Zadie Smith’s White Teeth was barely in paperback when it showed up on a syllabus for one of my classes at UNC in 2002. Smith’s debut had a lasting impact, and, for over twenty years, I have read her novels as they were released. Unpopular opinion, but The Autograph Man (2002) is my favorite. Smith’s writing is always full of sharp wit and cutting observations. While NW and especially Swingtime were misses for me, her talent is evident throughout her entire catalogue. The Fraud (Penguin Press 2023), her first foray into historical fiction, puts that talent on full display. This novel seems to be a love letter and an accusation to the writers that came before and that canon that stands today, and I loved every bit of it. Can we get more Dickens slander, please?
Set in 1873, the novel primarily follows Eliza Touchet, a housekeeper of sorts who runs in literary circles with her cousin (by marriage) William Ainsworth. She is a sexually explorative widow whose great love was Ainsworth’s first wife. While the three were never together together, Touchet hints that was her desire. She enjoys a roughness in sex with Ainsworth and a softness with his wife. With Ainsworth, she falls in with literary circles, making contacts and relationships, and trying to keep Ainsworth’s fragile masculinity intact. With Franny, his first wife, she becomes interested and involved in abolitionism. After Franny dies, Eliza becomes inactive in those interests – until 1873, when London is rocked by a scandal that has captivated Ainsworth’s new wife, Sarah. The Tichborne Trial consumes both Sarah and Eliza, but for different reasons. The Tichborne Trial is actually real – the most bizarre parts of this novel are actually real. (A lower-class butcher from Australia claimed to be the rightful heir of a sizeable estate in England. Is he Sir Roger Tichborne, as he claims. Or is he Arthur Orton, the butcher?) The star witness is a former slave from the Hope Plantation in Jamica. Andrew Bogle and his story is what Eliza becomes fixated on. His section of the novel is fantastic.
The Fraud needs to be read slowly and savored; Smith has packed so much into its pages and a lot of the fun and cheek is easily missed if you’re not paying attention. If you don’t like Victorian novels, you’re unlikely to like The Fraud. If you love “the empire writes back” works, you will love The Fraud.
Read this book.
A Girl Named Tommi 