Surely there is something to be said for drawing a circle around our attention and remaining within that circle. But how large should this circle be? Zadie Smith More Quotes by Zadie Smith More Quotes From Zadie Smith 13.5 Mrs. Wolfe asks whether Mr. Iqbal expects her Susan to undertake compulsory headstands. 13.6 Mr. Iqbal infers that, considering Susan's academic performance and weight problems, a headstand regime might be desirable. Zadie Smith weight-problems academic might It’s such a confidence trick, writing a novel. The main person you have to trick into confidence is yourself. This is hard to do alone. Zadie Smith tricks novel writing I do my best work under pressure, so I’ll nick an artery, and my husband isn’t allowed to stanch the bleeding till I’ve banged out a chapter. Zadie Smith bleeding husband pressure You don't come to live here unless the delusion of a reality shaped around your own desires isn't a strong aspect of your personality. A reality shaped around your own desires - there is something sociopathic in that ambition. Zadie Smith strong ambition new-york Sometimes I think my whole professional life has been based on this hunch I had, early on, that many people feel just as muddled as I do, and might be happy to tag along with me on this search for clarity, for precision. I love that aspect of writing. Nothing makes me happier than to hear a reader say: that’s just what I’ve always felt, but you said it clearly. Zadie Smith feels-just writing thinking A writer's duty is to register what it is like for him or her to be in the world. Zadie Smith duty writing world I tap danced for ten years before I began to understand people don't make musicals anymore. All I wanted to do was be at MGM working for Arthur Freed or Gene Kelly or Vincent Minelli. Historical and geographical constraints made this impossible. Slowly but surely the pen became mightier than the double pick-up time step with shuffle. Zadie Smith historical people years The nineties, ecstatic decade! Zadie Smith ecstatic decades To a novelist, fluidity is the ultimate good omen; suddenly difficult problems are simply solved, intractable structural knots loosen themselves, and you come upon the key without even recognizing that this is what you hold. Zadie Smith fluidity novelists keys In a whisper he began begging for—and, as the sun set, received—the concession people always beg for: a little more time. Zadie Smith sun littles people Try to read your own work as a stranger would read it, or even better, as an enemy would. Zadie Smith writing trying enemy He was bookish, she was not; he was theoretical, she political. She called a rose a rose. He called it an accumulation of cultural and biological constructions circulating around the mutually attracting binary poles of nature/artifice. Zadie Smith construction political rose Don't we all know why nerds do what they do? To get money, which leads to popularity, which leads to girls. Zadie Smith get-money nerd girl Some people--Samad for example--will tell you not to trust people who overuse the phrase "at the end of the day"--football managers, estate agents, salesmen of all kinds--but Archie's never felt that way about it. Prudent use of said phrase never failed to convince him that his interlocutor was getting to the bottom of things, to the fundamentals. Zadie Smith the-end-of-the-day football people Then you begin to give up the very idea of belonging. Suddenly this thing, this belonging,it seems like some long, dirty lie ... and I begin to believe that birthplaces are accidents, that everything is an accident. But if you believe that, where do you go? What do you do? What does anything matter? Zadie Smith giving-up believe lying 'A reality shaped around your own desires' - there is something sociopathic in that ambition. Zadie Smith ambition desire reality 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. Zadie Smith rapper army epic She hopes for nothing except fine weather and a resolution. She wants to end properly, like a good sentence. Zadie Smith resolution want weather She loved you in the morning because the day was new. Zadie Smith morning Art is the Western myth, with which we both console ourselves and make ourselves. Zadie Smith myth western art
