In his debut novel, Open City, Teju Cole rejects a traditional plot structure in favor of an intriguing collection of thoughts and encounters. He tackles problems of diversity and race without providing a clear solution and still maintains interest through his dreamlike stylistic choices.
Julius, the protagonist, is a young half-German, half-Nigerian psychiatrist living in New York City. His mixed racial background connects him with many local immigrants such as a Liberian refugee, a Haitian shoe shiner, and a Japanese professor. As these strangers’ stories develop, Julius finds that his perspective on life is changing. He has recently broken up with his girlfriend and spends all of his free time wandering aimlessly, thinking about his failed relationship and his work. He spontaneously decides to seek out his grandmother in Brussels, his only remaining familial connection besides his estranged mother. He travels to Europe to find her and continues to gather insight from varying cultures.
Cole’s style is a unique approach to a story that would be otherwise unremarkable. He quickly shifts from subject to subject while characters constantly appear and disappear even within paragraphs, leaving the reader wondering whether certain characters ever actually existed. The majority of the novel is made up of just Julius’s thoughts and flashbacks, so when something significant happens in the present, it is unexpected. This gives the narrative a dreamlike quality, which precisely reflects Julius’s state of mind. However, the majority of the events in the novel are extremely realistic. For the most part, Julius just wanders around New York City and Brussels and meets a diverse range of people. The contrast between the dreamlike sequence of events and the realistic quality of the plot is definitely the most compelling part of the novel.
Still, Julius sometimes fails as a narrator. Most of the time, he is too detached from the things happening to him. Although it is expected that, as a psychiatrist, he would know how to listen to others’ stories objectively, he fails to respond with emotion, even when thinking about his own failed relationship. His cold reactions make him a less relatable character. Nevertheless, this does not distract from the main focus of the novel as the structure of Julius’s story relies more on his experiences than his reactions to them.
Open City is frustrating and compelling at the same time. Though very little actually happens in the book, Cole’s varying perspectives on race and the apparent need to belong to a particular country will spark conversations among readers, encouraging them to challenge more traditional philosophical and political ways of thinking.
–Megan Bounds
