49 pages • 1 hour read
Zadie SmithNW
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2012A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Relationship between Urban Geography and Human Behavior
NW declares its connection to geography in its very title, which refers to the actual postal code for northwest London. The novel makes numerous references to street names, bridges, parks, buildings, and map directions—most of which highlight real places. However, the novel is not simply interested in providing a realistic depiction of London. Rather, the geographic references are a backdrop against which characters’ identities, motivations, and actions emerge.
On one hand, London spaces are imagined to define people. In section 173 of “Host,” for instance, characters at a public pool are having an argument, each proudly mentioning where they are from with the implication that some areas of London (like Hackney) are superior to others (like Harlesden). On the other hand, the attempts of characters such as Natalie, Michel, and Leah to leave certain neighborhoods (with varying degrees of success) shows that a core conflict in the novel is the struggle against the idea that where a person is from defines who they are.
In the novel, open spaces like sidewalks, parks, and public transportation tend to be sites of drama and danger. Alternatively, private and indoor sites depict intimate, domestic life. At the same time, since the turmoil that plagues characters like Leah and Natalie throughout the novel is existential, it is hidden even in private spaces for most of the novel—until it all comes out in the end.
The Pursuit of Authenticity in Modern Life
Every major character in NW articulates their version either of what makes life meaningful or of the challenge of pursuing meaning. For some characters, like Michel, the path seems clear: Make money, find a good partner, get a good home, have children, climb the ladder, and enjoy the fruits of a successful life.
For the protagonists Leah and Natalie, however, authenticity is elusive. From childhood on, the two of them struggle to pinpoint who they really are, and what they really want. Most poignantly, their continual awareness of the fact that they don’t know the answers to life’s questions only increases their anxiety and disaffection. Even after Natalie ostensibly conquers every major aspect of modern urban life—education, career, relationships, family, financial standing—she yearns for something missing. Ambition, many characters discover, adds pressure to the already chaotic world of urban life.
Indeed, NW directly demonstrates that ostensible success may not be a path to fulfillment at all. After having children, for instance, Natalie experiences a double-sided sense of guilt, as many contemporary women juggling family and career might. On one hand, she feels anxious about acknowledging her family in her career world, and on the other hand, she feels as though her career takes time, attention, and energy that she should be dedicating to her children.
The Intersection of Identities
NW reflects diversity, ever-present in cosmopolitan London and an increasingly obvious fact of contemporary life. Throughout the novel, different cultures and identities intersect. Residents from a diverse range of cultural backgrounds (Irish, French Algerian, Jamaican, Anglo-Saxon) and socio-economic standings (poor, working-class, and middle-class) live in the same area. Characters experience the collision of cultures in their interactions with each other in this space. Leah and Michel are a mixed-race couple, for instance, and as a child Keisha is fascinated by comparisons between her working-class home and the middle-class Hanwells'.
The intersections are also an irrevocable aspect of personal identity for the characters of NW. In some cases, intersections are beyond characters’ control. Some of the ways that Frank and Natalie differ, for instance, are attributed to the fact that Frank is mixed-race and born in Italy to a relatively well-off mother, while Natalie’s family has Jamaican roots and is decidedly working-class in London. Other identities are acquired through the life choices that characters make. When Natalie decides to pursue college, study law, and accept a job back in London, she must juggle both a new economic identity and the continual reminders of her origins, in addition to trying to negotiate between her multiple identities as a career woman and mother.
At times, characters’ identities clash with the realities of life in London, despite the city’s diversity. Aside from socio-economic challenges (as when Natalie is said by Nathan and others to have forgotten her roots by becoming financially successful), these conflicts often center on race and nationality. For instance, Leah’s mother, Pauline, dismissively refers to Michel as Nigerian—even though he is French Algerian—seeming to equate all of Africa with one nation. Characters like Nathan express frustration with being reduced to their racial identity (he expresses that as a black man, he has been viewed as nothing but a criminal since age 10). Likewise, when Felix is on the train, a pregnant woman asks him to get his “friends” (two other men across the aisle) to free a seat for her, assuming that since they are all black, they must know each other. Throughout the novel, NW shows that the pursuit of desired identities, as well as conflicts with given ones, shape characters’ sense of self and the struggle to define themselves authentically.
Related Titles
By Zadie Smith
