White Teeth
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White Teeth is a 2000 novel by the British author Zadie Smith. It focuses on the later lives of two wartime friends - the Bangladeshi Samad Iqbal and the Englishman Archie Jones, and their families in London.
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[edit] Plot summary
Archie marries the much-younger Clara, a Jamaican former Jehovah's Witness, having met her on a staircase at a drug party on New Year's Day 1975 after a failed suicide attempt. They have a daughter, Irie, who grows up to have low self-confidence. Samad, on the other hand, who has emigrated to Britain after World War II, marries Alsana, also younger than him, and they have twin boys Magid and Millat. The marriage is quite rocky, as their devotion to Islam in an Anglican life is troublesome. Separated as children when Magid is sent to Bangladesh by his father, the two boys follow very different paths. Magid becomes an atheist and devotes his life to science (a grave disappointment to Samad). Millat, despite his earlier womanizing and drinking, eventually becomes an angry fundamentalist, joining a Muslim brotherhood known as the Keepers of the Eternal and Victorious Islamic Nation (or KEVIN).
The lives of the Jones and Iqbal families intertwine with that of the Chalfens, a Jewish-Catholic family of intellectuals including father Marcus Chalfen, a geneticist working on the FutureMouse project. Returned from Bangladesh, Magid works as Marcus' research assistant, while Millat is also befriended by the Chalfens. To some extent the family provides a safe haven as they accept and understand the turbulent lives of both Magid and Millat. However this sympathy comes at the expense of their own son, Josh, whose own difficulties are ignored by his parents.
The strands of the narrative grow closer as Millat and KEVIN decide FutureMouse is an evil interference with nature and needs to be stopped. Irie, who is also working for Marcus, finds herself attracted particularly to Millat, but eventually ends up having sex with both twins. Irie believes that Millat cannot love her, for he has always been 'the second son'. Both symbolically and literally; since Millat was born two minutes after Magid. By having sex with both brothers, but losing her virginity to Millat, she wishes to make him 'the first one' for a change. Meanwhile Marcus's son Josh joins a militant animal rights group that also hopes to derail FutureMouse. Extraordinary consequences result as the seemingly divergent stories of the main characters coalesce in a stunning finale.
[edit] Major themes
The story mixes pathos and humour, all the while illustrating the dilemmas of immigrants and second-generation immigrants as they are confronted by a new, and very different, society. The reader can determine certain qualities and negativities about different cultures while they are contrasted in a different culture. Middle- and working-class British cultures are also satirised through the characters of the Chalfens and Archie.
This book also delves into the concepts of human relationship. Archie and Samad remain best friends despite the failed relationships of their families and culture. Magid and Millat, on the other hand, do not approve of each other's lives and never become cordial brothers.
FutureMouse is a central character and plot motivator in White Teeth. FutureMouse’s life has been programmed and designed by Marcus Chalfen, but once born it escapes, seemingly to map out its own life. In this sense future mouse has a similar journey to other human characters in White Teeth, Magid, Millat and Irie.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- White Teeth at the Internet Movie Database
- Official White Teeth Website (with Trailer)
- Random House Description of White Teeth.
- Excerpted portion from White Teeth
- White Teeth Interview with Zadie Smith.
- White Teeth by Zadie Smith Exploration of the cultural implications of Zadie Smith's debut novel.
