Tehran and was banned from a number of American schools and libraries for ‘atheism and profanity’.