I recognize myself to be an intensely naive person. Most novelists are, despite frequent pretensions to deep socio-political insight.
ZADIE SMITHI recognize myself to be an intensely naive person. Most novelists are, despite frequent pretensions to deep socio-political insight.
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 SMITHThe secret to editing your work is simple: you need to become its reader instead of its writer.
ZADIE SMITHCambridge was a joy. Tediously. People reading books in a posh place. It was my fantasy. I loved it. I miss it still.
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 SMITHThe greatest lie ever told about love is that it sets you free.
ZADIE SMITHPeople profess to have certain political positions, but their conservatism or liberalism is really the least interesting thing about them.
ZADIE SMITHDon’t confuse honours with achievement.
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 SMITHOne thing you learn about the novel as a form is that it’s always smarter than you are.
ZADIE SMITHYou can feel bad… I mean, that’s not illegal.
ZADIE SMITH…They cannot escape their history any more than you yourself can lose your shadow.
ZADIE SMITHWe cannot love something solely because it has been ignored. It must also be worthy of our attention.
ZADIE SMITHI am the sole author of the dictionary that defines me.
ZADIE SMITHFor me, George Saunders novel [Lincoln in the Bardo] is about a problem of pain.
ZADIE SMITHFull stories are as rare as honesty.
ZADIE SMITH