Changing My Mind by Zadie Smith is a collection of independent essays on various topics for almost any taste. Such a variety of themes allows readers to learn more about the author’s outlook on literature, politics, education, and even family life. It is light, sometimes entertaining, but still thought-provoking reading for people who appreciate a vivid and witty writing style.
A writer herself, Zadie Smith simply can’t mention the role of black female writers in the world literature. She voices the concerns that many of us have but rarely discuss: intellectuals and literature critics’ contempt for so called female literature. Believe it or not, but many people are too shy to admit that they enjoy reading love lines in women’s writing. Critics used to praise those female writers who wrote in a manly fashion and dragged down those who depicted women in search for love. When she was a teenager, Zadie behaved just like those critics. She reprimanded writers who narrowed down women’s aspirations to search of their won Prince Charming. However, she changes her opinion as soon as she finds the writer whose works, experience, and cultural backgrounds are somehow similar to her own.
As it has been already mentioned, the writer does pay attention to world politics, especially to the situations in developing countries. Her short-lasting visit described in One Week in Liberia and is highly recommended to everyone who thinks that war is a game. Destroyed infrastructure is not the worst thing there, what is more dangerous is hopeless existence that many are doomed to lead. As one of the passengers on the flight to Liberia said, it is difficult to stay kind whilst living surrounded with cruelty and violence. Low income, illiteracy, and lack of prospects make life almost unbearable, but there are people who refuse to put up with the situations.
Teachers, doctors, and just volunteers fight to bring the country back to life. They don’t complain even then when it seems that everything they do is in vain. This is a reminder to be grateful for what we have for all of us who take such fragile things as peace for granted. A topic of war is repeated in the essay Occasional Hero which is dedicated to Zadie’s father, Harvey Smith, who fought in Normandy in World War II. It is a story about a rethinking of traumatic experience.
