Exit West

“It might seem odd that in cities teetering at the edge of the abyss young people still go to class—in this case an evening class on corporate identity and product branding—but that is the way of things, with cities as with life, for one moment we are pottering about our errands as usual and the next we are dying, and our eternally impending ending does not put a stop to our transient beginnings and middles, until it does.” 

This opening passage, with its mixture of intimacy and detachment, in many ways sets the tone for the novel. It is a novel that talks about big, global disruptions, while also examining one intimate domestic relationship—that of Saeed and Nadia—up close.  

“Nadia looked him in the eye. ‘You don’t say your evening prayers?’ she asked. Saeed conjured up his most endearing grin. ‘Not always. Sadly.’”

There is some layered irony in this early exchange between Nadia and Saeed, as it is Saeed who will be revealed to be the more traditionally religious of the two. Nadia’s donning of a traditional pious persona is more of a means for her to preserve her independence. 

“He was aware that alone a person is almost nothing.” 

This refers to a minor character in the book: a thief, or perhaps simply a refugee, hiding out in the closet of an upper-class home. However, the quote reflects interestingly on the book as a whole, which is full of refugees and characters who have lost their usual contexts of home, work, and family. Rather than this loss making them “nothing,” it more often causes them to form a new community of disenfranchised people.