Awards

• Winner of Betty Trask Award 2001
• Winner of Betty Trask Award 2001.
• Winner of Guardian First Book Award 2000
• Winner of Guardian First Book Award 2000.
• Winner of WH Smith Book Awards: New Talent 2001
• Winner of WH Smith Book Awards: New Talent 2001.
• Winner of Whitbread Book Awards: First Novel Category 2000.
• Winner of Whitbread Prize (First Novel) 2000.

Overview

Most highly praised debut novel in recent years One of the most talked about fictional debuts of recent years, WHITE TEETH is a funny, generous, big-hearted novel, adored by critics and readers alike. Dealing - among many other things - with friendship, love, war, three cultures and three families over three generations, one brown mouse, and the tricky way the past has of coming back and biting you on the ankle, it is a life-affirming, riotous must-read of a book.

Full Product Details

9780140276336

Table of Contents

Reviews

A preternaturally gifted new writer [with] a voice that's street-smart and learned, sassy and philosophical all at the same time. -Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times <br> Brilliant.... Smith is a master at detail...a postmodern Charles Dickens...[Smith's] rich storytelling and wicked wit are suited to the sights and smells of the world that England has inherited. - The Washington Post<br> <br> [A] vibrant, rollicking first novel about race and idenity...[Smith's] prickly wit is affectionate and poignant. - People <br> [A] dazzling intergenerational first novel...wonderfully inventive...playful yet unaffected, mongrel yet cohesive, profound yet funny, vernacular yet lyrical. - Los Angeles Times <br> [A] marvel of a debut novel. . .Reminscent of both Salman Rushdie and John Irving, White Teeth is a comic, canny, sprawling tale, adeptly held together by Smith's literary sleight of hand. - Entertainment Weekly<br> <br> A magnificent and audacious novel, jampacked with memorable characters and challenging ideas. - The Atlanta Journal & Constitution<br> <br> Ambitious, earnest and irreverent. . . Smith has a real talent for comedy and a fond eye for human foibles. - The Wall Street Journal <p> Wonderful.... Zadie Smith...possesses a more than ordinary share of talent. - USA Today <br> Smith has an astonishing intellect. She writes sharp dialogue for every age and race-- and she's funny as hell. - Newsweek <br> <br> [ White Teeth ] is, like the London it portrays, a restless hybrid of voices, tones, and textures...with a raucous energy and confidence. - The New York Times Book Review<br> <br> Fresh...spirited...this extravagant novel bursts with optimism about people, aboutlanguage, and perhaps, above all, about novels and the joy, indeed the impertinence, of writing one. - The Philadelphia Inquirer<br> <br> Blissfully confident, wide-ranging and funny from the get-go, White Teeth...promises-and delivers-a wildly inventive journey into a fresh imagination. - Rocky Mountain News<br> <br> Brilliant.... Smith is a master at detail.... Like a postmodern Dickens, she has a flair for features, dress, dialogue, accents and human frailty. - The Miami Herald<br> <br> It's a treat to watch an immensely gifted young writer performing, for the very first time, such an admirably audacious and ambitious juggling act. - Elle<br> <br> Absolutely delicious.... Smith's voice is a perfect balance of tragedy and comedy. - The Tampa Tribune and Times <br> Gently observant and generous in its judgments.... Filled with vibrant life. - The San Diego Union--Tribune<br> <br> Brilliant.... Bubbles and pops in its imaginative intensity. - The Baltimore Sun<br>

She is ... a George Eliot of multi-culturalism Daily Telegraph The first publishing sensation of the millennium Observer White Teeth reflects a new generation Guardian [Zadie Smith] is one of the prominent voices of her generation Sunday Times

Funny, clever ... and a rollicking good read * Independent * Do believe the hype, buy into it, curl up with it, savour every sentence, then turn around and re-read * The Times * An impressive début, not only for its vitality and verve, but mainly for the sheer audacity of its scope and vision ... an epic tale ... swooping, funny ... it has ambition, wit and is unafraid -- Meera Syal * Express * Announces the debut of a preternaturally gifted new writer ... street-smart and learned, sassy and philosophical all at the same time * The New York Times * Relentlessly funny ... idiosyncratic, and deeply felt * Guardian *

An impressively witty satirical first novel, London-set, chronicling the experiences of two eccentric multiracial families during the last half of the 20th century. When Archie Joness suicide attempt on New Years Day 1975 is stymied by a finicky butcher (who frowns upon such things taking place in a car parked illegally in front of his establishment, especially when hes awaiting an early morning delivery), his life is changed forever. Lamenting the break up of his marriage, the distraught and disoriented Archiea middle-aged Brit who fancies himself in the direct-mail business but actually spends his life folding papersthen wanders into an end-of-the-world party where he meets his next wife. Jamaican Clara Bowden is 19 to Archies 47, at six feet tall she towers over him, and shes missing all her upper teeth, the result of a motorcycle mishap. Nonetheless, six weeks later the mismatched pair are married and living near Archies WWII buddy Samad Iqbal, a Bengali Muslim. And so begins Smiths frenetic, riotous, unruly tale, which hops, skips, and jumps from one end of the century to the other while following the Jones and Iqbal broods. Archie and Clara have a daughter, Irie, whose name translates into ``no problem' (although she has plenty of them); Samad, who is head waiter at an Indian restaurant, has twin sons, Millat and Magid. When theyre nine, their father separates the boys, sending Magid back to Bangladesh to be raised the old-fashioned way, far from the corruption of postwar London, filled with its mods and rockers and hippies and Englishmen and other bad influencesincluding Samad himself, who has been lusting after his twins schoolteacher. There isnt much of a plot here, the book being swept along by a series of sometimes hilarious, oft-times clever, occasionally tedious riffs on everything from race relations through eugenics and on to religion, but 25-year-old Smith is a marvelously talented writer with a wonderful ear for dialogue. (Kirkus Reviews)

In the last two decades, what this novel describes as the 'great ocean-crossing experiment' has added a whopping dose of fertiliser to British literature, enabling it to flower as never before. And now, with Smith's impressive debut, there are signs of fresh growth. Smith's disillusioned men, frustrated women and torn teenagers are 'midnight's grandchildren', for whom cultural meltdown, segregation and reinvention are recurring themes. Her narrative charts the tragi-comic progress of Samad Iqbal and Archie Jones from World War II to 1990s London. It's here, amid the caffs and tikka restaurants of Willesden that both men settle and found families - Archie with the Afro-Carribean Clara, and Samad with Alsana, from his native Bengal. And it is here that their assorted offspring do battle with the expectations and hypocrisies of their elders and the seductive lure of fundamentalism. Smith's habit of switching protagonists almost in mid-stream gives the book a directionless feel, but what the novel lacks in narrative drive it makes up for in humour, verve and stylistic playfulness. And while Smith's intelligent, feisty prose style bears more than a passing resemblance to Salman Rushdie's, the territory she lays claim to is her own. A writer to watch. (Kirkus UK)

Funny, clever ... and a rollicking good read * Independent * Do believe the hype, buy into it, curl up with it, savour every sentence, then turn around and re-read * The Times * An impressive début, not only for its vitality and verve, but mainly for the sheer audacity of its scope and vision ... an epic tale ... swooping, funny ... it has ambition, wit and is unafraid -- Meera Syal * Express * Announces the debut of a preternaturally gifted new writer ... street-smart and learned, sassy and philosophical all at the same time * The New York Times * An astonishingly assured début, funny and serious ... I was delighted -- Salman Rushdie Relentlessly funny ... idiosyncratic, and deeply felt * Guardian * She is . . . a George Eliot of multi-culturalism * Daily Telegraph * [Zadie Smith] is one of the prominent voices of her generation * Sunday Times * Britain's finest young author * The List * [Zadie Smith] packs more intelligence, humour and sheer energy into any given scene than anyone else of her generation * Sunday Telegraph * [White Teeth] established a model for how to make sense-and art-out of the complexity, diversity and pluck that have defined the beginning of this century * Time * She is . . . a George Eliot of multi-culturalism * Daily Telegraph * The first publishing sensation of the millennium * Observer * White Teeth reflects a new generation * Guardian * [Zadie Smith] is one of the prominent voices of her generation * Sunday Times *

She is . . . a George Eliot of multi-culturalism * Daily Telegraph * The first publishing sensation of the millennium * Observer * White Teeth reflects a new generation * Guardian * [Zadie Smith] is one of the prominent voices of her generation * Sunday Times *

Author Information

Zadie Smith is the author of the novels White Teeth, The Autograph Man, On Beauty, NW and Swing Time, as well as three collections of essays, Changing My Mind, Feel Free and Intimations, and a collection of short stories, Grand Union. White Teeth won multiple awards, including the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, the Whitbread First Novel Award and the Guardian First Book Award. On Beauty was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Orange Prize for Fiction, and NW was shortlisted for the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction. Zadie Smith is currently a tenured professor of fiction at New York University and a Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She is a regular contributor to the New Yorker and the New York Review of Books.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available