It's Zadie Smith!

Imagine my surprise, I opened my newly downloaded New York Times Book Review on NewsStand Reader, and there was her great big face! (She's pretty so it was ok, no open pores or sores - and it wasn't like being surprised by a tapeworm or a dustmite.) On the cover! And a glorious review of On Beauty. Is it really that good? Frank Rich and Booker think so ...

I'm still sideways over why a woman who has knowingly determinedly purposely and purposefully put herself into the forefront of publicity is so repulsed by same. She (evidently) writes peculiarly well - and in return we spend our money on her, we admire and reward her talent - and in return she demeans and condemns. How fascinating. How ill. But, on who's part?

Obviously it's a not a new thang ... Back when her second novel, The Autograph Man, came out, Bookslut in March of 2004 reported an encounter with her. She was by turns gloriously nasty and scathingly disdainful. The "long-term game" she refers to in the last paragraph must be Kick-the-Fan.

Turn back a couple of years to her first novel, White Teeth, and a 2002 interview with PBS; even with Masterpiece Theatrical editing she sounds superior and snide, starting with her comments on America, "There is a kind of desperate need for somebody to tell everyone what to do, which I find really peculiar in America. And then when you tell them, they're not interested, because it's also a country where everybody's opinion is their opinion, and they really don't give a damn what you think" and ending with "Email is the great channeler of disturbing people ... "

Hey!!! I have five email addresses myself! And I use them for differ ... and I ... um ... and ... ... ... ... never mind.

Back up to July 2000 and Random House' BoldType interview with Ms. Smith, but watch yerself - she'll bite yer butt. She disses her English Lit degree - well, ok, that's a gimme. We all do that. She does come down hard on Creative Writing classes. Truth be told, my version of truth anyway, she seems more irritated than irritating. Research continues.

Are we buying her books and bestowing her with attention and honors in efforts to please, win her affection, or at least divert her from being disgusted with us? Why is she in the business if she despises it, and us? Does her talent doom her to be immersed in the very thing she reviles? Could she write just because she must write, and not publish, just keep it to herself and avoid contact with us? What compels her to belittle? Are her demeaning "observations" of culture amusing to her? Is it an enormous, very public case of passive-agressiveness, "Yes you're all trival idiots, but I'm funny so it doesn't really mean anything, but you really are"?

There is a clue in the PBS interview: she wants to be known as a "comic novelist." She says, "And if I die and someone says, 'She was a comic novelist,' I would be more than happy." Isn't that what everybody is trying to do, make her happy? But Zadie - must you DIE for us to finally accomplish it?!

Oh, glory. I just MUST know more about her.