British - Novelist | October 25, 1975 -
When I think of the books I love, there's always a little laughter in the dark.
Zadie Smith
LoveLaughterThinkDarkAlways
English, as a subject, never really got over its upstart nature. It tries to bulk itself up with hopeless jargon and specious complexity, tries to imitate subjects it can never be.
NatureHopelessNeverOverUpGot
Without the balancing context of everyday life, all you have is the news, and news by its nature is generally bad.
LifeNatureYouBadNewsEveryday
I recognize myself to be an intensely naive person. Most novelists are, despite frequent pretensions to deep socio-political insight.
MyselfDeepPersonInsightNaive
It seems to me that we often commit ourselves wholly to something while knowing almost nothing concrete about it. Another word for that, I suppose, is 'faith.'
FaithMeNothingKnowingConcrete
I want to write without shame or pride or over-compensation in one direction or another. To write freely.
DirectionPrideWantShameWrite
All novels attempt to cut neural routes through the brain, to convince us that down this road the true future of the novel lies.
FutureBrainRoadDownTrueThrough
I can't add. I don't understand basic science. Or anything else. But I can read anything. I've always been able to, and I've always liked to. Even if I didn't understand it, I liked to.
ScienceI CanUnderstandAnything
Asking why rappers always talk about their stuff is like asking why Milton is forever listing the attributes of heavenly armies. Because boasting is a formal condition of the epic form. And those taught that they deserve nothing rightly enjoy it when they succeed in terms the culture understands.
CultureSucceedEnjoyNothingWhy
Can't a rapper insist, like other artists, on a fictional reality, in which he is somehow still on the corner, despite occupying the penthouse suite?
RealityRapperCornerArtistsStill
I like books that expose me to people unlike me and books that do battle against caricature or simplification. That, to me, is the heroic in fiction.
PeopleMeBattleFictionAgainst
I'm never interested in writing a kind of neutral, universal novel that could be set anywhere. To me, the novel is a local thing.
MeWritingKindNeverUniversalSet
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