Today, writing seems to me like an incredible luxury, almost a perversity, something which hardly exists in the world anymore, where you get to see the fruits of your actions in a daily way.
ZADIE SMITHToday, writing seems to me like an incredible luxury, almost a perversity, something which hardly exists in the world anymore, where you get to see the fruits of your actions in a daily way.
ZADIE SMITHThe greatest lie ever told about love is that it sets you free.
ZADIE SMITHI am the sole author of the dictionary that defines me.
ZADIE SMITHDon’t confuse honours with achievement.
ZADIE SMITHI often worry that my idea of personhood is nostalgic, irrational, inaccurate.
ZADIE SMITHFor me, George Saunders novel [Lincoln in the Bardo] is about a problem of pain.
ZADIE SMITHThe young people have a phrase for this now, which is “slay in your lane.” That’s a very important principle of writing. You have to work out what it is you can’t do, obscure it, and focus on what works.
ZADIE SMITHI’m very attracted to exile literature – particularly Nabokov – exactly because the idea of being away from home for any serious length of time is so inconceivable to me.
ZADIE SMITHYou can feel bad… I mean, that’s not illegal.
ZADIE SMITHIt’s difficult to tell the truth about how a book begins. The truth, as far as it can be presented to other people, is either wholly banal or too intimate.
ZADIE SMITHI cannot believe homosexuality is that much fun. Heterosexuality certainly is not.
ZADIE SMITHSomething in me was changed by Lincoln in the Bardo, and the great sublime/grotesque risk of [George Saunders’] ghosts was a part of it.
ZADIE SMITHTime is how you spend your love.
ZADIE SMITHThe lack of alternatives to an illegal action does not legitimise that action.
ZADIE SMITHRarely does one see a squirrel tremble.
ZADIE SMITHPeople profess to have certain political positions, but their conservatism or liberalism is really the least interesting thing about them.
ZADIE SMITH