Swing Time by Zadie Smith (Book Analysis)

This practical and insightful reading guide offers a complete summary and analysis of Swing Time by Zadie Smith. It provides a thorough exploration of the novel’s plot, characters and main themes, including friendship, racism and international development. The clear and concise style makes for easy understanding, providing the perfect opportunity to improve your literary knowledge in no time.

This clear and detailed 50-page reading guide is structured as follows:

• Biography of Zadie Smith
• Presentation of Swing Time
• Summary of Swing Time
• Character study
  • The narrator
  • Tracey
  • The narrator’s mother
  • Aimee
  • Lamin
  • Hawa
  • Fern
• Analysis of Swing Time
  • Non-linear structure
  • Race
  • Cultural inspiration and appropriation

About Swing Time

Swing Time tells the story of the fraught relationship between two girls who are united by their background and love of dance, but who find themselves divided by their marked differences. The unnamed narrator is the daughter of an ambitious mother who strives for social mobility, while her childhood friend Tracey is a talented dancer from a deeply dysfunctional family. The narrator later finds herself working as a personal assistant to the pop star Aimee, a job which takes her all over the world, including to the West African village where Aimee is planning to open a girls’ school. Through it all, Tracey maintains her hold over the narrator, who is continually pulled back into her orbit.

The hotly anticipated novel was longlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction.

About Zadie Smith

Zadie Smith is a contemporary English writer. Her debut novel, White Teeth, was published in 2000, shortly after she graduated from the University of Cambridge, and was an immediate critical and popular success. She is also the author of the novels The Autograph Man, On Beauty, NW and Swing Time, the essay collections Changing My Mind and Feel Free, and a number of short stories. Alongside her writing, she is a tenured professor in the Creative Writing faculty at New York University.