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kelcarter's review against another edition
4.0
I love Zadie Smith. I love that she gets lost in thought like she gets lost in gardens, looking at all the weird angles and strange people. I love getting lost with her, because we never stay lost: she always brings us back around to a clearer view of something taken for granted.
cwalsh's review against another edition
5.0
Zadie Smith's Feel Free covers such a variety of topics (she covers everyone from Kierkegaard to Justin Beiber) that it's so hard to pick a favorite, however as a librarian and a lover of Joni Mitchell, I have to say that The North West London Blues and Some Notes on Attunement are huge stand outs for me. I've always found Zadie Smith's writing beautiful, but hearing her thoughts and criticisms on film, art, music, social interactions, and general cultural commentaries really just made me look at her in another dimension. It's amazing how she can sound extremely academic in tone but so accessible at the same time. In each and every work, regardless of the topic at hand, her intellect shines through.
PS: Zadie, you're never too old to discover More Songs About People and Food.
PS: Zadie, you're never too old to discover More Songs About People and Food.
stumpnugget's review against another edition
5.0
These essays are brilliant, funny, serious, insightful, vulnerable, banal, consequential, and everything else in between. This reminded me a bit of reading old Joan Dideon essays.
rachelevelyn's review against another edition
2.5
This took me forever to finish! I picked up bc the first was about the area she grew up in and I now live, so was interested to hear her writing on how it had changed.
Some of the other essays were great but it felt like there was no real theme / order to them and at least 50% were v dull and I had to skim through.
Some of the other essays were great but it felt like there was no real theme / order to them and at least 50% were v dull and I had to skim through.
lovelykd's review against another edition
I received an ARC of Feel Free via Edelweiss.
I don’t think it’s fair to rate this collection as, honestly, I was disinterested in many of the essays. Smith’s lengthy discourse on works of art and classic literature are beautifully written, but topically boring—to me.
It’s clear she has a passion for art, music, and literature. If you do as well, then this is for you.
Her writing is beautiful and her depth of understanding—on such a wide range of topics—is hypnotic to behold; her thoughts made me want to learn more about the artist/musician/writer for whom she so passionately expounds.
That said, because I am so disconnected from such topics—due to lack of knowledge—it was difficult for me to remain focused.
I often felt an intense desire to skip or skim through many of the essays; I couldn’t remain engaged on topics upon which I held zero interest.
Even so, this is a book that has the potential to enlighten most anyone, because it’s a sort of bible on cultural discourse.
You may not feel the need to read every essay presented within Feel Free, but that certainly doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty worth reading.
I don’t think it’s fair to rate this collection as, honestly, I was disinterested in many of the essays. Smith’s lengthy discourse on works of art and classic literature are beautifully written, but topically boring—to me.
It’s clear she has a passion for art, music, and literature. If you do as well, then this is for you.
Her writing is beautiful and her depth of understanding—on such a wide range of topics—is hypnotic to behold; her thoughts made me want to learn more about the artist/musician/writer for whom she so passionately expounds.
That said, because I am so disconnected from such topics—due to lack of knowledge—it was difficult for me to remain focused.
I often felt an intense desire to skip or skim through many of the essays; I couldn’t remain engaged on topics upon which I held zero interest.
Even so, this is a book that has the potential to enlighten most anyone, because it’s a sort of bible on cultural discourse.
You may not feel the need to read every essay presented within Feel Free, but that certainly doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty worth reading.
marissasa's review against another edition
Some of the essays were really interesting and insightful, like the one about The Social Network movie. However, too many of them didn’t hold my interest and because of that I decided to stop reading in favor of others on my super long tbr.
dezlld's review against another edition
I loved the first chapters of this book, but it began falling short for me when there was a whole ton of pop culture references, that weren't explained and integral to the chapter. In most essay books, when people repeatedly mention something as a theme for a passage, they give the base amount of knowledge to properly convey the message, but this ended up falling flat and seeming as though it prioritized talking about a subjective pop culture experience rather than something like the defunding of libraries and racial biases of the UK that appears in the first chapters.
cfurniss22's review against another edition
2.0
2 would be a bit harsh probably more of a 2.5
Found myself skipping most of the essays as I didn’t get the intention behind them. Some really thought-provoking pieces interspersed within a lot of randomness.
Found myself skipping most of the essays as I didn’t get the intention behind them. Some really thought-provoking pieces interspersed within a lot of randomness.
danak147's review against another edition
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
4.25