Intimations

by Zadie Smith

Deeply personal and powerfully moving, a short and timely series of essays on the experience of lock down, by one of the most clear-sighted and essential writers of our time

“There will be many books written about the year 2020: historical, analytic, political and comprehensive accounts. This is not any of those—the year isn’t half-way done. What I’ve tried to do is organize some of the feelings and thoughts that events, so far, have provoked in me, in those scraps of time the year itself has allowed. These are above all personal essays: small by definition, short by necessity.”

Crafted with the sharp intelligence, wit and style that have won Zadie Smith millions of fans, and suffused with a profound intimacy and tenderness in response to these unprecedented times, Intimations is a vital work of art, a gesture of connection and an act of love—an essential book in extraordinary times.

Genres: Nonfiction, Essays, Memoir, Short Stories, Audiobook, Contemporary, Biography

97 pages, Paperback

First published July 28, 2020

About the author

Zadie Smith is an English novelist, essayist, and short-story writer. Her debut novel, White Teeth (2000), immediately became a best-seller and won a number of awards. She became a tenured professor in the Creative Writing faculty of New York University in September 2010.

Reviews

[Jenna ❤ ❀ ❤ · Rating 2 out of 5]

Did I read the same book as everyone else? Because I totally don't get all the four and five star reviews I'm seeing.

Zadie Smith's books have come across my radar many times but I'd never read one. When I saw Intimations, I decided it was time to remedy that. 

I thought a book of essays about the pandemic would be something everyone can relate to, and I'd get a taste of Ms. Smith's writing. 

Well......

Her writing is good, but the content? 

I'm an introvert. As such, I loathe small talk. I hate parties where everyone has to stand around gibbering nonsense. I don't have energy to be around people a lot and so when I am, I want to use that energy to have deep and meaningful conversations. Talk about things that are important. 

Unfortunately this book is the equivalent of small talk. I don't give a shit about your neighbour's dog and I don't give a shit about how you and your masseuse chat about holidays. I equally don't give a shit about hearing how you grab a macchiato when you have two minutes to spare.

I thought this was going to be a book about the pandemic but it's not. Or barely. Instead, it reads like a bunch of diary entries, and not the kind of deep, reflective diary entries I might find interesting. 

To be fair, I started reading this immediately after finishing Claudia Rankine's Just Us: An American Conversation. I read the last word, made a cup of tea, and began this book. Perhaps I would have liked it more had I not just read someone so profoundly moving and intellectual as Ms. Rankine.

I don't know. Probably I still wouldn't have liked this. There's only one essay I appreciate, "Contempt as a Virus". I bumped my rating up to two stars instead of one because of it. If all the essays were like it, I would perhaps be able to give this four stars. 

Unfortunately, most of the essays were party talk small talk, the kind of talk that is a waste of my time. The only thing I liked about this book aside from that one essay is that it's short.

[Adam Dalva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating, wonderful book of 2020, whose relationship w/ Marcus Aurelius is established at the beginning and cascades closed in a moving ending of relationship's in Smith's life. Sharp, intensely intelligent, and fast. She was a professor of mine, and seeing her intellectual rigor firsthand was as much a thrill as it is to read her - very grateful to have read this.

[karen]

ever since quarantine began, i have been bracing myself for the inevitable flood of memoirs i knew were gonna come out of it—everyone with their feels and reflections; those "now i know what's really important" realizations they felt needed to be shared beyond their social media platforms. i was not anticipating that zadie freaking smith would be first in that fray, so now i gotta take back at least 80% of my eyerolls even before i read this, and probably more of what's left once i get my hands on a copy.

way to deflate my anticipatory snark, zs.

everyone else still gets eyerolls.

[Jaidee (lost in Vegas for a few days) · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.33 "so lovely to spend the evening with you Zadie" stars !!!

2022 Honorable Mention Read

I am not going to start this review by letting you know how much I love Zadie...

Some of you know that I do not read essays. I mostly do not like them, or they bore me.... I would rather read a novel or big piece of nonfiction, poetry even but essays tend to be my least favorite form.

My last few reads have been poor to fair experiences so I thought let me change my vibe by grooving with my Zadie and what a smart decision that was (Thanx boyfriend by denying me chocolate until I started this book) Well I ate half a pound of chocolate and devoured this small book of essays and both were delicious.

So I will simply name the essay and write a rating and a little ditty. These were all 4 to 5 star quality...not a maraschino cherry in bunch (yukky)

1 Peonies ...4 stars... Zadie reflects on her identity as woman and novelist and her challenges with control and submission (to pleasure and inactivity)

2 The American Exception...4 stars...Zadie speaks about how Covid follows hierarchical structure in America and how lives are valued differently depending on race, wealth and geography...

3 Something to Do...4.5 stars... A short existential piece about time, art and love

4. Suffering like Mel Gibson... 4 stars...A very interesting piece on the co-dependent bubbles of privilege and the nature of suffering

5. Screengrabs...5 stars...the favorite in bunch...short pieces on various people and topics....beautifully written and astute

-Zadie's interactions with her Asian masseur and her inability to relax and be idle
-Zadie listening to a homeless disabled and possibly delusional man who spouts anger at the fleeing whites as Zadie prepares to leave with her family due to the pandemic
-an old New York woman and her dog...fiesty as nails and part of the fabric of the neighborhood
-reflections on Cy who has style...a black IT worker at her University
-conversations with both an adopted auntie and her own mum
-thoughts and feelings around hate crimes and the phenomenon of self-hatred

She ends this little series with a hugely impactful little piece of the virus of "contempt" and its relationship to racism towards African Americans.

6 Intimations...4.5 stars...second fave in collection

A fun and creative piece about the people in Zadie's life both known and unknown....strangely very moving.

I will also not end the review by letting you know how much I love Zadie...and yes I love you too boyfriend !

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a year so far and in these essays, Smith tells us how she feels and what she is thinking. Life under Covid, of course, reasons authors write and musings on privilege. The essay though that I consider her strongest and most impactful was one on contempt. Comparing the epidemic of contempt to the Covid epidemic, both far reaching, possibly deadly, having unforseen circumstances until as with George Floyd's death, emotions reach a head.. It gave me a new way of thinking, and it made so much sense. I thought it was brilliant. The last part of this short book, whose proceeds will be donated, was her most personal. Descriptions of friends, aquaintances and some recognizable others.

ARC from Edelweiss.

[Marchpane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Last night I had a particularly vicious attack of vertigo-anxiety-insomnia, an unholy trinity in which each of the three parts prolongs and intensifies the other two.

Unable to sleep, move, or open my eyes, I turned to the audiobook of Intimations by Zadie Smith. Under any other circumstances, I would have multitasked—sharing my attention with driving or cooking or laundry. Instead I listened in the darkness, clinging to Smith’s voice like a lifeline, funnelling every ounce of concentration into her words.

So it was in this uncommon state of attentiveness that I absorbed these uncommonly attentive little essays. The word ‘essay’ seems wrong though—the pieces are more like reflections, or exercises, to be read, then ruminated upon. I can see why some readers might find this collection too brief or lacking in heft. But these were words that arrived at precisely the moment I needed to hear them:

‘…when the bad day in your week finally arrives—and it comes to all—by which I mean, that particular moment when your sufferings, as puny as they may be in the wider scheme of things, direct themselves absolutely and only to you, as if precisely designed to destroy you and only you, at that point it might be worth allowing yourself the admission of the reality of suffering…’

It’s a gift to have access to wise and affirming words from an intelligent and compassionate person, to help us navigate the human experiences of what Smith calls ‘the global humbling’. Acknowledging that my experience of reading this book was incredibly subjective, I can only give 5 stars.

[Brown Girl Reading · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are a few good essays in here but nothing that wow-ed me. I just wish Zadie would get back to writing good fiction. Everything she seems to be releasing is just ok.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

What's our world of today like, really?

How do we process the situation individually and collectively while isolated in our bubbles - both physically and psychologically separated from each other, yet only a computer or phone away from the increasingly fragmented communication forms of our era?

The virus of contempt and hatred spreads alongside the not-so-democratic virus of more traditionally biological attacking methods, and it too makes differences, just like the social virus. For more people die of it in certain areas than others. Some people are immune from the herd, and others are not.

For the virus of hatred, there seems to be no vaccine, no matter how hard some idealists try to create one. There are too many anti-vaxxers out there, maybe? Or re-infection rates are higher than expected?

Who knows what is going to become of our generation, so connected and so lonely? Zadie Smith captures a few of the random worries, thoughts and observations that fight for our short attention span. We are distracted from our personal misery by the political mess, then we let the personal distract us from the collective again, in a vicious circle of half-concentration, like Zadie Smith's conversation patterns with her mum, spinning around (un-)safe work places, gardening and family gossip without ever resting in one place long enough.

The essays are made for us who tend to read news articles to fill time with anxiety that is not our own. They are short, full of understanding, to the point and not too demanding of our brain breeze conditions or post-covid fatigues (which in some cases may actually be long covid or pre-covid or not-covid, the common denominator being fatigue to varying degrees).

But most importantly: they appeal to what is still human in us not to stop filling time with love instead of hatred!

[Katia N · Rating 4 out of 5]

These are lock-down essays by Zadie. I did not expect them to be very crafty, but wanted to read them for the immediacy of our, I suppose, widely and weirdly shared experience. And by "widely" I mean more or less the whole planet. Based upon my understanding, she has moved from NY and spent this time in her London place with the family. Unsurprisingly, it is not difficult to identify with her experience. But some of these brief essays are quite poignant in its own right.

I liked the first one called "Peonies" when she caught herself looking at the new tulips and wanted them to be peonies. What follows is a short meditation of being woman and spend the life writing.

Another wonderful set of sketches called "Screengrabs". It is devoted to the last hours of their NY life. There is an episode when she walks her dogs and meets an old lady whom she knows from the neiigbourhood. The lady says to her that they all are going to get through this together. And Zadie cannot do much but nod knowing that she is actually leaving. I was touched by this moment and by Zadie's honesty of including it in these essays. It reminded me another book I've listened to recently where the western narrator living in Japan choses to leave for Hong Kong after Fukushima together with many expats. But the locals do not have this choice. She writes as well how hard it was after that to come back and how some people did not feel like welcoming any more. I do not want to make any judgement in both cases. Actually I am not sure why I am retelling this episode even. But it is the bundle of feelings on both sides i can so easily relate to.

There is one political essay as well. And if anything else, that would make this collection for me as I cannot agree more with her point of view. She makes the virus a metaphor. She talks about the virus of contempt both the UK and the US. And her conclusions are not very hopeful. I just quote her:

This is about the UK. I also would like to stress how potentially spot on she is about so-called "data-rich" structures Cummings is vexing lyrical:

"...in the form of the Prime Minister’s ‘ideas man’, Dominic, whose most fundamental idea is that the categorical imperative doesn’t exist. Instead there is one rule for men like him, men with ideas, and another for the ‘people’. This is an especially British strain of the virus. Class contempt. Technocratic contempt. Philosopher King contempt. When you catch the British strain you believe the people are there to be ruled. They are to be handled, played, withstood, tolerated – up to a point – ridiculed (behind closed doors), sentimentalized, bowdlerized, nudged, kept under surveillance, directed, used, and closely listened to, but only for the purposes of data collection, through which means you harvest the raw material required to manipulate them further. "

And this is her view on the reaction in the US to BLM. And it is so much what i feel when I see many people suddenly flock to read the books by people of colour. It is very good move. But it should not be done to make one feel better about herself, or to be under illusion that this constitutes any positive performative action:

"But I am talking in hypotheticals: the truth is that not enough carriers of this virus have ever been willing to risk the potential loss of any aspect of their social capital to find out what kind of America might lie on the other side of segregation. They are very happy to ‘blackout’ their social media for a day, to read all-black books, and ‘educate’ themselves about black issues – as long as this education does not occur in the form of actual black children attending their actual schools."

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars
It is inevitable that there will be a slew of books, memoirs, stories and reflections about lockdown and its effects. Zadie Smith seems to have got her contribution in first, this was published at the end of July. There is a nod to Marcus Aurelius and his meditations. Although Smith said that for her writing in lockdown was an obvious thing to do. She compares it to baking banana bread, playing Minecraft or working out to Joe Wicks (that may be a UK thing). On a personal note, I didn’t get a chance to do any of those things, having to go to work! Anyway I would probably have read! This is a brief read, only seventy pages or so.
There are half a dozen essays here; the longest is a series of sketches. They are mostly very personal and Smith also is sharply perceptive about herself in relation to others. This relates to a woman on her block in New York, who was normally aloof and appeared self-contained:
“Thing is, we’re a community, and we got each other’s back. You’ll be there for me, and I’ll be there for you, and we’ll all be there for each other, the whole building. Nothing to be afraid of – we’ll get through this, all of us, together.” “Yes, we will,” I whispered, hardly audible, even to myself”.
There is another conversation at a bus stop in London where she meets a family friend she hasn’t seen for a while. The woman is 58 and hasn’t yet reached the menopause: she is on her way to the doctors:
“I’m walking right in there and DEMANDING he brings it on, right now, because this is just silly business at this point.”
It is an intensely personal set of recollections, but there are big ideas here as well and the pandemic and Black Lives Matter weigh heavily as an underscore to it all. There is a brief and brilliant piece of writing about contempt where she talks about the Dominic Cummings fiasco and the death of George Floyd: the link being the absolute contempt with which those with power treat those they rule. Contempt is the real virus thinks Smith.
Then there is a brief piece about a meme popular during lockdown entitled “Suffering like Mel Gibson” which explores the idea that “misery is very precisely designed and is different for each person”.
There are reflections on contemporary America and particularly death in contemporary America:
“in America, all of these involved some culpability on the part of the dead. Wrong place, wrong time. Wrong skin color. Wrong side of the tracks. Wrong Zip Code, wrong beliefs, wrong city. Wrong position of hands when asked to exit the vehicle. Wrong health insurance—or none. Wrong attitude to the police officer…. America has rarely been philosophically inclined to consider existence as a whole, preferring instead to attack death as a series of discrete problems. Wars on drugs, cancer, poverty, and so on. Not that there is anything ridiculous about trying to lengthen the distance between the dates on our birth certificates and the ones on our tombstones: ethical life depends on the meaningfulness of that effort. But perhaps nowhere in the world has this effort—and its relative success—been linked so emphatically to money as it is in America.”
This is a quick easy read, some reflection, some polemic, very personal and thoughtful. It would have benefitted from some tighter editing, but maybe that’s the point.

[leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

intimations is a collection of six essays, and although written during lockdown, it is definitely not a ‘covid’ book. instead, it is a series of reflections and musings smith had during the first few months of the pandemic, particularly her attempts to try and make sense of the world during such a state of perpetual chaos. the postscript ‘contempt as a virus’, in which smith discusses coronavirus and racism as the ‘real virus’ is definitely the standout and the most moving piece, but the whole collection is incredibly powerful and full of smith’s trademark stunning and intelligent prose.

[Anna Avian · Rating 1 out of 5]

I thought this was supposed to be about the pandemic and the authors' experience and way of adapting to the "new normal". Instead, it felt like a few scattered diary pages had been put together in some random order. Dull and pointless conversations about neighbors and dogs and massages .. I don't really care if you can hold your Kindle underneath the massage table and read while having a massage.

[Julie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found this unmoving and not at all reminiscent of the tender, fragile, bewildering early weeks of the pandemic, when we hovered in a near dream-like state of wonder and fear, when dolphins swam in Venice's canals and Andrew Cuomo was shuttling Covid patients into nursing homes. Smith attempts to draw privilege into the conversation, while at the same time remaining secluded at home writing and preparing to leave New York City, like so many of privileged were able to do.

[Lisa (NY) · Rating 4 out of 5]

As usual, Smith helps me see more deeply. This slim collection is mostly about the pandemic and is more accessible than many of her essay collections. The essay on contempt as a virus is especially profound.

[Mehrsa · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Zadie Smith. Love her fictions, but her non-fiction essays could sustain me for a lifetime. I read this one twice in a row and will read it again. She's so good and this is way too short

[Z. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though Zadie Smith is possibly my favorite contemporary writer, I didn't expect a whole lot from Intimations, the sub-100-page essay collection on the COVID-19 pandemic which she managed both to pen and publish by the time 2020 was hardly half over. (Apparently all her royalties for the book have gone toward virus- or racial justice-based charities, which probably explains the hurried release.) I expected a pleasant but minor work, and the first two thirds delivered pretty much what I anticipated: scattered reflections on various by-now-well-worn aspects of the early lockdown—the suddenness of it all, the new abundance of free time, the emptiness of New York streets, the simultaneously obfuscating and revealing nature of Donald Trump's phraseology, the weird etiquette of video-conferencing, the gulf between those secure enough to weather the plague in relative comfort and those with no such luxury—and though Smith's unique slant and trademark erudition and empathy are evident throughout, the fact of her comparatively cushy socio-economic position also robs these writings of much real urgency. (As she's the first to admit.)

But towards the end of the book there's a tonal transformation which echoes, I think, the emotional one many of us underwent as the uneasy quarantine months of March, April, and May gave way to the explosive global protests of June and July. Whatever coyness or ironic distance Smith deploys in the first handful of essays is shed in "Contempt as a Virus," a piece whose somewhat on-the-nose title does little to prepare the reader for the cutting, deeply-felt, and concisely-argued upwelling of George Floyd-inspired rage and despair which follows. It's one of the best things I've read yet on America's race situation as it currently stands, and I needed to catch my breath after finishing it.

Already weakened by "Contempt as a Virus," Intimations' final, eponymous essay dealt me the death blow. The premise is simple: a list of people—family members, teachers, artists, celebrities, and others—along with a short summation of the "debts and lessons" Smith has incurred from each of them. It's a brief, sweet expression of gratitude in the face of difficulty which really struck a chord with me, and I finished the book through a fog of tears.

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Six beautifully-written essays that touch on the pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement, but mostly address the ‘pause’ in our daily lives caused by the lockdown. We have more time to think and reflect; more time to nurture ourselves and family.

The strongest essay of the six is ‘Contempt as a Virus’. Here, Smith reflects on how the contempt we have for various groups spreads like a virus and negatively affects society as a whole. Recommend.

[Marc Lamot · Rating 3 out of 5]

I guess it does make a difference whether you read this booklet in 2020, at the start of the pandemic when this was written, or two years later, as I did. Zadie Smith's brief reflections on her stay in New York and later London, quite shortly after the start of the covid-crisis, come across as remarkably light-hearted: they seem like fleeting impressions, and corona or the lockdown are actually only touched upon to a limited extent. But Smith does show how deeply the disease affects everyday life and unmasks obvious things as superficially founded. The essay “something to do” in particular, exposes how much of what we do is actually time-filling, and our lives seem little more than stretched out time. Still, I can't help but feel that Smith is also overestimating the long-term effects of the pandemic. At the very least, she suggests that the time before and after corona will not be the same. It may be too early to judge that, but what is happening in Ukraine now casts doubt on an impact for the better. That question aside, Smith's delicate reflections make a little beauty shine through the darkness, and that's comforting, to say the least. (rating 2.5 stars)

[Larry H · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zadie Smith's new collection of essays, Intimations , may be short, but it packs such a punch.

“Talking to yourself can be useful. And writing means being overheard.”

This is another book I read because, as I like to call it, "Bookstagram Made Me Do It" — my second this week, in fact! I have three friends to thank for this one.

Intimations is a 100+-page collection of short essays by Smith. I’m a fan of her fiction and don’t normally read essays very often, but I was fascinated by her take on our world as it has been affected by COVID-19.

Her essays fascinated me, serving as a source of amusement and inspiration as much as they made me think. She talks about the compelling need to always be doing something that has been exacerbated even more since the pandemic. She talks about anger, privilege, race, relationships, economics, psychology. She even touches on why so many writers love addressing the question of why they choose to write.

But it is the essay that serves as the postscript, “Contempt as a Virus,” that was the most impactful for me. In it she equates COVID with the plague of racism, particularly following the murder of George Floyd. In just a few pages she communicates so powerfully.

“Has America metabolized contempt? Has it lived with the virus so long that it no longer fears it? Is there a strong enough desire for a different America within America?”

If you’re looking for a thought-provoking piece, this is a book for you. Smith is donating all the royalties to charity, so you’re doing a good deed, too, in purchasing this.

Check out my list of the best books I read in 2019 at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-best-books-i-read-in-2019.html.

Check out my list of the best books of the decade at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2020/01/my-favorite-books-of-decade.html.

See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com.

Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/the.bookishworld.of.yrralh/.

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zadie Smith says she tells her students, " 'A style is a means of insisting on something.' A line of Sontag's." This is exactly what I expect whenever I pick up a Zadie Smith book: style. She never disappoints.

I found this clutch companion in a small used bookstore in Denver, Colorado, adjacent to elegant reading benches and a coffeeshop with the best espresso in the Union Station. It was tucked away in a small nonfiction section, two small paperbacks squeezed into a corner, hidden by prodigious celebrity nonfiction hardcovers. I bought this copy and moved the last available copy to the front. The bookseller smiled sheepishly.

Smith says this about style: "Every year I repeat it, and every year the meaning of this sentence extends and deepens in my mind, blooming and multiplying like a virus, until it covers not just literary aesthetics and the films of Leni Riefenstahl but bedrooms, gardens, makeup, spectacles, camera angles, dances, gaits, gestures, sexual positions, haircuts, iPhone covers, bathroom taps, fonts, drink orders, dogs and people, and so much more—but people above all."

This contemplative short book of essays is Smith's processing of the events of 2020. Her intimations. When the world is unrecognizable, she attempts to organize her thoughts, to process her suffering, to think aloud. She reads Aurelius' Meditations for practical help, and she writes a book that would donate its proceeds to the Equal Justice Initiative. It is almost like journal writing, as we get a glimpse into daily living, errands to the store and ATM machine, stories of neighbors, suffering exhibited by the virus, mental and physical anguish that results from racial hatred, the exit, and yet it is written with the academic flair one expects from Smith's books.

[julieta · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had not read Smith in a long time, and I guess I was expecting more. Maybe it all seemed a little too superficial, maybe something thought out with more time would have had a more profound result. This just seemed like what we were all thinking in the beginning of all this, but maybe it´s the fact that we have been in this for a long time, and I would have liked to know what she thinks about it having given herself more time to think about it. If there is one thing we have learned from this, is that time has become different, and the usual speed with which people are supposed to read into situations needs to be slower. It seems to me, this book is the first thing that came to her head, and I would like to know what came to her after almost a year of all this.

[Alwynne · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mostly written in response to the pandemic, this slim collection of Zadie Smith’s essays ranges from more personal aspects of life in her New York neighbourhood to broader issues. So, she rehashes awkward conversations with neighbours about community – Smith doesn’t reveal that she’s planning to leave the city as soon as possible – as well as what’s happening to local shops and businesses, stalled or slowly closing in scenes all-too-familiar across large areas of the globe. But, and maybe I’m being unfair here, I didn’t find Smith’s attempts at forging closer connections either with the people around her or with her readers persuasive or convincing; there’s something too self-conscious, too obviously calculated in the way she writes and what she writes about. Although Smith’s concerns about the poor and struggling are incredibly important, it’s these groups that are being hit hard by government policies in this crisis, both in the US and elsewhere, I’m just not sure she’s got much to say that’s not already been said countless times. I thought the sections that worked best were more abstract, directly political ones, particularly a piece on contempt as a foundation of racism that spreads like a virus, which clearly refers to recent events centred on George Floyd’s murder and the necessity of the BLM movement’s strong response. But ultimately this collection’s content’s as slight as its size. Not sure what I was expecting from these but whatever it was, I didn’t find it.

[Atri · Rating 4 out of 5]

To read every line of a book with the same sense of involvement and culpability as if you had written it yourself. And, conversely, to write your own sentences as if you had no more ownership over the lines than a stranger. To be never finished thinking, because everything is as infinite as God. To know there is a metaphysics of everything.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

There will be no shortage of books written about our current year. Scientific examinations of the virus, stories focused on New York hospital's response in the early months of the pandemic, speculative fictions, alternate histories, intersectional narratives and more. Zadie Smith's Intimations comes out of the gate fast (Proceeds from the book are going to the Equal Justice Initiative and the COVID-19 Emergency Relief Fund for New York) and has me pining for the bygone days that marked the height of blogging.

I don't mean it in a dismissive way. Smith is of course a polished writer, her six essays are snapshots of a moment, stolen fragments with a precise attention to the little details. But it has me remembering when I'd start off the day reading from a host of bloggers doing just that, boiling down personal moments into consumable online essays. It was for them, as it is for Smith, something to do. I realize I want more of that, a connection to how individuals are navigating this moment without grandiose statements around race, polarization, social media and American individualism. Just more pre-menopausal women clinging to the bars of the Market Garden staring at tulips.

[Lee Klein · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best when relaying observations from immediate life, small scenes, character sketches. Insightful, graceful, reckoning with life at a remove thanks to lockdown, intrinsic/artistic nature, race, class, and gender. Will be interesting to revisit in a decade or two.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Intimations is a perfect title for this short collection of essays, reflections, and literary sketches that Zadie Smith wrote over the course of the first few months of the pandemic. While not front and center in most of these pieces, the pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement hover in the background throughout.

The thread that weaves these works together is the concept of difference and sameness; we are all in the same situation, and our circumstances differ. These particularities matter.

The essay that most strongly stood out to me was one of the "Screengrabs," her brilliant metaphor of contempt as a virus.

I am always impressed by Smith's writing. I am in awe of the consummate skill with which she ended each of these essays with the perfect sentence or paragraph to tie the piece together. She brilliantly succeeds at her stated aim to, ". . . give readers the thing I try to fight for myself, which is a space to think your own thoughts, whatever they might be."

[Tee · Rating 2 out of 5]

**** 1.75 Stars ****

I understand that this book seems to be working for everyone else and my rating may come across as harsh. But this is my experience with this book and I cannot lie or sugarcoat it to please others and come acoss as insincere. I don't know what I was expecting from this but whatever it was, I did not find it. I don't even know what the point was to be completely honest.

I've never read anything for Zadie Smith and I've never heard of her before. So I was really excited to read Intimations because it sounded interesting and I usually love reading essays.

Despite what everyone is saying about this book, I found it very dull and short. I did not like Smith's writing style. It was too simple and too short. Her thoughts were often scattered across the pages with no direction. Some topics seemed insincere. For example, Screengrabs and her story of the nail store worker. There was nothing new or original about that story and it felt forced.

The only one that I enjoyed was Contempt as a Virus because it offered a new outlook on racism in America and how it relates to contempt and the failure of hope.

Maybe I read this at the wrong time. I don't know. But I just couldn't connect with her and her writing style. I wasn't interested in any of her stories. Her essays felt more like reflections and they lacked abstract ideas. I wish I would've liked this like everyone else. I really wish, but it just did not work out.

[Jonfaith · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a dry, sad, small idea of a life. And how exposed it looks, now that the people I love are in the same room to witness the way I do time. The way I’ve done it all my life.

Throughout the pandemic, my perspective was oblique if often harrowing. Yes, I was working but my trips to the supermarket involved me avoiding people, like the proverbial (and now literal) plague. It was just work and apprehension. My focus had shifted from day services to residential and everyone was healthy. yet I trembled and struggled with uncertainty. then in June we began providing day services again but at a residential location. My life had purpose and the states were all reopening, ignoring the guidelines of the White House, the CDC, and the rest of the world. Then the infections soared. I found myself infected and suddenly facing fourteen days at home with the Mrs -- who tested negative. My reading wasn't focused. I wanted divergence and then suddenly I was aware of this and ordered it instantly. This is a stirring meditation on what it all means -- in 2020 and what we will never understand.

[nathan · Rating 2 out of 5]

“𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘭𝘦𝘧𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘢 𝘯𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘴𝘵: 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘪𝘴 𝘪𝘵 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘢 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘯-𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘦 𝘢𝘵 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘢 𝘮𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵? 𝘋𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥? 𝘖𝘳 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥, 𝘪𝘯 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘦𝘹𝘵𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘪𝘵𝘺, 𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶?”

girl, whatever lol

this literally could’ve been a substack post

a few good strokes of brilliance here and there, but nothing to sustain or measure out all the pain and misery that the pandemic held. the issues do not have enough emotional distance for rendering, but exist as a time capsule for now-then minutia. can we just accept that the pandemic was just a wonderful time for writers to stay locked-in and write what they held off on for so long and just move on with the rest of our lives ok thanx baiii !!!

[Walker Iversen · Rating 4 out of 5]

We all knew the quarantine musings would come. But how soon? And should they come at all? If I’m going to give into such things right NOW, I’d rather it be with Zadie Smith; her famously unpretentious, and often funny, frankness on full display. This collection is short, not even 100 pages. It is brisk, for sure, but she recognizes that we are just at the beginning of a major unraveling and captures the absurdity and surreality of this liminal space. She does this, not with grand statements, but intimate sketches of the people that inhabit the peripherals of her life. She draws connections between their (and her) privileges and inequities, the pandemic and the police brutalities, and the ways these things are converging at this particular moment. Per her title, these are only intimations of things to come, but right now there is more than enough time for reflection—and reckoning.

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.