(2005) is Zadie Smith’s third novel, following her incredibly successful debut novel,

in 2000, and

in 2002. It was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize 2005 and won the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2006. Like the earlier two novels, it is a broadly humorous text, largely focused on family relations, and significantly engaged with interracial and cross-generational connections. Set primarily in the prosperous fictional university town of Wellington on the east coast of the United States (somewhat resembling Cambridge, Massachusetts),

follows the fortunes of the Belsey family, comprising Kiki Belsey, a beautiful black American woman, once petite and now obese, working as a hospital administrator, her white British husband Howard Belsey, a…

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Citation: Tolan, Fiona. "On Beauty". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 13 February 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=21583, accessed 21 November 2024.]