BOOK REVIEW | WHITE TEETH | ZADIE SMITH.
Zadie Smith is not an author I have encountered before, never heard of her, that is until I was gifted this book. Few weeks later to my utter awe she was featured here on Maria Popova’s brain pickings.
Brain pickings is such a jewel of history’s ultimate brain power on thoughts, writings and exchanges that changed the world. It is my esteemed opinion that if you appear on brain pickings, you are somebody or you were somebody on this planet. That fact alone was enough to get me excited about reading this book.
White teeth is Zadie Smith’s first novel whose debut was in year 2000 and it generated much hype. So much Hype, that it has won a couple of awards making it one of the greatest debuts in early 2000s.
Because I cannot match the descriptive abilities of some folks who have detailed the awards she has won, check this extract from a British council website.
Her acclaimed first novel, White Teeth (2000), is a vibrant portrait of contemporary multicultural London, told through the story of three ethnically diverse families. The book won a number of awards and prizes, including the Guardian First Book Award, the Whitbread First Novel Award, and the Commonwealth Writers Prize (Overall Winner, Best First Book). It also won two EMMA (BT Ethnic and Multicultural Media Awards) for Best Book/Novel and Best Female Media Newcomer and was shortlisted for the Mail on Sunday/John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Author’s Club First Novel Award. White Teeth has been translated into over twenty languages and was adapted for Channel 4 television in 2002
Let’s start, shall we.
White Teeth is a story of two friends, Archibald Jones a Brit and Samad Miah a Bengali Muslim or a Bangladeshi Muslim, I am not sure, fella was so complicated in the story I couldn’t tell. These two friends met during world war 2 at 17 years of age (Ahem, it is a fiction story by the way) don’t get this twisted, a novel.
Archibald didn’t manage any schooling, blame poverty. Samad claims he is from a family of heroes and he associates himself with a great grandfather called Pande, who single handedly begun the Indian war of independence from the British. Pande’s story is a very silly piece of narrative and it manages to keep resurfacing in the entire length of the book because Samad has an Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder — (OCD) called Pande Syndrome, an uncommon fascination about pande.
Let’s go back to world war 2. Samad and Jones find themselves in deep Europe, their tank stalls in a tiny village situated in the middle of nowhere, world war ends, both none the wiser. It is only when some Russian soldiers pass by celebrating that they are informed world war ended two weeks earlier to the day. Having gotten themselves some Russian friends, here stuff happens, crazy stuff, and somehow Jones and Samad capture a Nazi scientist. Jones is to kill this scientist and yes, a shot is fired somewhere in the bush while Samad is waiting for him by a jeep. But did Archibald Jones kill this Nazi scientist?
Years later, long after the war, Samad moves to England and meets with his old friend Jones and their friendship will last forever. He, Samad, comes to England with a wife, Asana, a very naïve girl I must say, Samad has no choice but to Masturbate or rather slap the salami because the wife doesn’t fancy sex, I can’t say it fairer than that.
Jones at this time had married some Italian woman who had goes bonkers, her entire family has a history of bonkers humans that Jones didn’t know of, hence he is stuck with a crazy wife plus some other crazy relatives of hers, a situation that is literally driving Him Crazy too.
In the beginning of the book, Jones is on a mission to kill himself, his preferred method? Car fumes. But a fat Halal Butcher called Hussein saves the day, and he saves the day only because he was waiting for a carcass delivery and Jones was packed on the delivery spot, so he politely advices Jones to try a dark alley down the road. So, Jones believed that to be a sign that life wants him, and a decision is made, he will leave his mad wife, desert her karma like relatives too and drive far away.
Somehow, he comes across some new year party organized and executed by a group of delusional teenagers. Here he meets Clara Bowdens, a black girl from Jamaica who doesn’t have front teeth. (She was a Jehovah witness before she lost the teeth, and she lost them the day the lord was to come, kill everyone and take the holiest 144k to the watch tower) So here she was, all black, perfect ass, well rounded tits, no teeth and Jones had never seen someone that beautiful.
Weeks later they were married.
So far so good. Samad has Asana who doesn’t fancy sex, Jones has Clara who lost her front teeth. There is more information … both wives are 20 years younger than their husbands. Good!
Asana was the first to get pregnant with twins, boys. Then Clara, a girl. The world welcomes Millat and Magid, perfect handsome Twins and Irie, a bunny teeth black girl. (Jones had hoped she would have blue eyes, but Clara’s Jamaican genes couldn’t allow).
The kids grow up. At 9 years of age, Samad believes England is not a good place to bring up kids, it is a land of heathens and nudists. He wants to ship his sons to Bangladesh, but he is broke. Plan? Ship one son. He was to kidnap one son and send him to his family in Bangladesh without the wife’s knowledge and deal with the consequences later. Oh boy, yes, he managed with some help from Jones, but what a mistake! Samad would slap the Salami for a long time afterwards for sure.
Millat grows up as an only child, friends with Irie. As teenagers, we learn that Millat is a handsome overload, girls cannot help it but unleash pussy to him right, left and center (Zadie is not a hypocrite, she has generously used the words cunt, pussy and dick in the book such that by the time she is done with you its already part of your vocabulary) and Irie has a crush on Millat.
In between, Irie and Millat are caught smoking weed. Aha, yes, finally something familiar everywhere. As punishment, they are to meet twice a week with another classmate of theirs called Joshua, at his home for studies. Joshua’s family is at the top of upper class food chain, a perfect middle class, something Irie and Millat have never experienced.
Marcus is a top-notch scientist, husband to Joyce another top-notch biologist, both Joshua’s parents. Between them their IQ can power a small neighborhood if we are to equate it to electricity, if we add their children IQ’s you will manage to power a small steel company. Naturally, therefore, Joshua has good genes, and it is the idea of their teachers that both Millat and irie should rub shoulders with this middle-class family so that they somehow improve on their grades and probably divert their smoking weed energy to something positive.
Two things happen; one, Joyce, Joshua’s mother gets fascinated with Millat, because of his beauty and because she believes he is broken, and she thinks it is her job to fix him. Second, Irie, finds a new place to spend her youth bathing in the brilliance and sophistication of this family. She becomes Marcus home assistant cum secretary.
Soon enough, Millat and Irie, spend their spare time at Joshua’s, modest term to say every day and this makes their mothers, Asana and Clara very jealous. Around this time, Millat Joins a movement of radical muslims, Joshua differs with his Father about cloning and veganism. Meanwhile, Magid, Millat’s twin, the brother who was kidnapped and flown to Bangladesh comes back at 17. Not as a humble Muslim, but an atheist!
Surprise! Samad had sent his son to Bangladesh to grow up as a good Muslim man, whose roots are anchored in tradition, but the fool came back as an atheist, and, this is better, sharp as a whip!
Soon, Magid begins working hand in hand with Marcus — Joshua’s father. Marcus has a project where he is cloning a mouse. The mouse would create a divided citizenry, people like Millat and Joshua joining outfits that are eager to stop further cloning believing it is bad to play God, others believing Mice have rights too or some shit like that.
The story knocks you senseless when it becomes evident that the Nazi scientist who Archibald Jones faked to have killed in world war 2 is alive and now the mentor to Marcus!
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White teeth is a lovely novel, humorous and utterly satisfying to read. If entertainment in a book is your thing, white teeth is your book!
My copy was bought by a friend under the London bridge — UK while she was taking a stroll, so I am not sure where you can buy yours! Just know the book is great should the gods ever conspire to have you come across it.
