Teju Cole's Every Day Is for the Thief
opens as it means to go on, with a jeremiad against the corruption and
sense of hopelessness in which Nigerian society wallows and which it
seems incapable of escaping. The unnamed narrator has to pay a bribe,
right under a sign that says, "don't give bribes", as he applies for a
visa in the Nigerian consulate in New York. The bribe-givers know they
shouldn't give bribes, the bribe-takers know they shouldn't take them,
but both are helpless, it seems, against an almost metaphysical force
that drives them on this path, with no end in sight. At the embassy a
man says over and over, as if trying to convince himself, "This should
be a time of joy. You know. Going home should be a thing of joy."
