Not only do teeth factor into the novel’s title, they are also a recurrent symbol throughout the narrative, with several layers of symbolic significance. Importantly, the titular reference to “white teeth” alludes to an early moment in the novel in which Irie, Millat, and Magid visit Mr. J. P. Hamilton, an older and highly racist man in their neighborhood. Mr. Hamilton tells the children that when he was in the Congo, “the only way [he] could identify a nigger was by the whiteness of his teeth.” On one hand, white teeth—contrasted with dark skin—represent the vulnerability of non-white people: throughout the novel, the non-white characters experience prejudice and are confronted by racist microaggressions that draw attention to their status as outsiders in British society. Yet white teeth are also popularly considered an attractive feature, and indeed, the novel characterizes non-white individuals as intelligent, vivacious, and complex, combatting the negative stereotypes upheld by white characters like Mr. Hamilton.
In the novel, teeth are also closely connected to history and its pernicious influence over the present. Chapters dealing specifically with characters’ histories refer to root canals (“The Root Canals of Alfred Archibald Jones and Samad Miah Iqbal,” “The Root Canals of Mangal Pande,” “The Root Canals of Hortense Bowden”), a process in which infections are removed from teeth roots. Just as a root canal involves searching for a hidden problem at the root of the tooth, these chapters examine the underlying events and conflicts that affect the characters or their descendants (so Hortense Bowden and Mangal Pande’s actions and experiences affect Clara and Irie Bowden, and Samad Iqbal, respectively). Moreover, the narrator notes that “old secrets,” like wisdom teeth, “will come out […] when the time is right.”
Wisdom teeth also represent the various secrets that characters keep from each other throughout the novel, all of which are eventually revealed, despite the characters’ best efforts at concealing them: for example, Archie reveals to Samad that he did not kill Dr. Perret, and Clara reveals to Irie that she wears false teeth (having had hers knocked out during a scooter accident with Ryan Topps). Additionally, Irie professes a desire to become a dentist, suggesting her propensity for uncovering hidden problems; she is also the only character in the novel to carefully examine her family history, discovering its blemishes (whereas Samad, for example, refuses to see his ancestor Mangal Pande as anything other than a clear hero). Ultimately, teeth are a shape-shifting symbol in the text, highlighting issues of race, history, and relationships between characters and their families.
Teeth Quotes in White Teeth
If religion is the opiate off the people, tradition is an even more sinister analgesic, simply because it rarely appears sinister. If religion is a tight band, a throbbing vein, and a needle, tradition is a far homelier concoction: poppy seeds ground into tea; a sweet cocoa drink laced with cocaine; the kind of thing your grandmother might have made. To Samad, as to the people of Thailand, tradition was culture, and culture led to roots, and these were good, these were untainted principles. That didn’t mean he could live by them, abide by them, or grow in the manner they demanded, but roots were roots and roots were good. You would get nowhere telling him that weeds too have tubers, or that the first sign of loose teeth is something rotten, something degenerate, deep within the gums.
It worked like this: someone (whoever had actually bought a pack of fags) lights up. Someone shouts “halves.” At the halfway point the fag is passed over. As soon as it reaches the second person we hear “thirds,” then “saves” (which is half a third), then “butt!,” then, if the day is cold and the need for a fag overwhelming, “last toke!” But last toke is only for the desperate; it is beyond the perforation, beyond the brand name of the cigarette, beyond what could reasonably be described as the butt. Last toke is the yellowing fabric of the roach, containing the stuff that is less than tobacco, the stuff that collects in the lungs like a time bomb, destroys the immune system, and brings permanent, sniffling, nasal flu. The stuff that turns white teeth yellow.
O what a tangled web we weave. Millat was right: these parents were damaged people, missing hands, missing teeth. These parents were full of information you wanted to know but were too scared to hear. But [Irie] didn’t want it anymore, she was tired of it. She was sick of never getting the whole truth. She was returning to sender.
Teeth Symbol Timeline in White Teeth
