Zadie Smith's White Teeth (Continuum Contemporaries) [Paperback]

Claire Squires (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0826453260 | ISBN-13: 978-0826453266 | Publication Date: June 26, 2002

This is part of a new series of guides to contemporary novels. The aim of the series is to give readers accessible and informative introductions to some of the most popular, most acclaimed and most influential novels of recent years – from ‘The Remains of the Day’ to ‘High Fidelity’. A team of contemporary fiction scholars from both sides of the Atlantic has been assembled to provide a thorough and readable analysis of each of the novels in question.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Study Aids Get Chic
Concerned about keeping up at the book club? Stuck for something to say when dinner party talk turns to Zadie Smith? Or no time to read Captain Corelli’s Mandolin before the movie comes out? Never fear, cool new study aids are here in the form of Continuum Contemporaries....The Novel Approach, a series of handy readers’ guides to contemporary fiction. Launching in September, with further waves in January and May 2002, they’re much slicker than the frumpy cheat-aids of yore, including everything from website links to review buzz, and deliberately featuring new novels such as Bridget Jones’s Diary, The Shipping News, Trainspotting, and even the Harry Potter books." —Time Out (London)

"A brilliant idea—short, perceptive books which tell you what you need to know about some of the most vibrant and challenging writing around today—a bit like having a reading group in your pocket."—Ian Rankin

"The series comes as near to squaring various circles - popular / academic, 'good read' / 'classic Lit', novel / film of the book as any I know. And at best it goes a fair way towards reshuffling those categories and redrawing the boundaries. With the first volume, I was relieved. After two or three, I was hooked.

The books are invaluable for gathering out-of-the-way or ephemeral comment from TV and radio interviews and the web as well as from literary reviews.

Refreshingly upfront and up-to-date…

Given the space, there are remarkably balanced film/novel comparisons of the most well-known examples…

An important feature is the fully referenced bibliographies, including reviews and copious website addresses - the latter ranging from fanzines and authors' and publishers' own sites to academic discussion lists and online journals.

In method as in subject matter, these guides move freely on the interface between print culture and multimedia. Highly finished and pleasantly handleable as books in their own right, they gesture accommodatingly to both words and worlds beyond.

Taking the series as a whole, it also confirms two things: that narrative nowadays is generically highly hybrid and increasingly cross-media; and that an understanding of the processes of writing and reading 'contemporary classic' (or at least 'currently famous') fiction cannot be separated - yet must be distinguished - from the processes of making and marketing books and films."
— The Times Higher Education Supplement, May 31, 2002

From the Publisher

This is an excellent guide to Zadie Smith’s prize-winning debut novel. It features a biography of the author, a full-length analysis of the novel, and a great deal more. If you’re studying this novel, reading it for your book club, or if you simply want to know more about it, you’ll find this guide informative and helpful.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 96 pages
• Publisher: Continuum (June 26, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0826453260
• ISBN-13: 978-0826453266
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 5.4 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #866,085 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A refreshing piece of Lit Crit, June 25, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Zadie Smith's White Teeth (Continuum Contemporaries) (Paperback)

Before I'd read the book, this seemed like a dubious enterprise. Surely 'White Teeth' is too recent to reward (or deserve?) this kind of close critical attention. But in fact, this short book works well because of its chronological proximity to its subject, and you get a genuine sense of the author's enthusiasm for the novel - an enthusiasm that I share.

Briefly, this book consists of a chapter that sketches the pertinent details of Zadie Smith's career so far; a chapter that engages fully with the themes and qualities of the novel; a couple of chapters that look at how the book was reviewed upon publication and how it performed initially; and a concluding chapter that contains a wide selection of Discussion Points and a surprisingly thorough bibliography. Ms Squires is particularly good at illuminating Zadie Smith's stylistic techniques, and is also refreshingly well-researched on the novel's history in terms of its publishing life (agents, deals, marketing, etc).

I was not aware of this series ('Continuum Contemporaries') until I stumbled across this particular volume on Amazon. If the other volumes are of the same high standard, I will be impressed.

4 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars White Teeth, February 11, 2005

By 

Mark A. Miller "Arataba" (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Zadie Smith's White Teeth (Continuum Contemporaries) (Paperback)

Great book. Very vivid descriptions of language, character and the family structure of non-native society in London. I feel that this book could explain the conflict any transplant could experience in a foriegn land.
It almost explains, though, that once you have tasted the western world, there is no going back.
Didn't care for the ending, though-- too much like a Wes Anderson movie where the players all congregate toward one spot rather unnaturally.
If you desire wit, involved reading and changes in eras, White Teeth is definitely for you.

23 of 90 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Uh, okay., July 6, 2003

By 

"writing_static" (Melbourne, AU) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Zadie Smith's White Teeth (Continuum Contemporaries) (Paperback)

If you require a guide to Smith's execrable 'White Teeth', then I regret to inform you that you are too stupid to live.