black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

When I was young, I was very technical about these things. I didn’t like to admit to any intimate relation with what I was writing.

Zadie Smith

I’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 SMITH

Home Idea Literature
I cannot believe homosexuality is that much fun. Heterosexuality certainly is not.
ZADIE SMITH

Belief Fun Heterosexuality
I often worry that my idea of personhood is nostalgic, irrational, inaccurate.
ZADIE SMITH

Idea Nostalgic Worry
The library was the place I went to find out what there was to know. It was absolutely essential.
ZADIE SMITH

Absolutely Essential Library
Don’t confuse honours with achievement.
ZADIE SMITH

Achievement Confuse Honour
We cannot love something solely because it has been ignored. It must also be worthy of our attention.
ZADIE SMITH

Attention Ignored Something Worthy
I am the sole author of the dictionary that defines me.
ZADIE SMITH

Author Define Dictionary Sole
The secret to editing your work is simple: you need to become its reader instead of its writer.
ZADIE SMITH

Edit Secret Simple
The greatest lie ever told about love is that it sets you free.
ZADIE SMITH

Country Love Lying People
One thing you learn about the novel as a form is that it’s always smarter than you are.
ZADIE SMITH

Form Novel Smarter
For me, George Saunders novel [Lincoln in the Bardo] is about a problem of pain.
ZADIE SMITH

Novel Pain Problem
Time is how you spend your love.
ZADIE SMITH

Emotion Express Feeling Love Spend
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 SMITH

Incredible Luxury World Writing
Full stories are as rare as honesty.
ZADIE SMITH

Coverage Emotion Full Honesty Story
The lack of alternatives to an illegal action does not legitimise that action.
ZADIE SMITH

Action Alternatives Lack
It’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 SMITH

Book People Reveal Tell Truth

When I was young, I was very technical about these things. I didn’t like to admit to any intimate relation with what I was writing.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

When I was young, I was very technical about these things. I didn’t like to admit to any intimate relation with what I was writing.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Zadie Smith Quotes