Plot
The reason Nadia moves in with Saeed and his father in Chapter 4
What is Saeed's mother's death?
“In dark London, rubbish accrued, uncollected, and underground stations were sealed” (Ch. 8). In this sentence, "accrued" means this:
What is "accumulated"?
Hamid puts this social issue, which is of increasing global urgency, at the center of his novel.
What is global migration, or refugee crises?
“Saeed's mother's mental map of the place where she had spent her entire life now resembled an old quilt” (Ch. 4). "Quilt" functions here as this kind of figure of speech:
What is "simile"?
Nadia's black robe and her use of "opaque usernames and avatars" online both underline this aspect of her characterization.
What is guardedness, or caution?
When Nadia and Saeed exit their first black door in Chapter 6, they find themselves here -- that is, in this kind of public space.
What is a public restroom?
“People in foreign lands preparing and consuming feasts of such opulence that the very fact of their existence boggled the mind” (Ch. 3). "Opulence" means this:
What is "luxuriousness"?
The description in Chapter 8 of “tanks and armored vehicles and communication arrays and robots” emphasizes this about the way the refugees feel in London:
What is a sense of powerlessness, of being overwhelmed by superior force?
“Nadia frequently explored the terrain of social media, though she felt left little trace of her passing" (Ch. 3).
"Terrain," the way it is used here, is an example of this kind of figurative language.
What is metaphor?
"Saeed also had the added advantage of being among those workers who spoke English and so occupied a status midway between the foreman and the others on the team."
His "midway status" between migrants and natives can also be described using this term borrowed from sociology.
What is "liminal"?
In Chapter 5, Saeed’s father sees a group of young men playing this sport, with a very particular kind of ball. (2 answers)
What is soccer, played with a human head?
“She always hoped they had found a way to depart unharmed, abandoning the city to the predations of warriors on both sides who seemed content to flatten it in order to possess it" (Ch. 4). In this sentence, the word predations means this:
What are "attacks"?
Centering the narrative on Nadia and Saeed as a couple suggests that, in addition to topics of great sociopolitical import, Exit West is also interested in this universal theme.
What is "love"?
“The city seemed to hold its breath, waiting for the next explosion that would shatter the silence.”
The primary figurative device used in this quote is this:
What is personification?
In Chapter 10, when Nadia and Saeed are in California, the migrants go to hear stories told by this group of people, because the stories "felt appropriate to this time of migration, and gave listeners much-needed sustenance."
Who are Native Americans?
In Chapter 2's "black-door" sequence set in Tokyo, a man follows girls from this country who arrive via a black door.
What are the Philippines?
"In times of violence, there is always that first acquaintance or intimate of ours, who, when they are touched, makes what has seemed like a bad dream suddenly, evisceratingly real" (Ch. 2).
The process of "eviscerating," in its LITERAL meaning, relates to this part of the body:
What are the viscera (bowels, or guts)?
The notable presence in the novel of islands and island nations (e.g., Mykonos, Greece, the British Isles, Japan, the Philippines) suggests that, among other big ideas, Hamid wants us to embrace this insight about the world:
What is, "no man [or nation] is an island"?
In the early chapters of the book, doors come to symbolize escape; windows, on the other hand, come to represent this:
What is (the boundary between life and) death?
"In exchange for their labor in clearing terrain and building infrastructure and assembling dwellings from prefabricated blocks, migrants were promised forty meters and a pipe" (Ch. 9).
Hamid's invention of this form of reward for the migrants' labor is an allusion to this actual occurrence in American history.
What is the promise of "40 acres and a mule" that General Sherman made to formerly enslaved persons following the Civil War?
Saeed learns in Chapter 9 that his father has died from this cause.
What is pneumonia?
"Sometimes someone from the press would descend on Saeed and Nadia’s camp or work site, but more often denizens would themselves document and post and comment online upon what was going on" (Ch. 9).
The word "denizens," as used in this sentence, means this:
What is "inhabitants"?
The "blackness" of the black doors in the novel's early chapters emphasizes this aspect of Saeed and Nadia's thoughts of flight.
What is profound uncertainty (about what lies beyond)?
"The foreman [had] that sort of quiet charisma that young men often gravitate towards, part of which lay in the native man’s not seeming the least interested in being admired" (Ch. 9).
In describing the foreman's effect on young men, Hamid uses this device -- also a favorite of F. Scott Fitzgerald -- which often includes paradox or seeming contradiction.
What is "epigram"?
In Chapter 10, Hamid describes one particular group of inhabitants of the United States using the following conceit: "While this layer of nativeness was not vast in proportion to the rest, it had vast importance, for society had been shaped in reaction to it, and unspeakable violence had occurred in relation to it, and yet it endured, fertile, a stratum of soil that perhaps made possible all future transplanted soils."
Who are African Americans?