When the New York Times list of the 100 best books of the twenty-first century came out, I was appalled that I had only read ten of them, though I have that many more on my Kindle to-be-read stack. On Beauty is a funny, poignant family saga told in multiple points of view. Each character is fully realized and is a person not merely a character in Smith’s novel, flawed, at times likable, and at others downright despicable. This novel is loosely based on Howard’s End by E.M. Forster but transported to contemporary times.
Howard Belsey, is a White British art history professor at the fictional Wellington College in New England, not far from Boston. His field is aesthetics. He specializes in Rembrandt but doesn’t consider the artist to be a particular genius. For eons, Howard has been working on a book to prove his point. He sees himself as open-minded and liberal but in reality is rather entrenched in his beliefs. His wife, Kiki, is a Black nursing administrator at a local hospital. Despite their differences in interests, they have been in love and married for thirty years, raising a blended English/American, Black/White family. They live in an old home in a nice neighborhood in a mostly White community where they interact with mostly White friends and colleagues. They have three children, Jerome, a newborn Christian, who attends Brown University; Zora is a bright, forceful young woman attending the Wellington; and Levi, who is a high-school student, struggling with his racial identity, a biracial young man who feels he’s losing his Blackness.
Howard’s nemesis is Monty Kipps, a dapper black art history professor from Trinidad who currently lives in London with his family. His wife, Carlene, seems to be chronically ill; their oldest son, Michael, works in finance in London; their daughter, Vee, has just completed a tour of Europe. Monty is hired to teach at Wellington and moves there, bringing his wife and daughter. Monty is everything Howard despises: an inflexible ultra-Christian, homophobic, and anti-affirmative action and other DEI programs.
On Beauty is a captivating look at a multitude of issues: individual identity in modern times, family dynamics, familial love, fraternal love, coming of age, academia, infidelity, and the breaking of trust, all with a lively sense of humor and en pointe observations about race and modern life.
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On Beauty (Penguin Book, August 29, 2006) is available through:
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