Zadie Smith in Conversation with Kwame Kwei-Armah

On 17 June 2024, I went to see Zadie Smith at Union Chapel, a beautiful venue in Highbury, Islington, north London. The event's host was Kwame Kwei-Armah, courtesy of the Intelligence Squared.

As I travelled on the 30 bus to the area, nostalgia sank right in. I grew up in Highbury; it's where I went to primary and secondary school. In my adult years, I worked and lived there. Although I'm not based in Islington now, this journey felt like I was coming home. How cool that my first physical sighting of Zadie Smith was in my home town territory!

I have seen Zadie many times in a range of interviews on YouTube videos over the years, but this was seeing her in-person; a whole other anticipated and excited experience was in store. I arrived twenty minutes early to find a lengthy queue outside. I eventually managed to find a good enough seat three rows from the front in the middle section. The venue's capacity is 800 people and it was full to capacity!

Zadie was appearing at this event to talk about her new novel, The Fraud, named in December as one of the ten best books of 2023 by the staff of The New York Times Book Review. This is Zadie's sixth novel, first novel in seven years, and her debut historical novel. She was also at this event to mark the publication of the paperback edition of the novel.

The Fraud's main characters are based on real historical figures — alleged fraudsters, freed enslaved people — who lived in Zadie's own London neighbourhood of Kilburn, north-west London. Yet, the novel is as international as it is local and addresses issues of politics and identity that make The Fraud feel as much about today as about the past.

The novel explores the controversy surrounding the Tichborne case, in which a lower-class man claimed to be the lost heir to an aristocratic family fortune. The plot is partly about an enslaved man on a Jamaican sugar plantation whilst simultaneously a complicated and comedic narrative that sketches scenes of life in 19th century England and the Caribbean. Much of the novel follows a bizarre court case, that gripped the British public during that time period. 

The event started with Zadie reading a short passage from The Fraud followed by a conversation with Kwame, who embarked upon a range of questions about the idea behind the book, the characters, plot, and her writing journey from start to publication. The book took two years to write but many years of research beforehand. We were then in store for a general discussion about Zadie's writing career, writing process, and how she lives her life without social media distractions, during which she was, as usual, her most generous. 

My experience of being in the limelight of Zadie Smith for one and a half hours was in one word mesmerizing! I got so much from hearing her talk; it was such a splendid experience. I knew Zadie had a way with the written word but this extends to her spoken words too, which is why she is such an inspiring and insightful writer. Every word she spoke was richly textured, nuanced and multi-layered with such depth of understanding of not just her craft but the world at large which came through in the way she responded to every question she was asked, not just by Kwame but during the Q & A at the end.