An Evening with Zadie Smith, Spring 2016

WTUL News & Views presents a reading and interview from the event, "An Evening with Zadie Smith, Spring 2016 Newcomb College at Tulane University, Zale-Kimmerling Writer in Residence" on March 1, 2016.

Reading of "Two Men Arrive in a Village" by Zadie Smith, a story on suffering and pain. The author asks, "is there a way to write a story not just about one person's pain in one particular place, but about pain in general, in all places, at all times, amongst all people?"

The story is followed by an interview with the author and Karen Zumhagen-Yekplé, Assistant Professor in English and faculty affiliate in the Stone Center for Latin American Studies and the Programs for Gender Studies and Film Studies.

Zadie Smith is the author of six books. Her acclaimed first novel, 'White Teeth' (2000), a vibrant portrait of contemporary multicultural London, told through the stories of three ethnically diverse families, won a number of awards and prizes, including the 'Guardian' First Book Award, the Whitbread First Novel Award, the Commonwealth Writers Prize (Overall Winner, Best First Book), and two BT Ethnic and Multicultural Media Awards (Best Book/Novel and Best Female Media Newcomer). It was also shortlisted for the 'Mail on Sunday'/John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Author’s Club First Novel Award. 'The Autograph Man' (2002), a story of loss, obsession and the nature of celebrity, won the 2003 Jewish Quarterly Wingate Literary Prize for Fiction. In 2003 and 2013 she was named by Granta magazine as one of 20 ‘Best of Young British Novelists’. 'On Beauty' won the 2006 Orange Prize for Fiction and her most recent novel, NW, was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize and the Women’s Prize for Fiction and was named as one of 'The New York Times' “10 Best Books of 2012.” Zadie Smith writes regularly for The New Yorker and the New York Review of Books. She published a collection of essays, 'Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays' (2009) and is working on a book of essays entitled Feel Free. She is currently a tenured professor of Creative Writing at New York University.