A daring escape, conflicting beliefs, and painful obstacles

Teju Cole reads his story “Incoming,” which appears in the December 4, 2023, issue of the magazine. Cole, a winner of the PEN/Hemingway Award and the Windham Campbell Literature Prize, is a novelist, critic, curator, and essayist. His novel “Tremor” was published earlier this year and a new book, “Pharmakon,” a collection of prose pieces and photographs, will be published in 2024.