Glimpses of Lagos Through Vehicle Windows: The Motorized Returnee and Transient ‘Home’ in Teju Cole’s Every Day is for the Thief

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article proposes interpreting the narrator of Teju Cole’s Every Day is for the Thief (2014) as a ‘motorized returnee’, exploring how his visual experiences through the windows of various modes of transportation resonate with his perception of ‘returning home’. I argue that the narrator’s progressive motorized lens reflects his deepening understanding of the transience of homelike landscapes and the irreversibility of his departure from home. As he navigates through different modes of transportation, the distance between him and his former hometown gradually narrows. Such progression is mirrored in the changing states of vehicle windows, moving from closed to open, and eventually, to a state where their presence is entirely neglected, depicting his transition from a detached observer’s perspective to an embedded inhabitant’s one. My analysis highlights that the danfo bus emerges as pivotal, both thematically and formally, during the narrator’s homecoming trip, providing him with a liminal space that maintains a balance between distance and proximity, estrangement, and vulnerability to unpack his complex perceptions of the landscapes of Lagos.