Displacement Stories of Identity and Belonging. Andrea Levy

a multi-cultural society.

      Then: Different generations of immigrants are faced with different challenges when trying to fit in and develop a new sense of belonging in an unknown and at first alien environment. In the second section, two slightly longer and more complex stories deal with this type of immigrant experience, in the US and the UK respectively, their protagonists always returning to the central question: ‘Where is home?’

      Given that the fictional examples provided here are all based on the personal experiences of their authors in different corners of the world, you as readers are shown the wide kaleidoscope of developing an identity under extraordinary circumstances. Furthermore, the texts expose the challenges our modern multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society must face on a daily basis.

      We hope that you enjoy reading the stories and will relate to the central human issue of identity and belonging.

      In order to get to know the five authors a little better, please start with the following research activity:

       Five authors, five biographies, five stories of displacement

       In small groups, choose one of the authors to research and present to the class. Or choose and work on an author individually and then form groups to compare ideas:

       Qaisra Sharaz, Jhumpa Lahiri, Andrea Levy, Shereen Pandit, Saeed Taji Farouky

      1.Research your author’s biography, including ethnic and cultural background(s). Speculate how his/her experiences might have influenced his/her writing.

      2.Look at social media (Facebook/Twitter etc) and/or the authors’ personal websites and analyse how they present themselves and their work.

      3.Find quotes from the authors’ works or from interviews (e.g. on YouTube). Choose your favourite quote and present it to the class. Explain your choice.

1.Questions of courage and conscience

      Andrea Levy

       Loose Change

I am not in the habit of making friends with strangers. I’m a Londoner. Not even little grey-haired old ladies passing comment on the weather can shame a response from me. I’m a Londoner – aloof sweats from my pores. But I was in a bit of a predicament; my period was two days early and I was caught unprepared.

I’d just gone into the National Portrait Gallery to get out of the cold. It had begun to feel, as I’d walked through the bleak streets, like acid was being thrown at my exposed skin. My fingers were numb searching in my purse for change for the tampon machine; I barely felt the pull of the zip. But I didn’t have any coins.

      I was forced to ask in a loud voice in this small lavatory. “Has anyone got three twenty-pence pieces?”

      Everyone seemed to leave the place at once – all of them Londoners, I was sure of it. Only she was left – fixing her hair in the mirror.

      “Do you have change?”

She turned round slowly as I held out a ten pound note. She had the most spectacular eyebrows. I could see the lines of black hair, like magnetized iron fillings, tumbling across her eyes and almost joining above her nose. I must have been staring hard to recall them so clearly now. She had wide black eyes and a round face with such a solid jawline that she looked to have taken a gentle whack from Tom and Jerry’s cartoon frying pan. She dug into the pocket of her jacket and pulled out a bulging handful of money. It was coppers mostly. Same of it tinkled on to the floor. But she had change: too much – I didn’t want a bag full of the stuff myself.

      “Have you a five-pound note as well?” I asked.

      She dropped the coins on to the basin area, spreading them out into the soapy puddles of water that were lying there. Then she said, “You look?” She had an accent but I couldn’t tell then where it was from; I thought maybe Spain.

      “Is this all you’ve got?” I asked. She nodded. “Well look, let me just take this now …” I picked three coins out of the pile. “Then I’ll get some change in the shop and pay them back to you.” Her gaze was as keen as a cat with string. “Do you understand – only I don’t want all those coins?”

      “Yes,” she said softly.

I was grateful. I took the money. But when I emerged from the cubicle, the girl and her handful of change were gone.

I found her again, staring at the portrait of Darcey Bussell. She was inclining her head from one side to the other as if the painting were a dress she might soon try on for size.

      I approached her about the money but she just said, “This is good picture.”

Was it my explanation left dangling or the fact that she liked the dreadful painting that caused my mouth to gape?

      “Really, you like it?” I said.

      “She doesn’t look real. It looks like…” Her eyelids fluttered sleepily as she searched for the right word. “A dream.”

That particular picture always reminded me of the doodles girls drew in their rough books at school.

      “You don’t like?” she asked.

I shrugged.

      “You show me one you like,” she said.

As I mentioned before, I’m not in the habit of making friends with strangers, but there was something about this girl. Her eyes were encircled with dark shadows so that even when she smiled – introducing herself cheerfully as Laylor – they remained as mournful as a glum kid at a party. I took this fraternisation as defeat but I had to introduce her to a better portrait.

Alan Bennett with his mysterious little brown bag didn’t impress her at all. She preferred the photograph of David Beckham. Germaine Greer made her top lip curl and as for A.S. Byatt, she laughed out loud. “This is child make this?”

      We were almost creating a scene. Laylor couldn’t keep her voice down and people were beginning to watch us. I wanted to be released from my obligation.

      “Look, let me buy us both a cup of tea,” I said. “Then I can give you back your money.”

      She brought out her handful of change again as we sat down at a table – eagerly passing it across for me to take some for the tea.

      “No, I’ll get this,” I said.