Zadie Smith Has Some Explaining To Do

I'm a white male of a certain age -- in case you hadn't already figured that out.  So what would your reaction be if I said the following:

"The first time I was aware of Zadie Smith's existence was a few years ago. We had James Joyce, Joseph Conrad, Earnest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. What did we need with a black writer?"

My guess is I would be viewed at best as being politically incorrect and at worst as an outright racist.

So what should one think when Zadie Smith, herself, says the following in "Feel Free," her collection of essays published in 2018:

"The first time I was aware of Debbie Harry's existence, I was in college.  We had Joan Armatrading and Aretha and Billie and Ella. What did we need with white women?"


 

"Oh, Zadie was just young and immature and knew no better," one might argue. I don't think so. Her first novel, "White Teeth," published when she was 25, suggests she was if anything super-conscious of racial sensitivities, in part because she is of mixed race herself -- a white father and a black mother. "White Teeth" is largely about race and related cultural differences.

I mention this in large part because the traditional literary canon -- the previously more or less agreed upon list of great books -- is now under considerable attack for being composed very largely of books by white males.  When one hears talk of just which authors should replace the current list, Zadie Smith is frequently mentioned.

By way of explanation, the Smith quote reproduced above comes from a chapter in "Feel Free" entitled "Attunement" in which she explains how she rather reluctantly came to like the singing of Joni Mitchell who, like Debbie Harry, is white.

I suspect Ms Smith would depict "what did we need with white women?" as mistaken as opposed to racist. Would I be excused in the same fashion with "what did we need with a black writer?" Somehow, I doubt it. My guess is that if I were a celebrity like Smith (she recently appeared here in Seattle at an Arts and Lectures event that attracted over 2,000 people), that quote would be thrown in my face at every opportunity. I'd be in worse shape than Joe Biden trying to smudge over the more questionable aspects of his political past as he now runs for president.

One senses the presence of a double standard.

I wasn't going to write about this until I saw in today's New York Times "Style Section" an item in which a mother lamented that her12-year-old daughter discarded a sticker with the Dr. Seuss quote:

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose."

The young girl peeled it off her water bottle when a classmate told her the quote was racist because many people can't choose what they want to do because of structural racism. Well, yes, there is structural racism and guess what, there is structural discrimination against women, of all races, too.

So, let's see: no one should attempt to make anything of their life because some face higher hurdles, fairly or not, than others? Many, many black (and other non-white) people have done very well in the U.S. in recent decades and one increasingly sees their stories published. Most argue they got where they are because they used their brains and their feet to overcome barriers that were often unfortunately very considerable. Personal initiative, it seems, is paramount.

The unidentified mother in The Times item said she felt it was important that children be taught that they have agency. I agree and especially with respect to girls.

Yes there are wrongs that need to be addressed, but that is even less likely to happen than is currently the case if children -- presumably white in this case -- are told that to attempt to make anything of themselves by their own initiative is somehow racist. It sounds like a great way to perpetuate society as it exists today.

Perhaps Ms Smith, whose "Feel Free" essays constitute cultural commentary, will address these issues the next time around.