If you’re looking to read some Zadie Smith then I’d recommend you steer clear of this one... It pains me to say it, as Smith’s other four novels are all absolute delights, but unfortunately I found this one very tedious - But you can all rest assured that I recommend White Teeth, Swing Time, On Beauty and NW heartily!
.
Usually Smith’s novels are bursting with life and vibrancy, there’s a great sprawling cast of characters and she turns her sharp eye to dissecting society... in The Autograph Man, there’s a man. Who trades and sells autographs. It’s very much centred on Alex-Li’s life, without any further exploration of wider society which Smith does so well.
.
I’m often all for novels that are character-driven, even if the main character is unlikeable, that’s fine by me as long as they’re interesting. Unfortunately, again, Alex-Li is neither likeable nor very interesting. It feels like blasphemy writing this review, as I count Zadie Smith among my favourite authors, but this just did not do it for me at all!
.
A slight saving grace were the supporting characters, who very much were just there to provide some background to Alex-Li, if there’d been more focus on them it would have made for a slightly better story.

Although maybe somewhat too generous, I think the book's description from the publisher puts it aptly. The Autograph Man is a "deeply funny existential tour around the hollow trappings of modernity: celebrity, cinema, and the ugly triumph of symbol over experience." This sort of novel isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea. It revels in the nullity of mediate and self-aware modern life. It cartoonishly chases sincerity while acknowledging its improbability.

This sort of knife-edge act of deferring to and defeating Influence (RE: the anxiety of influence) ironically defaults to authorial style and wit. I think Zadie Smith passes this test well enough despite the underwhelming nature of her lead's character and doings. Alex-Li Tandem is "a dreary blank, an empty centre" like the critic James Wood complained in his 2002 review, but I don't quite take it as the disappointed he does. Tandem serve as Smith's vehicle for lots of hilarity and dread. This is what The Autograph Man modestly promises and delivers to readers.

n  n

After finishing this novel, I was somewhat surprised by the number of negative reviews of the vaunted Smith. I enjoyed White Teeth similarly to this work, though the former enjoyed a bit more verve. James Wood's review stands out to me because it manage to deliver a negative review while identifying some very interesting things about the work. He labels Smith's second novel a disturbing mutant because she, a contemporary British author, has mind-melded with distinctly American know-it-all writer. Wood laments that "the novel... bears the impress of American writers like Dave Eggers and David Foster Wallace, clever, nervy exhibitionists, IQs-with-i-Books, guys who, as Smith has put it, ‘know things’, writers with a gift for speedy cultural analysis, whose prose is choppy with interruption." This is a style I love so what does it matter that Smith is British? I understand rolling one's eyes at that endless recycling or iteration of snappy pop culture references in ways common to postmodern American artists (e.g. Tarantino). But I think Wood is a bit ahead of the curve with this insight given this was only 2002.

And yes, Wood is right about some of the moral confusion in The Autograph Man, but I don't find this concerning. The amorality and unrelenting cynicism compel a close look at the obsession with spectacle. Although Tandem's profession is a bit quaint (collecting and selling autographs) to today's readers, in some ways the democratization of celebrity in a fragmented cultural landscape have made the theme of the mediate self without sincere grounding more resonant. Like Wood says, "in a world of signs nothing is authentic." Where can we turn to for real meaning except to our cultural artifacts that are built on top of prior cultural artifacts that are often subjects of derision or parody? Where is raw real-life meaning and feeling?

But look at this, this purportedly insubstantial and second-rate Zadie Smith novel has prompted introspection. I think this is what we can hope for from contemporary literary fiction. That and some entertaining frivolity, which this one delivered. Some real bangers!

James Wood Review "Fundamentally Goyish"

Extended review with thoughts on hysterical realism at Holodoxa, my Substack

***Fine, if you don't want to read this I understand. Just get the book and read "The Joke about the Pope and the Chief Rabbi" section and enjoy a good laugh.

I'm torn on this book, mostly because I wanted to like it a lot more than I did. I found it to be complex and convoluted, which made it boring. Alex had great potential to be a great main character, but he was boring and hard to like, which is not great for an author whose stories are as character-driven as Smith's. The secondary characters were much more interesting and I would have loved more time with them and less with Alex.

I'm also very conflicted on Smith writing a story that is so filled with Judaism. There is just too much "Jewishness" (to borrow a term from Smith) in the book for something written by a non-Jew. Judge Judy once said to RuPaul "Incorporating Judaism into your personality is maybe something you don't need" and I feel like that is really just my feeling here...

The fact that this book took me eight months to finish is all you need to know.

Una lunga estenuante fatica, una noia infinita.

A well-developed diverse pool of characters, an interesting premise, and Zadie Smith's mastery of language should add up to a five star review - right? While there are several flashes of brilliance and insight, I mostly just wanted this book to end. It's long, it's meandering, and while I recognise that it may be a great study for an English Literature seminar, it just wasn't for me.

Zadie Smith is and will always be my favorite author. I loved The Autograph Man, but it honestly felt like two separate books to me. The second half was way more interesting.

2 ⭐️
It took me a while to get into the story. Once I did it was fine, I liked the idea of meeting your idols. However, I did not think this was funny even though it is described as such.

Probably a bad place to start reading Zadie Smith, I admit - but this convinced me that she must have been a bully in high school.

I'd delayed reading this book for many years because of the mediocre reviews but there it was: a lone English novel, in a Spanish book shop, so I decided to take the plunge. Plus I had just finished rereading On Beauty, which is enjoyable and insightful, and works so well as an updated Howard's End.
Unfortunately the reviews were right. This feels like it was difficult to write; you can sense the sections where Smith must have thrown up her hands in despair. It makes several clunky attempts to offer insight into the vapid nature of celebrity but it feels painfully forced - a reference to a bird singing the first notes of a popular show tune made me blush - and the Jewish/Goyish thing, although amusing at first, quickly becomes infuriating.
I always despair of reviews that complain of the lack of 'likeable characters', but you know a novel is in trouble when you could quite happily punch the noses of those with whom the author intends you to sympathise. Alex is meant to be irksome (I presume) but Adam is just a massive pain in the arse. (Is suspicion of the over earnest a Goyish thing?)
By some coincidence I started rereading London Fields halfway through (out of despair and necessity) and the similarities between Smith and Amis and their approach to tales of the city are striking, but Amis wrote about young lust, when he was in his precocious phase, and Smith has attempted to tackle something that Amis wisely left alone for a few years. I have NW on my bookshelf and I am afraid.

This is the first Zadie Smith book I've read. I really enjoyed her style.

She uses very modern characters and deliberately chooses unique and sometimes surprising ethnic/social/economic groups to make them fresh and interesting - the main character is Alex-Li Tandem, a half-Chinese Jew who trades in autographs. Her characters all have a comic feel to them but she sketches them in a respectful way and they still seem (just about) believable.

She uses a lot of dialogue. She's not afraid to gently poke fun at the way people of different backgrounds say things. It's the conversation between the characters that shapes the story, provides the (many) comic moments and keeps the plot developing.

The arc of the plot is interesting if a little odd. It's primarily a book about a young man searching for some kind of meaning or success in his life - like a hundred other books. In this case, success means securing the autograph of Kitty Alexander, a washed up ex-Hollywood actress. I assumed Tandem's quest would peter out and end in misery, but the book takes a surprising turn when Tandem travels to America and finds Kitty. It then becomes a story about what achieving your dream actually means (not very much) and leads on to a new comic series of events but unfortunately not much in the way of new insight into the characters.

I did like the ending though - I won't give it away but it's simple, poignant and ties the book up nicely.

I'd definitely read Zadie Smith again. The Autograph Man wasn't a classic but I enjoyed her style and I think I'd like to give White Teeth a try next.

7/10

Great voice missing a great story