Americanah
novel by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Americanah (2013) is a novel by the Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, for which Adichie won the 2013 U.S. National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction. Americanah tells the story of a young Nigerian woman, Ifemelu, who immigrates to the United States to attend university. The novel traces Ifemelu's life in both countries, threaded by her love story with high school classmate Obinze.
- “She liked, most of all, that in this place of affluent ease, she could pretend to be someone else, someone specially admitted into the hallowed American club, someone adorned with certainty.”
- Narrator, Part 1, Chapter 1
- Ifemelu expresses her sense of alienation in America, as well as her desire to belong in her adopted country as she prepares to return to her homeland.
- "He felt a hollow space between himself and the person he was supposed to be."
- Narrator, Part 1, Chapter 2
- Obinze has everything a Nigerian man is supposed to want: a good job, a nice house, a beautiful wife, and a healthy child. These things are nice, but they don't fill the void in his soul. They are not important to Obinze. He cares more about emotional connections and intellectual stimulation, neither of which he gets from his job or his relationship with Kosi. The only time he has ever known the contentment he craves was when he was with Ifemelu. She is his missing piece.
- “She would always remember this moment, these words: I’m chasing you.”
- Narrator, Part 2, Chapter 4
- This quote sums up Ifemelu’s relationship with Obinze.
- “She liked that [Obinze] wore their relationship so boldly, like a brightly colored shirt. Sometimes she worried that she was too happy. She would sink into moodiness, and snap at Obinze, or be distant. And her joy would become a restless thing, flapping its wings inside her, as though looking for an opening to fly away.”
- Narrator, Part 2, Chapter 4
- This quote highlights Ifemelu’s personality. She is a deeply restless individual who seeks out happiness and meaning in her life, but is then unable to accept that she deserves it.
- " She rested her head against his and felt, for the first time, what she would often feel with him: a self-affection. He made her like herself. With him, she was at ease: her skin felt as though it was her right size. She told him how she very much wanted God to exist but feared He did not, how she worried that she should know what she wanted to do with her life but did not even know what she wanted to study at university. It seemed so natural, to talk to him about odd things. She had never done that before. The trust, so sudden and yet so complete, and the intimacy, frightened her."
- Narrator, Part 2, Chapter 4
- "If you are not careful in this country, your children will become what you don't know."
- Jane, Part 2, Chapter 10
- Jane and Aunty Uju both believe the stereotypes they've heard about African Americans. They share the fear that their children will grow up to be ill-mannered delinquents like the ones they hear about in the news and in popular culture.
- "If you have braids, they will think you are unprofessional."
- Aunty Uju, Part 2, Chapter 11
- Hair comes up a lot in Americanah—how it is styled, who styles it, and what it all means. Aunty Uju decides to take out her braids, which are common in Nigeria, because corporate white America does not view traditionally black hairstyles as professional.
- "I didn't know I was even supposed to have issues until I came to America."
- Ginika, Part 2, Chapter 12
- Ginika grew up calling herself half-caste, but when she moved to the United States she was told that was an insult.
- "That was what Curt had given her, this gift of contentment, of ease."
- Narrator, Part 2, Chapter 19
- Ifemelu genuinely likes Curt, but she also likes how free and easy her life has become since she started dating him. This is what she had hoped to find in America: a brighter, easier life.
- "When you make the choice to come to America, you become black."
- Ifemelu, Part 2, Chapter 21
- Ifemelu argues that it doesn't matter where a person is from or how light their skin is—it is American culture, not the individual, who decides how the individual will be categorized.
- "These white people think that everybody has their mental problems."
- Ojiugo, Part 3, Chapter 24
- Mental health comes up frequently in the novel Americanah. Ojiugo mentions this when she attends a meeting for people wanting to lose weight and is told she has "internal issues." Funnily enough, she attributes it to her love for food.
- "He expected her to feel what she did not know how to feel."
- Narrator, Part 4, Chapter 34
- Blaine grew up in the United States, where race impacted every part of his life. He becomes irritated with Ifemelu because he thinks she doesn't care deeply enough about race relations in the United States. He doesn't understand that race doesn't define her experiences the way it defines his.
- " She was no longer sure what was new in Lagos and what was new in herself."
- Narrator, Part 7, Chapter 44
- Ifemelu has been away for so long that she is no longer a "true Lagosian," and the feeling is disconcerting.
- "She was inside this silence and she was safe."
- Narrator, Part 7, Chapter 51
- Obinze and Ifemelu have have reunited in Lagos, and Ifemelu has just told him why she stopped talking to him all those years ago. Instead of judgment or anger, Obinze responds with compassion and love. He takes her hand, and the silence that grows between them feels the same as when they were teenagers. Ifemelu has not felt this at peace since she left Lagos the first time.
- The pain of his absence did not decrease with time; it seemed instead to sink in deeper each day, to rouse in her even clearer memories. Still, she was at peace: to be home, to be writing her blog, to have discovered Lagos again. She had, finally, spun herself fully into being.
- (Chapter 55 )
- Once she had told him, “The thing about cross-cultural relationships is that you spend so much time explaining. My ex-boyfriends and I spent a lot of time explaining. I sometimes wondered whether we would even have anything at all to say to each other if we were from the same place,” and it pleased him to hear that, because it gave his relationship with her a depth, a lack of trifling novelty. They were from the same place and they still had a lot to say to each other.
- (Chapter 54 )
