Something To Consider Before Immigration Teju Cole's Everyday Is For The F

Something to Consider Before Immigration Teju Cole’s Everyday is For the Thief follows a protagonist visiting Nigeria after immigrating to America. Despite living there, the protagonist lacks a connection to America. The protagonist struggles to fit into Nigeria as well, due to how the West has changed him. Absence also portrays the protagonist as an outsider in his family. Through the story of a protagonist struggling to find places and people he can be a part of after immigration, Cole’s novel discusses the topic of belonging. Initially, one can infer that the protagonist does not resonate with America. To illustrate, as he explores the city of Lagos, the protagonist excitedly declares, “The energies of Lagos life—creative, malevolent, ambiguous—converge

He paints America as a place he calls “home” due to living there, while he paints Lagos as more of a feeling, life, and place he yearns for. He does not give America the same meaning he gives to Lagos, as he feels displaced and not at “home” when he is in America. As a result, the protagonist considers moving back to Nigeria, stating, “I am going to move back to Lagos. I must. I have headphones on, and I am listening to “Giant Steps,”. but the generators say, No, you will not enjoy this. I have no right to Coltrane here, not with everything else going on. This is the Lagos. I disagree with that. I turn up the volume.” (Cole 76). The generators are personified as someone telling him that despite the beauty, Lagos is a city of crime, poor economy, and corruption. The music symbolizes the good parts of Nigeria that draw the protagonist towards it. Turning up the music represents the idea that even though the bad parts of Nigeria outweigh the good, the protagonist focuses on what draws him to the country as if desperately finding a reason to move from America. This further shows that he does not feel any sense of belonging in America to stay

However, after immigrating, he does not fit into Nigeria either. Additionally, having lived in the West causes the protagonist to be an outsider in Nigeria. The protagonist witnesses corruption in the country, and he hears about a significant amount of violence. In response, he states, “I have taken into myself some of the assumptions of life in a Western democracy—certain ideas about legality, for instance, certain expectations of due process—and in that sense, I have returned a stranger” (Cole 24). The protagonist mentioning Western ideologies shows how living abroad has changed how he looks at Nigeria since his departure. This idea is expanded through the image showing the inside of a car, as the protagonist drives through Lagos and observes corruption (Cole 27). His physical separation represents him being set apart from Nigerians, as he is not accustomed to violence and corruption like they are. This makes him a stranger. The locals also recognize him as an outsider, as seen when the protagonist walks through the market and is called a White man by shop owners. He responds, “What subtle signs of dress or body language have, again, given me