On Beauty

by Zadie Smith
2005

In the college town of Wellington, Massachusetts, two academic families, the Belseys and the Kippses, are ideological and personal opposites whose lives become deeply intertwined. Howard Belsey is a politically liberal professor of art at Wellington College, a white Englishman married to an African-American woman. Their three children — Jerome, Zora, and Levi — grapple with their own identities and conflicts in the face of their parents' tumultuous marriage. Howard, an atheist and iconoclast, has not published recently, and brings chaos to his marriage with infidelity and his outlook which rejects the important or sacred; he seems not at home in the world.  In contrast, Monty Kipps, a British-Caribbean art historian, is conservative, confident, larger than life, popular, and successful.  When the oldest son, Jerome Belsey, becomes romantically involved with Monty's daughter, Victoria, an awkward entanglement of personal, political, and professional conflicts is set in motion. As the story unfolds, and minor characters flit in and out of the families' orbit, the characters confront themes of race, privilege, identity, and fidelity while struggling to reconcile their ideals with the messy realities of life.

The novel draws heavily on its academic setting, portraying the complexities of campus politics, ideological divisions, and personal hypocrisies. It's densely layered yet is a smooth, alluring read, has a mordant wit, and the prose style is beautiful.  It won the Orange Prize, was nominated for the Booker, and ended up on countless Best of the Year lists.  Smith acknowledges an explicit comparison to E.M. Forster's Howard's End in both its plot and its concern with human relationships, but I haven't read that novel, so perhaps I'm missing something.  I very much enjoyed reading it, and I think Smith is an excellent communicator of complex subjects.  I liked especially the critiques of intellectualism's failings regarding the hard realities of the world, and the nuanced depiction of race, especially Kiki's experiences as a non-academic black woman in a white man's academic world.  I was put off, somewhat, by the overstuffed narrative, with its many subplots and secondary characters vying for attention.  I am also the type of reader who seeks some form of closure to be fully satisfied, and this novel, essentially a slice of life, albeit a complex one, begins in media res and ends with all possibilities open.  In sum, this is a masterfully-written work that I enjoyed reading, but upon completing it, I felt a bit let down, as if I'd had a whirlwind dance with someone I can now no longer find.

four stars