White Teeth (Penguin Essentials)

　　這是一齣荒謬劇。舞台很大，角色在上面顯得渺小。台詞都像囈語或詛咒，悲傷看似很輕，笑聲很沈重。

　　幾個主要演員：阿奇，一個做任何事都要靠擲硬幣來決定的英國白人。伊格伯，孟加拉裔的餐館服務生，活在自己曾曾祖父是國家英雄的光環裡。他鄉愁如此濃烈，卻只能跟餐館客人和好友喃喃傾訴。他們的兒女，活在各自心靈上的異鄉：滿頭捲髮的愛瑞希望自己變身成直髮美女，米列特幻想自己是義大利電影裡的黑幫老大，馬吉德一心想要前往科技許諾的未來……

　　戲如人生，看時漫長，居然忽忽來到最後一幕。這是莎娣‧史密斯在她二十三歲時說的故事，關於過去與現在，關於地震、叛變、戰爭與預言，關於愛與折磨，關於東方對西方的大夢。關於一個年輕作家的幻滅，以及，憤怒裡的包容。

　　---擷取自中譯本《白牙》，大塊文化出版

　　Zadie Smith's White Teeth is a classic international bestseller and an unforgettable portrait of London, available as a Penguin Essential for the first time

　　One of the most talked about fictional debuts ever, White Teeth is a funny, generous, big-hearted novel, adored by critics and readers alike. Dealing - among many other things - with friendship, love, war, three cultures and three families over three generations, one brown mouse, and the tricky way the past has of coming back and biting you on the ankle, it is a life-affirming, riotous must-read of a book.

　　'Funny, clever ... and a rollicking good read' Independent
　　'An astonishingly assured début, funny and serious ... I was delighted' Salman Rushdie
　　'The almost preposterous talent was clear from the first pages' Julian Barnes, Guardian
　　'Quirky, sassy and wise ... a big, splashy, populous production reminiscent of books by Dickens and Salman Rushdie ... demonstrates both an instinctive storytelling talent and a fully fashioned voice that's street-smart and learned, sassy and philosophical all at the same time' New York Times
　　'Smith writes like an old hand, and, sometimes, like a dream' New Yorker
　　'Outstanding ... A strikingly clever and funny book with a passion for ideas, for language and for the rich tragic-comedy of life' Sunday Telegraph
　　'Do believe the hype' The Times
　　'Relentlessly funny ... idiosyncratic, and deeply felt' Guardian

 

作者簡介

莎娣．史密斯（ZADIE SMITH）

　　於一九七五年生於倫敦西北地區，而且至今仍生活在該區。她是《白牙》、《簽名買賣人》和《論美》的作者，以及《其他人的書》（The Book of Other People)的編輯。以上作品全由企鵝出版社出版。

　 　Zadie Smith was born in north-west London in 1975. Her debut novel, White Teeth, won the Whitbread First Novel Award, the Guardian First Book Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction, and the Commonwealth Writers' First Book Prize, and was included in TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005. Her second novel, On Beauty, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Orange Prize for Fiction. She has written two further novels, The Autograph Man and NW, a collection of essays, Changing My Mind, and also edited a short-story anthology, The Book of Other People.