The novel “White Teeth” takes place in North London and begins on New Year’s morning in 1975.  This setting affects the novel a tremendous amount.  Some reasons why the setting affected the novel so much are the education and behavior of the characters in the novel, the technology, and the religion.  If the setting had not been in North London, the novel’s plot would have been entirely different.  The setting contributed to the success of this novel by making it witty, interesting, and exciting.  

First, the setting affects the character’s education and behavior.  Children are educated in public or private schools.  Some of the schools even have a band or an orchestra.  In other countries, there might be poor education or they might not even have decent schools let alone a band or orchestra.  The schools in the novel cared for students and tried hard to stop students from committing crimes like using drugs or illegal substances.  For instance, when the school’s principal finds out that Josh and his  pot-smoking friends have been receiving poor grades and taking drugs, he makes them study together.  The school also put strict restrictions against drug use and even got the police involved.  Different places have different restrictions against drugs.  The use of drugs would alter the character’s way of thinking and their behavior.  In North London, many people smoked at least occasionally every week.  If the setting took place elsewhere, there would have been laws against the use of drugs or drugs in that area were rare or expensive.                        

Second, the setting also affected the technology because of the period in time in which the novel takes place.  If the novel took place one hundred years ago, for example, drugs would not be present or not as widely used.  There would not be the technology to alter an organism while it is still developing in its mother’s womb, which would greatly change the plot of this story.  Without vehicles, firearms, televisions, or a greater knowledge of science, the plot in this novel be very different.  If this novel had  taken place in a different time, there would have been different technology resulting in a completely different plot.  Thus, the novel would be very different.  

Next, religion plays an especially important part in this book.  The main characters in this book are all religious.  Sam’s family is Muslim and Clara’s family is Christian.  Each family’s religion plays a very important part to their behavior and beliefs.  Sam, for instance, is a devout Muslim who follows Muslim rules carefully.  Recently though, he has not been following these rules and is angry at his two sons because he believes they have not been following the Muslim way.  Clara is a Christian along with her mother and Ryan, her former boyfriend.  She angered both of them by running away to wed a man named Archie Jones.  Archie changes Clara’s views about her religion because he is not religious himself.  Thus, their daughter is not religious and earns the disapproval of her grandmother and friend, Ryan.

Lastly, the setting of this novel made it amusing, interesting, and exciting to read.  Places where the characters said or did things that were funny, interesting, or exciting is a Jamaican hair salon in North London, an Indian restaurant, an Irish poolroom turned into an immigrant cafe, a liberal public school, and a sleek science institute.  Sams and Archie’s conversation in the immigrant cafe with Mickey were hilarious to read.  The Jamaican hair salon and liberal public school were interesting to read about.  The Indian restaurant, where Sam worked as a waiter, was often times depressing to Sam but amusing to read.  The science institute was exciting because of the work they did on lab mice to genetically modify their life expectancy.  

In conclusion, the setting greatly contributes to the success of this novel because it made the novel, interesting, amusing and exciting to read.  It also affected the character’s education and behavior, the technology, and religion.  If the setting had been in another part of the world, perhaps the novel may not have been so entertaining to read.  I enjoyed this book and the setting was a large part of the reason I liked the book so much.