The Times - UK (2022-04-09)

6 saturday review Saturday April 9 2022 | the times

become seriously warped during the

pandemic. I think in the before-times

I would have said The Wire or The

Sopranos or Mad Men — the usual

nostalgic choices of a person my age.

Now it may be the second season of

Married at First Sight. Plus, one more

shout out to Buffy.

My favourite piece of music

Who has a single favourite piece of

music? I struggle even to choose a genre.

But judging from the iPod I somehow

still own it’s a three-way struggle

between all of hip-hop, the Great

American Songbook and Tracy Chapman.

The last song that made me cry

Ultralight Beam by Kanye West.

The lyric I wish I’d written

“It’s been a long time coming, but I

know a change gonna come” [from A

Change Is Gonna Come by Sam Cooke].

The song that saved me

Once the song 7 by Prince

“literally”, as the kids say, saved my

life. I was hanging from a windowsill,

if you can believe that, and it gave me

the strength to hold on a little longer

so I could fall safely.

The instrument I played

I played the violin and viola, all the

recorders, the guitar and the piano.

I’ve lost them all, except a bit of

piano.

screen slayer RuPaul’s

Drag Race. Left: Vigil for

a Horseman (detail) by

Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.

Below: Sarah Michelle

Gellar in Buffy the

Vampire Slayer

The book I couldn’t finish

It’s worse than that. Most books written

in the present tense I can’t even begin.

The book I’m ashamed I

haven’t read

If I’m really honest it’s all the good

books by good friends. I really want to

read them but I can’t read anything right

now, not until I finish the book I’m

working on. When you’re writing

something that requires a lot of

historical research you have to be a bit

ruthless, and all the new novels I swore

I’d read are actually lined up on the floor

of the study, waiting for Freedom Day,

which is whenever this novel is done. I’m

ashamed about that. Writing is so often

selfish and self-involved. Top of the list is

the book I promised to read longest ago,

if you see what I mean. That is Imbolo

Mbue’s How Beautiful We Were.

My favourite film

I don’t have good taste in films. Movies

are for me pure pleasure, pure escapism.

I watch “movies” and not “cinema” —

which is for people with better taste. If

I wanted to be very

happy on my sofa it

would be a triple bill of

Now, Voyager, Jackie

Brown and Ferris

Bueller’s Day Off.

The box set that

I’m hooked on

Box sets? I’m streaming

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

with my family, which

will make it, I think, my

fourth time watching all

seven series through

(the first three were

before we had children). In my defence

— and to humblebrag a moment — one

of those times was in Italian. My solo

watch is RuPaul’s Drag Race. I’ve got

nothing intelligent to say about it. I just

adore it.

My favourite TV series

My judgment on these things has

The book I’m reading

It’s always books, plural. Sometimes
I wish it wasn’t. I’m reading Peterloo:
The Story of the Manchester Massacre
by Jacqueline Riding and Hope
Transformed: A Historical Sketch of the
Hope Landscape, St Andrew, Jamaica,
1660-1960 by Veront M Satchell. They
are both excellent. Both, in their own
way, about the obliviousness of a ruling
class to the suffering of an underclass.

The book I wish I had written

I don’t think this concept is a “thing”. It’s
like wishing for a different consciousness,
or a different set of concerns or interests.
I can’t get my head round it. But I often
wish my novels were shorter and
perfectly formed and had no essayistic
element — no overarching argument.
So when I’m feeling that way I think of
Penelope Fitzgerald’s novel The Blue
Flower or Toni Morrison’s The Bluest
Eye. Two novels in which the characters
appear to me to be not so much written
as secreted. The Blue Flower is a
historical novel, the reality of which feels
absolute when you’re reading it. As if all
that Fitzgerald herself consciously
wanted to “say” was, “These people lived
long ago. Their lives were completely
different from ours.” Which sounds
simple but has a very powerful and
humbling effect on the reader. The fact
that she sees the past so clearly helps
you to see your own present in sharper
relief. I’d even say your present comes
to feel strange to you. In The Bluest Eye,
the characters also seem to really “live”,
independent from my judgment of them
and even independent from Morrison’s.
Until you write a novel yourself you
can’t realise how hard that is to do. Now
I think of it, maybe I have a special
affinity for books with blue in the title.
Kafka’s Blue Octavo notebooks mean a
lot to me too.

my culture fix

The novelist lets us into her cultural life

Zadie Smith

BBC/WORLD OF WONDER; LYNETTE YIADOM BOAKYE, COURTESY THE ARTIST, CORVI-MORA, LONDON, AND JACK SHAINMAN GALLERY, NEW YORK

The instrument I wish I’d learnt

Drums. Rhythm is my favourite.

The music that cheers me up

Alright by Kendrick Lamar. Beyond

cheer, joy!

If I could own one painting it

would be...

Another impossible question, only really

answerable by people who hate painting.

Can’t I have two? The Incredulity of Saint

Thomas by Caravaggio, and anything

from the exhibition Under-Song for a

Cipher by Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.

The place I feel happiest

In water. Or dancing. There I go

choosing two again.

My guiltiest cultural pleasure

The Mail Online side-bar. But it’s like a

Big Mac. Seems like a quick way of filling

a hole, but just ends up making you sick.

The film (and concert) that

I’m looking forward to

I really want to see The Worst Person in

the World. And I’m going to see Arlo

Parks in the summer. Summer plus Arlo

Parks! Imagine!

I wasted an evening watching...

Station Eleven. Nothing against the book,

but the show was not for me. If it’s a

choice between the end of the world and

watching Bed-Stuy hipsters in perfectly

curated 1970s swimming costumes and

ski jackets butchering Shakespeare then

I choose apocalypse.

Zadie Smith performs with the BBC

Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican,

London EC2 (barbican.org.uk) on

April 22, in-person and live stream

tickets available now. Highlights will

be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and

BBC Sounds on April 30, and the full

concert on BBC Radio 3 at a later date

becomeseriouslywarpedduringthe

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