The Embassy of Cambodia

Zadie Smith

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2013

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-7

Chapters 8-14

Chapters 15-21

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

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Discussion Questions

Themes

The Consequences of Dehumanization and Stereotypes

Very few of the characters in the short story are allowed to be dynamic or hold dynamic views of the people around them. As a result, no characters’ fully lived experience is portrayed with any nuance or understanding, highlighting the danger of dehumanization and stereotypes.

Fatou lives in modern-day enslavement and is frequently dehumanized by the Derawals. The children use her name as a slur with each other: “Sometimes she heard her name used as a term of abuse between them. ‘You’re as black as Fatou.’ Or ‘You’re as stupid as Fatou’” (16). Fatou goes to great lengths to convince herself she’s not enslaved after reading an article about an enslaved woman. However, following Fatou’s life-saving action during Asma’s choking incident, the Derawals are forced to view Fatou as human for the first time. She is no longer the girl they have clean their home without pay; she is a woman who saved their child. They are unable to deal with this role reversal and struggle to maintain eye contact with her in the weeks leading up to her termination. Ultimately, they fire Fatou for no explicit reason, but it is implied that Fatou’s very human and generous help when Asma was choking is the cause. By dehumanizing Fatou for so long, the Derawals are unable to recategorize their relationship with her when she acts in ways outside the stereotypes and expectations they have for her.

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Additionally, many of the characters in the novella are interested in the Embassy of Cambodia but are unable to view it outside of its historical stereotype of genocide: “I doubt there is a man or woman among us, for example, who—upon passing the Embassy of Cambodia for the first time—did not immediately think: ‘genocide’” (6). While the Cambodian Genocide is an important part of Cambodia’s history, it is not their whole history or identity. By only focusing on one aspect of their history, Fatou is unable to see the similarities she and people from Cambodia might share and instead sees them as people very different from her. However, her fixation with the embassy also suggests a pull based on an idyllic façade housing complex lives underneath, much like Fatou’s life with the Derawals.

Self-Reliance, Independence, and Agency

Amid her domestic enslavement at the Derawals’ home, Fatou seeks independence by swimming at the health center. The recurring motif of water emphasizes her desire for independence from a young age, as she taught herself to swim in the ocean near Ghana, where the beach was dirty and the water rough. For Fatou, water is a place where she is in control. While the Derawals provide the opportunity for her to swim with their guest passes, they are never aware of the fact that she swims at the health center weekly, giving Fatou an aspect of her life that she can keep secret. Interestingly, when Fatou feels like she is losing some power in her conversations with Andrew, she asks him to swim, so she can better understand his quirks and “weaknesses.” This is successful, as Andrew proves to be a terrible swimmer, and Fatou remains in the water, where he watches her. This makes her uncomfortable, as it is not only predatory but also occurs in the place where she takes her respite and asserts her self-reliance, independence, and agency.

Fatou often stereotypes people from Asian countries as having more independence and self-reliance, and she finds herself jealous of this assumption. She explains, “She both admired and slightly resented this self-reliance but had no doubt that it was the secret to holding great power, as a people” (20-21). Fatou assumes that all people from Asia have a level of independence that she will never have, making her unable to see their fully lived and nuanced experience. This truth is complicated by her undeniable pull to the Embassy of Cambodia, suggesting some reckoning of likeness that she does not verbalize.

The Pain and Suffering of Daily Life

Throughout the short story, Fatou is obsessed with understanding why people originating from Africa seem to suffer more than others. Despite many conversations with Andrew, she only once receives an answer that brings her peace. After telling Andrew about two traumas she witnessed, he tells her, “A tap runs fast the first time you switch it on” (48). This implies that when people are consistently exposed to trauma—like the people on the beach where the children’s bodies washed ashore—they are less likely to react with extreme feelings because suffering and pain are a daily part of their lives. Meanwhile, people who are not exposed to trauma daily—like the people in Italy who saw the boy wreck his bike—are going to react with extreme emotion because the trauma is an abnormality. To deal with trauma, Fatou assumes the Devil is responsible for most of her suffering, such as her sexual assault and her termination by the Derawals. The Devil becomes a symbol of her systemic suffering, and she often reacts in extreme anger whenever she believes he appears.

Notably, most characters focus on the Embassy of Cambodia’s association with genocide and the suffering that the genocide caused. By focusing on such a large-scale example of suffering and pain, the characters can ignore other instances of suffering and pain in their daily lives, such as the fact that Fatou lives as an enslaved person in modern-day London.