Notes 4/8

On Beauty by Zadie Smith


During an interview, Zadie Smith talks about the greater implications of authors projecting their ideas onto their audience. Vanity and self-perception come into play when people tell political truths in their novels. If writers berate you with an idea, you can't trust them. Novels are political and moral. Iris Murdoch said that art is a case of morals, an analogy of morals. The best art is when the artist is truthful and honest to themselves and to their audience. "Good" artists are able to see the truths of both sides of the story, other perceptions and not simply their own. They are able to extend beyond the "me/us" vs "them" mentality. Similar to the culture war - Shakespeare and the canon vs multicultural works; right conservatism vs left liberalism.


Zadie Smith vs "Zadie Smith" - the quotational Zadie Smith isn't real. She's an idol, set up on a pedestal by reporters, critics, editors. The left has now done the same thing that the right has done, put someone up on a pedestal, made certain people the "good" artist, the must-reads. They've created a new canon. We attack things in people that we don't like about ourselves.


On Beauty can teach us morals and dissolve the lines between "us" vs "them". Caricatures are one-sided, flat, plain, boring. They are always right or always wrong or always something! They aren't real! Characters, on the other hand, are real; they have more emotions and sides. They aren't always right or always wrong or always anything; they simply are.


On the left, we have Howard and his family, sans Jerome; on the right, we have Monty and his family. Jerome is in the center, being pulled in both directions.


The Belsey's - An American family headed by Howard, a college professor, who are extremely free. Jerome is the only child who's Christian and they aren't quite sure how to react to him. The Kipps - A British family headed by Monty, also a college professor, who are very religious, right-wing, conservative, business oriented.


Jerome is trying to get his father's attention and rebel against the lifestyle which he grew up in, particularly now because Howard had an affair. The children may feel betrayed and Jerome could want to get back at his father. He could just be different from his family. He could just want to be religious that has nothing to do with his father or family.


Jerome falls in love with the Kipps. It could be the fact that they are so different from his own and he is so enamored with that idea. "The grass is greener on the other side." He could also enjoy as the Kipps utterly destroyed the ideals or morals of the Belsey family, the ideals that his father used to betray his mother.