Caleb Azumah Nelson's debut novel Open Water features an exquisite story of love and existence while exposing the Black experience and the intensely intimate terrors of living, being oneself, while knowing that the self is seen differently by everyone ‘other’. For our anonymous male narrator, this is both a battle to open up to someone he wants to be honest with, as well as the terrible realities of his experience as a young Black man. Through brilliantly written prose Nelson examines what it means to be a young black Londoner, the essence of masculinity, the terrible tiredness, fragmentation, and trauma of racism, police violence, and the perpetual feeling of being invisible, only seen as the black ‘other’.
What is better than believing you are heading towards love?
The short novel has the echoes of a typical romance: two young people fall in love when they shouldn't, she being the ex-girlfriend of our male lead’s friend. The characters connect over their joint experiences and traumas, both being Black British and creatives, (her a dancer, him a photographer) struggling to establish a name for themselves in a city that both celebrates and hates them for their ‘otherness’. As their relationship develops professionally, so does their friendship, with them finding themselves travelling beyond the boundaries of said relationship into the deeper, open seas of an extremely intense and personal platonic connection. But, as typical for the ‘forbidden-love’ trope, the pair can no longer withstand the desire they feel for one another, and after a brief stint of that all too familiar ‘will they/won't they’ tension they move from friends to lovers. Inevitably, the relationship is met with challenges with their newly established bond tested by our male protagonist's past and insecurities. With him, he carries his past, including wounds, worries, and uncertainty that have dire repercussions on this relationship.
It's one thing to be looked at and another to be seen.
But Open Water is more than just its romance, rather it is about the idea of being ‘seen’ and what this means. The use of specific language and perspective places the reader as both observers and the observed, exposing the Black experience and the intensely intimate terrors of living, being oneself, while knowing that the self is seen differently by everyone ‘other’.
The emotional impact of the story is directly pushed on you, the reader, asking you to embody the body of this anonymous central character, who, in turn, uses the 'you' to detach themselves from their sorrow in order to gaze at it from the outside. By utilising a second-person narrative Azumah Nelson creates a dramatic dimension of immediacy to the novel, placing readers, who might not relate to the complex Black trauma, at the root of it. Readers become one with the story, with any hesitancy of embodying such a narrative pushed away swiftly and as they become unafraid and get swept up in Azumah Nelson’s prose.
This notion of being seen and defined by those who see you is rooted in the photographer’s trauma and ultimately plagues his relationship, fearing the vulnerability that comes from the intimacy of a loving relationship; an extremely relatable feeling that shows Azumah Nelson’s skill at accurately portraying the human experience. This is then contrasted by the concept of ‘not’ being seen, and how this, in itself, is vulnerable and dangerous.
The narrative is often interrupted by the stop-and-searches of the photographer, the flow of the novel now reflecting the real-life narrative of young black men in London. The photographer is stopped because of his Black body, where he is seen as “someone, but that person is not you”, merely for existing on a London street at night. This imposition upon his identity causes internal conflict in the photographer, and subversively the reader, that perpetuates a trauma that permeates the novel and his relationships. These racist observations and definitions by society become a continual worry for him, providing him with a grim self-awareness that his physicality unintentionally identifies him as a threat, making him simple to degrade or destroy.
The interest in energies and frequencies remains, and you’ve always wanted to make music, always wanted to know where you, too, could feel just right.
For all that Open Water focuses on Black trauma, Azumah Nelson also infuses his novel with the successes of Black creativity, artistry and joy, reminding the reader of the valuable contributions and impacts of Black culture and individuals. Artists such as Dizzee Rascal, Kendrick Lamar and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye are named as both influences in the photographer's work, as well as in emotive discussions within his relationship. Perhaps most notable is the cameo of Zadie Smith, a world-renowned Black British author that, through the admiration of her novel NW by our male protagonist, brings together the context and framing of both Black British creative and Londoner that is interwoven throughout the novel.
The novel, while small, packs a proverbial punch, creating an intense but poetic exploration into a myriad of topics alongside the already impactful main narrative. These include, but are not limited to: the unique experience and challenges as a black individual in a private school, the Notting Hill Carnival, and the experiences of grief after a loss.
Azumah Nelson’s intentions when crafting Open Water are astounding and deeply impactful, and his desire to capture the multiplicity of a distinctly black perspective in near-poetic prose exemplifies his unarguable skill. With less than 200 pages Azumah Nelson portrays a pure emotional intensity that belies the contradiction of not wanting to be vulnerable but also wanting to be ‘seen’. He posits this alongside the dehumanisation of the Black body and how in this context this contradiction is fraught with so much more: racism, police brutality, and the manifestation of generational trauma. Open Water is both brutal and tender, more of an experience than a novella, and ultimately a love story to Black creativity.
Below are links to further information regarding the many references to artists, writers, and musicians made within Open Water.
Photographers
Painters
Writers (incl. essayists)
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