I lost many literary battles the day I read 'Their Eyes Were Watching God.' I had to concede that occasionally aphorisms have their power. I had to give up the idea that Keats had a monopoly on the lyrical.
Zadie SmithIf you're going to write a good book, you have to make mistakes and you have to not be so cautious all the time.
Zadie SmithA lot of women, when they're young, feel they have very good friends, and find later on that friendship is complicated. It's easy to be friends when everyone's 18. It gets harder the older you get, as you make different life choices, as people say in America. A lot of women's friendships begin to founder.
Zadie SmithThe secret to editing your work is simple: you need to become its reader instead of its writer.
Zadie Smith