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Play in the City 2013
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Welcome to the on-line conversation for Play in the City, an Emily Balch Seminar offered in Fall 2013 @ Bryn Mawr College, in which we are addressing the question of how we construct, experience, and learn in the act of play. How is play both structured by the environment in which it occurs, and how might it re-structure that space, unsettling and re-drawing the frame in which it is performed? This is an interestingly different kind of place for writing, and may take some getting used to. The first thing to keep in mind is that it's not a site for "formal writing" or "finished thoughts." It's a place for thoughts-in-progress, for what you're thinking (whether you know it or not) on your way to what you think next. Imagine that you're just talking to some people you've met. This is a "conversation" place, a place to find out what you're thinking yourself, and what other people are thinking. The idea here is that your "thoughts in progress" can help others with their thinking, and theirs can help you with yours. |
Who are you writing for? Primarily for yourself, and for others in our course. But also for the world. This is a "public" forum, so people anywhere on the web might look in. You're writing for yourself, for others in the class, AND for others you might or might not know. So, your thoughts in progress can contribute to the thoughts in progress of LOTS of people. The web is giving increasing reality to the idea that there can actually evolve a world community, and you're part of helping to bring that about. We're glad to have you along, and hope you come to both enjoy and value our shared explorations. Feel free to comment on any post below, or to POST YOUR THOUGHTS HERE.
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37: An Anchor to the Past
Although at first glance the chapter numbers of Visitation, the first section of NW by Zadie Smith, seems almost arbitrary, there is an underlying intent behind the chapter-nomenclature intended to draw specific focus to how Leah thinks, and her desire to stay firmly planted in a position in the past.
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Identity
When Zadie Smith came to speak at Bryn Mawr, she discussed how we as people are able to view others and see who they are as a person, but when we look back on ourselves, we are unable to place who we are as a person, which can be frustrating and disconcerting to those who are unable to accept this as a general fact of existing. This struggle with identity can be seen in Zadie Smith’s novel NW, through the characterization of Keisha/Natalie, who throughout the novel battles with who she is as a person, who she wants to be, and how she wants others to view her. Keisha’s first battle with her identity develops from her being ashamed by her background in the low-income area of north west London, where her decision to change her name is representative of wanting to leave her previous life behind and start anew, however, the new Natalie is never able to leave Keisha behind. Another identity crisis that Natalie struggles with is her need to create an identity that she can see, rather than being content with who she is as an individual. She has grown up trying to become the ideal model of a person that she has created based on her perceptions of other people and what she views as fitting for a successful life, and she unsuccessfully does this by taking fragmented bits of other peoples lives and trying to build a life of her own.
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The True Essence of Natalie/Keisha Blake
How does one define their own identity? Is it by the way that they wish to be seen and the person they want to be or is it something more than that? In “NW” by Zadie Smith, Natalie (formerly Keisha) struggles with these questions as she moves through her life trying to find who she really is.
In existentialism it is though that a person defines their essence through their actions rather than being governed by some greater human nature. Every action a person does is a part of that identity, even if it is done unconsciously. (Crowell) In her youth, Keisha had already begun to feel the identity crisis that would plague her adulthood. Around the age of ten she realized “In the child’s mind a breach now appeared: between what she believed she knew of herself, essentially, and her essence as other seemed to understand it.” (Smith 208) She alone saw the inner workings of her own mind, though that is not what defines her identity, or, more accurately her essence. In the existentialist perspective the way in which others understood her essence was much closer to her identity because that view was based much more heavily on her actions rather than her private thoughts.
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Reasonably Self-Interested
Zadie Smith’s novel NW contains multiple stories composed of social, familial, romantic, and marital interaction. Surrounding several of these interactions are performances of economic activity, behaviour, and mentality. The stories of Leah, Michel, Natalie, Frank, and Natalie’s and Frank’s children all raise ideas of economic behavioural influences in non-economic aspects of their lives. This analysis leads to the notion of how self-interest and tendency for self-serving fundamentally drive our performance and behaviour in life.
![Cathy Zhou's picture Cathy Zhou's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1256.png)
the economical status in marriage
When I started reading NW, I was confused about the entirely different actions by Leah and Michel. And I decided to focus on their difference caused by economical influences.
The story keeps comparing their differences: Leah wants to stay wherever she is, and Michel is always trying to push things forward. Their conflict comes from their different plans for future: as a well-planned man, Michel wants a child but Leah has a fear for having a change. But that difference didn’t occur for Leah hates her husband----she always likes being with Michel when alone, but she got socially embarrassed all the time by his poor English and social awkwardness in public. When they were in Natalie’s house, Leah kept correcting Michel and they came to a little fight which ended soon when they went back home and had time alone. This show that they actually are very harmonious without the society interrupting. Their social life seems to be one interruption to their relationship. And what made the differences?
![Claire Romaine's picture Claire Romaine's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1257.jpg)
Two Sides of the Same Coin
When does friendship begin? When can you say that you’ve made an acquaintance? It might be after a dinner conversation, or even a long walk back to the dorm from classes, but what really marks the start of any kind of relationship is names. Knowing another person’s name is what differentiates them from a person seen across the hallway or a face you recognize in a crowd, as if knowledge of names equates to familiarity and knowledge of another’s identity. In NW by Zadie Smith, names are critical to understanding the identities and personalities of the characters. In particular, the dichotomy between Keisha and Natalie as two different aspects of the same individual causes an incredibly complex identity crisis that drives much her story in the novel.
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The Real UK
The real NW
Though seemingly realistic, Zadie Smith’s NW is loaded with inaccuracies in regards to the area and characteristics of locals that become apparent after an investigation.
While reading NW something didn’t ring true. The story did not feel real. Having never been to the area, however, I accepted the descriptions of all of the actual locations to be accurate. I accepted Willesden as an area where whites are the minority, everyone smokes and most people are from modest backgrounds, but these characterizations are inaccurate. According to a report on the public health of Brent County in London more than half of Willesden residents are white and about 70% of all people in London are as well (Willesden). This report goes on to show that “at least a fifth of the population… smokes” and in all of the separate sections of Willesden, for men and women, unemployment ranges from 3.4% to 7.4% which is about 50% higher than that of all of England; the report does not, however, indicate the actual socioeconomic statuses common in Willesden. Though just numbers, these statistics paint a much more detailed picture of the citizens of Willesden.
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Smith Meets Kirkegaard: Existentialism in NW
Phoenix
Mlord
Play in the City 028
Sunday, October 27, 2013
Smith Meets Kirkegaard: Existentialism in NW
Chapter number 138 in the section titled Host, in NW by Zadie Smith, is titled with a long URL. The URL, when typed into the web address bar of a browser, is merely a Google search on Søren Kierkegaard. The chapter itself is not about Kierkegaard at all. It is short, only 60 words:
Such a moment has a peculiar character. It is brief and temporal indeed, like every moment; it is transient as all moments are; it is past, like every moment in the next moment. And yet it is decisive, and filled with the eternal. Such a moment ought to have a distinctive name; let us call it the Fullness of Time. 303
What exactly this moment is, is somewhat unclear. The preceding chapter talks about the difference between a moment and an instant, but does not mention any particular type of moment that Smith might be describing now. If ‘Such a moment’ is all moments as opposed to instants, then it might describe the “special awareness” that beauty invokes in Natalie. “The fullness of time,” on the other hand, is rather easier to understand and to relate to the title: it’s a Bible verse, Galatians 4:4.5, describing the timing of God sending Jesus to Earth.
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Leah's life through 37 and Shar
The number 37 and Leah Hanwell are introduced at the beginning of NW and resurface throughout it. Leah probably learned about the number 37 from her friend Natalie who said, “The number 37 has a magic about it, we’re compelled toward it. Websites are dedicated to the phenomenon. The imagined houses found in cinema, fiction, painting, and poetry-almost always 37. Asked to choose a number at random: almost always 37. Watch for 37, the girl said, in our lotteries, our game-shows, and our dreams and jokes, and Leah did, and Leah still does.” (46) This quote conveys that the number 37 has a “magical” significance, and is somehow part of the underlining structure of society. The number 37 stays in Leah’s subconscious throughout NW and she notes whenever she sees it.
Leah has many chance meetings with an old schoolmate named Shar. (5) After these encounters, like the number 37, Shar stays in Leah’s subconscious. Shar knocks on Leah’s door one day asking for money. Leah lends Shar money, and Shar promises to pay her back. After that incident, Leah starts to have multiple chance encounters with Shar, and Shar doesn’t pay her back.
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Race: A factor in Relationship Stability and Function
Jessica Bernal
ESEM- Play in the City
Race: A factor in Relationship Stability and Function
In NW, Zadie Smith delves into three preeminent romantic relationships; Leah and Michel, Natalie and Frank, and Felix and Grace. Each relationship with stories and dilemmas of their own like any other typical relationship. Yet, Leah and Michel’s relationship is far more complex than the average relationship as we determine that their different ethnicities play a bigger role in defining their unity. From the view of a London inner city resident, the attitude towards interracial couples emphasizes that race plays a role in relationship stability and function to which such is represented by Zadie Smith’s unique relationship creation of Leah and Michel.
Leah and Michel’s relationship is more of a physical attraction and sexual compatibility than respect and admiration for one another. Two complete different ends of a spectrum where as she is a white successful woman and Michel is a francophone black man trying to make a better living by disproving all stereotypes based on the color of his skin and in the end proving he as well can do greatness. Their social status creates tension within their relationship causing it to be unfunctional.
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Agency: A Moot Point?
In class, several people argued that Zadie Smith’s Natalie was the only character who showed any agency. By doing well in school, becoming a lawyer, and marrying a wealthy man, Natalie escapes poverty. But, is Natalie the only character who has agency in NW?
Sabina Alkirke analyzes several researchers’ methods of studying agency in “Subjective Quantitative studies of Human Agency.” She finds that agency is not only measured by a person’s ability to change her socioeconomic class. Alkirke broadens the definition of agency to be “people’s ability to act on behalf of what matters to them” (Alkirke 223). She presents agency as multi-faceted; it can be measured objectively through a person’s resources, but also subjectively through feelings of empowerment (Alkirke 23). Agency, therefore, is both an internal and an external phenomenon. Using Alkirke’s definition, Natalie has agency, but so do Leah and Felix.
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The Other: Friendship in Existentialism
Co-authored by Frindle
Zadie Smith begins and ends her novel, NW, with each half of a friendship. The novel opens with Leah, grown up and on her own, listening to a radio that at some point mentions what it is to define oneself. The novel closes with Keisha (now Natalie), going through an existential crisis. A large portion of the middle of the novel is devoted to the events that lead to the beginning and the end of the novel, toward the adulthood of these characters. In this way, the book appears to almost grow from the inside out, which parallels the theme of existentialism throughout the novel. Existentialism is the idea that one is defined through one’s own actions; what one chooses to do internally is observed by an “Other,” who then is able to define the other. In this way, one cannot be defined without an Other (in this case, a close friend). When one loses their Other, they also lose a large part of their identity and fall into despair, which leads to an existential crisis.
![Frindle's picture Frindle's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1262.jpg)
The Other: Friendship in Existentialism
Co-authored by Muni
Zadie Smith begins and ends her novel, NW, with each half of a friendship. The novel opens with Leah, grown up and on her own, listening to a radio that at some point mentions what it is to define oneself. The novel closes with Keisha (now Natalie), going through an existential crisis. A large portion of the middle of the novel is devoted to the events that lead to the beginning and the end of the novel, toward the adulthood of these characters. In this way, the book appears to almost grow from the inside out, which parallels the theme of existentialism throughout the novel. Existentialism is the idea that one is defined through one’s own actions; what one chooses to do internally is observed by an “Other,” who then is able to define the other. In this way, one cannot be defined without an Other (in this case, a close friend). When one loses their Other, they also lose a large part of their identity and fall into despair, which leads to an existential crisis.
![Clairity's picture Clairity's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1275.jpg)
Do we get what we deserve?
"I just don’t understand why I have this life." Leah said.
"Because we worked harder...We were smarter...We wanted to get out...they didn't want it enough...people generally get what they deserve." Natalie replies.
I paused at this paragraph towards the end of Zadie Smith's NW, thinking.
This is a book that presents vivid reality. This is a book that leads me to ask questions. This is a book that makes me doubt whether social mobility is really feasible. And one of the questions that I keep wondering is why Zadie Smith didn't seem to agree that it is very much possible.
"Visitation-Guest-Host-Crossing-Visitation". Through a circle of chapters, the four main characters, Leah, Natalie/Keisha, Felix and Nathan, live towards different paths after they leave their childhood's council estate, a place where all of them start from together.
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The End of the World as Felix Knows It
ex·is·ten·tial·ism (n)–
A philosophy that emphasizes the uniqueness and isolation of the individual experience in a hostile or indifferent universe, regards human existence as unexplainable, and stresses freedom of choice and responsibility for the consequences of one's acts.
Throughout the course of Zadie Smith’s novel NW, the reader is treated to three different yet concurrent perspectives from residents of the NW neighborhood in London. The novel stars Leah Hanwell, the perennial underachiever, Felix Cooper, who is actively turning his life around, and Natalie Blake, née Keisha Blake, who on the surface seems the happiest and most successful of the three, but has her own demons to deal with. Each character has chapters following his or her life, leading up to the annual neighborhood Carnival. Besides the neighborhood itself, one of the points of the novel that ties all three sections together is Felix’s death the night before Carnival. It is referenced in Leah’s chapters, experienced in his, and the aftermath is mentioned in Natalie’s. Smith uses the intersection of these perspectives within the city in regards to Felix’s death as a tool to express the ideas of existentialist philosophy, structuring the story to show the connections in order to expose the meaninglessness in the lives behind those connections.
![Mindy Lu's picture Mindy Lu's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1276.jpg)
Friendship between Leah and Natalie
Friendship between Leah and Natalie
Relationships make a novel. Every single piece of stories is connected and combined by relationships of various sorts. Complex relationships among characters make plots splendid. In the novel NW by Zadie Smith, there are lots of relationships not only among characters but also among the backgrounds, the city, the stories and the fates, which makes the novel absorbing and interesting.
![Grace Zhou's picture Grace Zhou's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1264.jpg)
self-respect
On one side, Felix was naked and did not intend to cover himself. (Smith 113) On the other side, Natalie was naked, shamefully. (Smith 389) It is interesting to find that Zadie Smith opens two seemingly separated stories of unrelated people with the same settings and portraits. In re-reading this book, I am shocked that there are many similarities between Felix and Nat. However, there are large differences or even contrasts between them, which seem like two people with analogical background turn to adverse directions in lives. Maybe, I think, Felix plays vital rule in this book by acting as another opposite Natalie.
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On Vulnerability (co-written with Pia Wong)
“The man was naked, the woman dressed. It didn’t look right, but the woman had somewhere to go. He lay clowning in bed, holding her wrist. She tried to put a shoe on. Under their window they heard truck doors opening, boxes of produce heaved onto tarmac. Felix sat up and looked to the car park below… Grace tapped the window with a long fake nail: “Babe – they can see you.” Felix stretched. He made no effort to cover himself. “Some people shameless,” noted Grace and squeezed round the bed to straighten the figurines on the windowsill” (113).
![pialikesowls's picture pialikesowls's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1268.jpg)
Classical Sculpture as NW (co-written with Natalie Schall)
“The man was naked, the woman dressed. It didn’t look right, but the woman had somewhere to go. He lay clowning in bed, holding her wrist. She tried to put a shoe on. Under their window they heard truck doors opening, boxes of produce heaved onto tarmac. Felix sat up and looked to the car park below… Grace tapped the window with a long fake nail: “Babe – they can see you.” Felix stretched. He made no effort to cover himself. “Some people shameless,” noted Grace and squeezed round the bed to straighten the figurines on the windowsill” (113).