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The Embassy of Cambodia
'The fact is, if we followed the history of every little country in the world - in its dramatic as well as its quiet times - we would have no space left in which to live our own lives or apply ourselves to our necessary tasks, never mind indulge in occasional pleasures, like swimming ... ' First published this Spring in the New Yorker, The Embassy of Cambodia is a rare and brilliant story that takes us deep into the life of a young woman, Fatou, domestic servant to the Derawals and escapee from one set of hardships to another. Beginning and ending outside the Embassy of Cambodia, which happens to be located in Willesden, NW London, Zadie Smith's absorbing, moving and wryly observed story suggests how the apparently small things in an ordinary life always raise larger, more extraordinary questions.
70 pages
First published February 11, 2013
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3840 people want to read
About the author
Zadie Smith
115 books16.1k followersZadie Smith is an English novelist, essayist, and short-story writer. Her debut novel, White Teeth (2000), immediately became a best-seller and won a number of awards. She became a tenured professor in the Creative Writing faculty of New York University in September 2010.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 611 reviews
April 3, 2019
Was it wrong to hope to be happy?
Whenever I get foul tempered about my work being overly demanding, a haranguing inner voice whispers 'check your privileges' into my ear, thinking of the incredible high level of protection and good working conditions I enjoy, and recalling my mother’s. Like so many daughters from the working class that couldn’t afford another choice, she was obliged at 14 to leave school and her family and go live with and work for a local doctor’s household as a servant, working daily from 5 AM until 1 AM, cleaning, cooking, taking care of three small children. She made several attempts to run off back to her family, but was sent back until she managed to get married with my father and find a better job. This weren’t the Middle Ages, but the Swinging Sixties. Predictably, since my teens, the stories of my mother fueled my emerging indignation on inequality and wish for a life in dignity for all.
The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point however, is to change it.
- Marx, Eleven Theses on Feuerbach
Half a century later, a new worldwide underclass has popped up, an inexhaustible reservoir of workforce vulnerable to exploitation and abuse behind closed doors, undeclared, insecure, invisible to the outside world: the migrant domestic workers – often present in an irregular situation, not fulfilling the legal conditions for entry, stay or residence (anymore).
Tens of millions of women and girls around the world are employed as domestic workers in private households. They clean, cook, care for children, look after elderly family members, and perform other essential tasks for their employers. Despite their important role, they are among the most exploited and abused workers in the world. They often work 14 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, for wages far below the minimum wage. They may be locked within their workplace and subject to physical and sexual violence. Children and migrant domestic workers are often the most vulnerable. An international treaty – the Domestic Workers Convention – was adopted in June 2011, providing the first global standards to protect domestic workers.
Human Rights Watch
Do we care? Do we care enough? Observing an episode from the life of Fatou, a domestic worker coming from Ivory Coast, living with a wealthy family of Pakistani descent in the area of Willesden, NW London, Zadie Smith poses the pertinent and uneasy question how far human empathy and solidarity can stretch:
Surely there is something to be said for drawing a circle around our attention and remaining within that circle. But how large should this circle be?
Imagine standing in Fatou’s shoes, a determined and proud woman, objectified, at the mercy of the employers who have taken her passport and pay her no wages. A survivor, an unostentatious rebel, her unyielding independence coming out in symbolic flares of ‘civil disobedience’ to her employer, cherishing her freedom of spirit in her stolen moments in the swimming pool (which is again a striking parallel with my mother’s life - she taught herself how to swim, and so is the only one of her family who can swim). When the power balance between Fatou and her employers shifts, another life for Fatou is dawning.
Smith touches on a wide range of substantial and thorny themes: human rights, free will, religion, migration, power and inequality, class struggle, rape, genocide (the presence of the Cambodian Embassy in the neighborhood and the story, suggesting threat, danger, suffering, intensified by elaborating on an horrendous motto of the Khmer Rouge regime 'To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss').
As a matter of fact, to raise awareness on injustice and inequality, we ostensibly need more than voluminous in-depth studies on the economy and social issues like Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century in my opinon. In the hour it takes to read this compact story, Smith jolts one’s conscience and hits where it hurts. Deceivingly soft and feather light, like the badminton shuttle and the lopsided game which 21 points scoring system structures the story – The Embassy of Cambodia in all its brevity pithily exposes this world’s imbalances of power.
The ending reminded me of the plight of Frances and her testimonial in how domestic workers become slaves (illustrating Zadie’s tenth tip for writing fiction I read in The Guardian: ‘Tell the truth through whichever veil comes to hand.’)
This was my first acquaintance with Zadie Smith (thank you, Helle, for enthusing me about her prose); the story can be read here.
Whenever I get foul tempered about my work being overly demanding, a haranguing inner voice whispers 'check your privileges' into my ear, thinking of the incredible high level of protection and good working conditions I enjoy, and recalling my mother’s. Like so many daughters from the working class that couldn’t afford another choice, she was obliged at 14 to leave school and her family and go live with and work for a local doctor’s household as a servant, working daily from 5 AM until 1 AM, cleaning, cooking, taking care of three small children. She made several attempts to run off back to her family, but was sent back until she managed to get married with my father and find a better job. This weren’t the Middle Ages, but the Swinging Sixties. Predictably, since my teens, the stories of my mother fueled my emerging indignation on inequality and wish for a life in dignity for all.
The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point however, is to change it.
- Marx, Eleven Theses on Feuerbach
Half a century later, a new worldwide underclass has popped up, an inexhaustible reservoir of workforce vulnerable to exploitation and abuse behind closed doors, undeclared, insecure, invisible to the outside world: the migrant domestic workers – often present in an irregular situation, not fulfilling the legal conditions for entry, stay or residence (anymore).
Tens of millions of women and girls around the world are employed as domestic workers in private households. They clean, cook, care for children, look after elderly family members, and perform other essential tasks for their employers. Despite their important role, they are among the most exploited and abused workers in the world. They often work 14 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, for wages far below the minimum wage. They may be locked within their workplace and subject to physical and sexual violence. Children and migrant domestic workers are often the most vulnerable. An international treaty – the Domestic Workers Convention – was adopted in June 2011, providing the first global standards to protect domestic workers.
Human Rights Watch
Do we care? Do we care enough? Observing an episode from the life of Fatou, a domestic worker coming from Ivory Coast, living with a wealthy family of Pakistani descent in the area of Willesden, NW London, Zadie Smith poses the pertinent and uneasy question how far human empathy and solidarity can stretch:
Surely there is something to be said for drawing a circle around our attention and remaining within that circle. But how large should this circle be?
Imagine standing in Fatou’s shoes, a determined and proud woman, objectified, at the mercy of the employers who have taken her passport and pay her no wages. A survivor, an unostentatious rebel, her unyielding independence coming out in symbolic flares of ‘civil disobedience’ to her employer, cherishing her freedom of spirit in her stolen moments in the swimming pool (which is again a striking parallel with my mother’s life - she taught herself how to swim, and so is the only one of her family who can swim). When the power balance between Fatou and her employers shifts, another life for Fatou is dawning.
Smith touches on a wide range of substantial and thorny themes: human rights, free will, religion, migration, power and inequality, class struggle, rape, genocide (the presence of the Cambodian Embassy in the neighborhood and the story, suggesting threat, danger, suffering, intensified by elaborating on an horrendous motto of the Khmer Rouge regime 'To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss').
As a matter of fact, to raise awareness on injustice and inequality, we ostensibly need more than voluminous in-depth studies on the economy and social issues like Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century in my opinon. In the hour it takes to read this compact story, Smith jolts one’s conscience and hits where it hurts. Deceivingly soft and feather light, like the badminton shuttle and the lopsided game which 21 points scoring system structures the story – The Embassy of Cambodia in all its brevity pithily exposes this world’s imbalances of power.
The ending reminded me of the plight of Frances and her testimonial in how domestic workers become slaves (illustrating Zadie’s tenth tip for writing fiction I read in The Guardian: ‘Tell the truth through whichever veil comes to hand.’)
This was my first acquaintance with Zadie Smith (thank you, Helle, for enthusing me about her prose); the story can be read here.
June 9, 2021
5 "outstanding, poignant, chaotic yet ordered" stars !!
2017 Honorable Mention with High Distinction Read
Fatou is from Africa. She understands little and experiences so much. She is at times violated and yet lives life fully, beautifully and at times full of mirth. She is ignorant and in her own ways is racist, sexist but wants to learn and understand. She really does not know how to love but she knows how to swim, watch badminton matches and wonder about Cambodians while not fully grasping her journey from country to country and finally living in London as a domestic for a middle class South Asian Family who disdain her and discard her. Despite these events, Fatou is not sad or traumatized but in the end simply bewildered.
Zadie writes:
"No doubt there are those who will be critical of the narrow, essentially local scope of Fatou's interest in the Cambodian woman from the Embassy of Cambodia, but we, the people of Willesden, have some sympathy with her attitude. The fact is if we followed the history of every little country in this world - in its dramatic as well as its quiet time- we would have no space left in which to live our own lives or to apply ourselves to our necessary tasks, never mind indulge in occasional pleasures like swimming. Surely there is something to be said for drawing a circle around our attention and remaining within that circle. But how large should this circle be?"
I do not know how Zadie is able to write a little masterpiece with so much of everything in a very short novella and discomfort and amaze and challenge a reader.
I think the answer is that she is just Zadie....amazing and brilliant and able to see the whole of life from so many disparate viewpoints that it makes us more limited beings spin with wonder and anxiety and in the end, gratitude.
I love you Zadie and your brilliance, wisdom and your wide and panoramic perspectives.
2017 Honorable Mention with High Distinction Read
Fatou is from Africa. She understands little and experiences so much. She is at times violated and yet lives life fully, beautifully and at times full of mirth. She is ignorant and in her own ways is racist, sexist but wants to learn and understand. She really does not know how to love but she knows how to swim, watch badminton matches and wonder about Cambodians while not fully grasping her journey from country to country and finally living in London as a domestic for a middle class South Asian Family who disdain her and discard her. Despite these events, Fatou is not sad or traumatized but in the end simply bewildered.
Zadie writes:
"No doubt there are those who will be critical of the narrow, essentially local scope of Fatou's interest in the Cambodian woman from the Embassy of Cambodia, but we, the people of Willesden, have some sympathy with her attitude. The fact is if we followed the history of every little country in this world - in its dramatic as well as its quiet time- we would have no space left in which to live our own lives or to apply ourselves to our necessary tasks, never mind indulge in occasional pleasures like swimming. Surely there is something to be said for drawing a circle around our attention and remaining within that circle. But how large should this circle be?"
I do not know how Zadie is able to write a little masterpiece with so much of everything in a very short novella and discomfort and amaze and challenge a reader.
I think the answer is that she is just Zadie....amazing and brilliant and able to see the whole of life from so many disparate viewpoints that it makes us more limited beings spin with wonder and anxiety and in the end, gratitude.
I love you Zadie and your brilliance, wisdom and your wide and panoramic perspectives.
May 9, 2017
The Embassy of Cambodia is a multi layered short story by Zadie Smith that originally appeared in the New Yorker in November 2013. Following the life of an Ivory Coast immigrant to London named Fatou, Smith details how race, gender, and ethnic group play a role in ones station in life. A mere 67 pages in book form, Smith's story gave insights into London's immigrant culture.
In search of a better life than the Ivory Coast had to offer, Fatou moves with her father to Libya then Italy and finally England. While in these countries, she picks up both Italian and English, and it is evident that Fatou is an educated individual. Despite her level of education, the only job Fatou can procure is as a housekeeper to the Pakistani Derawal family. Likewise her lone friend Andrew, an educated Nigerian, does menial labor in an office. The treatment of African immigrants to England is a hot button issue that I have seen in the writings of contemporary African writers today. Experiencing the question of race for the first time, Africans as Fatou often experience better treatment at home than in England, not the dream of better living they desired before they left.
The bulk of the story takes place outside of the Cambodian embassy in NW London. Even though Fatou experiences poor treatment due to her race, the Cambodians, according to Andrew have been subject to human rights abuses abroad. Despite this suffering, the Cambodians make the best of their time abroad, and often engage in games of badminton. This leisure in the face of rights abuses gives Fatou food for thought and allows her to ponder her station in life, whether England has been a positive or negative experience.
The Embassy of Cambodia is my first exposure to Zadie Smith's writing. From this short story she appears to be a gifted writer, creating many multi layered characters in a short space of time. On occasion I prefer reading short stories, and Smith's was above average for one appearing in a magazine. I look forward to reading her full length novels that have received many accolades.
In search of a better life than the Ivory Coast had to offer, Fatou moves with her father to Libya then Italy and finally England. While in these countries, she picks up both Italian and English, and it is evident that Fatou is an educated individual. Despite her level of education, the only job Fatou can procure is as a housekeeper to the Pakistani Derawal family. Likewise her lone friend Andrew, an educated Nigerian, does menial labor in an office. The treatment of African immigrants to England is a hot button issue that I have seen in the writings of contemporary African writers today. Experiencing the question of race for the first time, Africans as Fatou often experience better treatment at home than in England, not the dream of better living they desired before they left.
The bulk of the story takes place outside of the Cambodian embassy in NW London. Even though Fatou experiences poor treatment due to her race, the Cambodians, according to Andrew have been subject to human rights abuses abroad. Despite this suffering, the Cambodians make the best of their time abroad, and often engage in games of badminton. This leisure in the face of rights abuses gives Fatou food for thought and allows her to ponder her station in life, whether England has been a positive or negative experience.
The Embassy of Cambodia is my first exposure to Zadie Smith's writing. From this short story she appears to be a gifted writer, creating many multi layered characters in a short space of time. On occasion I prefer reading short stories, and Smith's was above average for one appearing in a magazine. I look forward to reading her full length novels that have received many accolades.
September 21, 2024
Hard hitting in so few pages... that I feel is the skill of a gifted writer.
July 31, 2024
4★
“The only real sign that the embassy is an embassy at all is the little brass plaque on the door (which reads, ‘the embassy of cambodia’) and the national flag of Cambodia (we assume that’s what it is—what else could it be?) flying from the red tiled roof.”
‘We’ are the people of Willesden (an area of north-west London), which actually has a number of more buildings more surprising than this. There’s a health center next door and some very fancy houses, assumed by the residents to belong to wealthy Arabs.
Fatou is a young woman from Ivory Coast who’s working for a well-to-do family, using their membership card to swim in the health center pool, without their knowledge. Before going in, she likes to sit across from the embassy to watch and hear the “Pock, smash. Pock, smash” of the badminton rallies.
I wondered if she wondered if the high walls were hiding people, and if so, whom. Did the pock, smash of the shuttlecock possibly serve as a reminder of battles and aggression?
She happens to see an article about a Sudanese ‘slave’ in London in a rich man’s house and reflects again about her own situation. Her father had taken her first to Ghana, where they worked in a hotel, and then he moved her on.
“Two years later, when she was eighteen, it was her father again who had organized her difficult passage to Libya and then on to Italy—a not insignificant financial sacrifice on his part. Also, Fatou could read English—and speak a little Italian—and this girl in the paper could not read or speak anything except the language of her tribe.”
Fatou discusses history and world events with her friend Andrew Okonkwo, a night guard who is studying business and can access the internet with his student card.
Zadie Smith gives us a sharp reminder that privilege and opportunity are not handed out equally at birth. How long will those of us who were born ‘lucky’ be able to fool those who’ve been born in such appalling conditions that we are doing them a favour by hiring them for menial jobs and restricting their movements?
How many of the people who employ women like Fatou can read in a second language and have a smattering of a third, as she and many refugees do? A lot of those in the privileged world speak only the language of their tribe, like the Sudanese slave.
This was published in the ‘New Yorker’ magazine in February 2013. If you have access, you can read it here.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...
You can also download a free pdf of it here.
https://cafeliterarioba.com/wp-conten...
Thanks to Goodreads friend Suz for her review with the link.
“The only real sign that the embassy is an embassy at all is the little brass plaque on the door (which reads, ‘the embassy of cambodia’) and the national flag of Cambodia (we assume that’s what it is—what else could it be?) flying from the red tiled roof.”
‘We’ are the people of Willesden (an area of north-west London), which actually has a number of more buildings more surprising than this. There’s a health center next door and some very fancy houses, assumed by the residents to belong to wealthy Arabs.
Fatou is a young woman from Ivory Coast who’s working for a well-to-do family, using their membership card to swim in the health center pool, without their knowledge. Before going in, she likes to sit across from the embassy to watch and hear the “Pock, smash. Pock, smash” of the badminton rallies.
I wondered if she wondered if the high walls were hiding people, and if so, whom. Did the pock, smash of the shuttlecock possibly serve as a reminder of battles and aggression?
She happens to see an article about a Sudanese ‘slave’ in London in a rich man’s house and reflects again about her own situation. Her father had taken her first to Ghana, where they worked in a hotel, and then he moved her on.
“Two years later, when she was eighteen, it was her father again who had organized her difficult passage to Libya and then on to Italy—a not insignificant financial sacrifice on his part. Also, Fatou could read English—and speak a little Italian—and this girl in the paper could not read or speak anything except the language of her tribe.”
Fatou discusses history and world events with her friend Andrew Okonkwo, a night guard who is studying business and can access the internet with his student card.
Zadie Smith gives us a sharp reminder that privilege and opportunity are not handed out equally at birth. How long will those of us who were born ‘lucky’ be able to fool those who’ve been born in such appalling conditions that we are doing them a favour by hiring them for menial jobs and restricting their movements?
How many of the people who employ women like Fatou can read in a second language and have a smattering of a third, as she and many refugees do? A lot of those in the privileged world speak only the language of their tribe, like the Sudanese slave.
This was published in the ‘New Yorker’ magazine in February 2013. If you have access, you can read it here.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...
You can also download a free pdf of it here.
https://cafeliterarioba.com/wp-conten...
Thanks to Goodreads friend Suz for her review with the link.
July 14, 2024
This tiny little book, which I chose to read as part of my readathon with @chaptersforchange, run by Australian charity Humans for Hope, is a gem. Had I not been looking for resources about Cambodia (the readathon raises funds for literacy programs in rural parts of this country) this would have passed me by. This novella is so small, this story is easily read online, originally published for The New Yorker. Here is one of those links to a free and accessible pdf: https://cafeliterarioba.com/wp-conten...
Having no expectations, I was drawn to Fatou, a young black migrant woman in London working for a family who treat her poorly, with disrespect and derision. Simply put, she is a modern slave.
This is Fatou’s story, the way she carries herself amid something very wrong. ‘Borrowing’ a guest pass from the abusive employers to the local baths she swims every Monday, with the guise of shopping, taking extra bags as props, holding her head high as she wears her black underwear in place of swimwear. This is the only freedom she has – but she does not complain.
This is not just a story of Fatau being a slave, it is a closer look into Fatau herself, an unpaid servant, passport removed. Her strong resilience and outlook on life.
The Embassy comes in to play as she observes it on her daily walking to do tasks or swim, she consistently notes the smashing of the shuttlecock ‘pock smash, pock smash,’ while imagining what is beyond the high wall. She is a strong girl, always surviving. Chatting with her friend after church on Sunday, not believing herself to be the slave we know her to be.
A small story carrying a big issue at the heart, I do not know a lot about Zadie Smith. I believe I have a lot more to learn.
Sponsor to support literacy in Cambodia!
https://chaptersforchange.org/suzanne...
Having no expectations, I was drawn to Fatou, a young black migrant woman in London working for a family who treat her poorly, with disrespect and derision. Simply put, she is a modern slave.
This is Fatou’s story, the way she carries herself amid something very wrong. ‘Borrowing’ a guest pass from the abusive employers to the local baths she swims every Monday, with the guise of shopping, taking extra bags as props, holding her head high as she wears her black underwear in place of swimwear. This is the only freedom she has – but she does not complain.
This is not just a story of Fatau being a slave, it is a closer look into Fatau herself, an unpaid servant, passport removed. Her strong resilience and outlook on life.
The Embassy comes in to play as she observes it on her daily walking to do tasks or swim, she consistently notes the smashing of the shuttlecock ‘pock smash, pock smash,’ while imagining what is beyond the high wall. She is a strong girl, always surviving. Chatting with her friend after church on Sunday, not believing herself to be the slave we know her to be.
A small story carrying a big issue at the heart, I do not know a lot about Zadie Smith. I believe I have a lot more to learn.
Sponsor to support literacy in Cambodia!
https://chaptersforchange.org/suzanne...
May 27, 2022
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This is the first story I read by Zadie Smith that I actually didn’t hate. In fact, one could even say that I quite liked The Embassy of Cambodia. Smith’s adroit storytelling is characterised by a razor-sharp social commentary and a trenchant sense of humor. While I was overall able to appreciate this short story, I still do find Smith’s brand of satire to be a bit too mean for my taste. Her portrayal of her characters sometimes strike me as exaggerated, and she does seem to have a propensity for ridiculing the people who populate her works (regardless of the role they play in their story).
The Embassy of Cambodia follows Fatou, a young woman employed by a wealthy family based in Willesden, London. Unbeknownst to her employers, Fatou swims at the health centre that they are members of (using their membership). On her way to the pool, she walks past the embassy of Cambodia and occasionally catches sight of a shuttlecock going back and forward behind the embassy’s walls. We learn of Fatou’s friendship with Andrew, a fellow immigrant who is working a min. wage job despite his education. Together they talk about politics, history, and Christianity. The two for example discuss the possible reasons why in Europe very few people know, let alone speak of, the Rwandan genocide but seem ‘fixated’ on the Shoah. We also learn of how Fatou’s employers treat her, from their racist comments to the fact that they have her passport (meaning that Fatou is not free). While by the end of the story Fatou’s circumstances change, it isn’t sure whether her new path will lead to happiness or safety.
The Embassy of Cambodia was a quick and relatively engaging read. While it didn’t quite succeed in making me a fan of Smith just yet it did make me want to give the rest of her published works a second chance.
This is the first story I read by Zadie Smith that I actually didn’t hate. In fact, one could even say that I quite liked The Embassy of Cambodia. Smith’s adroit storytelling is characterised by a razor-sharp social commentary and a trenchant sense of humor. While I was overall able to appreciate this short story, I still do find Smith’s brand of satire to be a bit too mean for my taste. Her portrayal of her characters sometimes strike me as exaggerated, and she does seem to have a propensity for ridiculing the people who populate her works (regardless of the role they play in their story).
The Embassy of Cambodia follows Fatou, a young woman employed by a wealthy family based in Willesden, London. Unbeknownst to her employers, Fatou swims at the health centre that they are members of (using their membership). On her way to the pool, she walks past the embassy of Cambodia and occasionally catches sight of a shuttlecock going back and forward behind the embassy’s walls. We learn of Fatou’s friendship with Andrew, a fellow immigrant who is working a min. wage job despite his education. Together they talk about politics, history, and Christianity. The two for example discuss the possible reasons why in Europe very few people know, let alone speak of, the Rwandan genocide but seem ‘fixated’ on the Shoah. We also learn of how Fatou’s employers treat her, from their racist comments to the fact that they have her passport (meaning that Fatou is not free). While by the end of the story Fatou’s circumstances change, it isn’t sure whether her new path will lead to happiness or safety.
The Embassy of Cambodia was a quick and relatively engaging read. While it didn’t quite succeed in making me a fan of Smith just yet it did make me want to give the rest of her published works a second chance.
January 29, 2020
Fatou, an African immigrant in England, walks by the Cambodian embassy on her way to the swimming pool and notices there is a badminton game played there every week. Fatou thinks about the Cambodian Khmer Rouge whose motto, directed to the New People in their cities, was "To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss."
Fatou works for a Pakistani family for room and board. Her immigrant friend Andrew also works in a low level job, although he is well educated. They meet in a coffee shop, and often discuss human suffering, religion, the genocides around the world, and inequities in income and power. Fatou had been through some terrible situations on her way from the Ivory Coast to England.
Each section of this story has a badminton score at its start: 0-1, 0-2, 0-3, up to 0-21. In the last section, Fatou watches the shuttlecock appear over the embassy's walls as it's smashed back and forth. Someone is one game down, and it looks like Fatou also has a losing score. We wonder what the future holds for her and the other immigrants.
Fatou works for a Pakistani family for room and board. Her immigrant friend Andrew also works in a low level job, although he is well educated. They meet in a coffee shop, and often discuss human suffering, religion, the genocides around the world, and inequities in income and power. Fatou had been through some terrible situations on her way from the Ivory Coast to England.
Each section of this story has a badminton score at its start: 0-1, 0-2, 0-3, up to 0-21. In the last section, Fatou watches the shuttlecock appear over the embassy's walls as it's smashed back and forth. Someone is one game down, and it looks like Fatou also has a losing score. We wonder what the future holds for her and the other immigrants.
January 30, 2020
Too frequently my objection to short stories is that they leave you feeling there was so much more to say but it was cut short by the author in service of keeping the story "short". Well, Zadie Smith is not one of those authors. She tells this story of an African immigrant who regularly passes the Embassy of Cambodia as she steals a rare moment of personal time, without leaving a thing unsaid. The ending is superb.
Pock. Smash.
Pock. Smash.
November 9, 2013
This excellent short story by Zadie Smith first appeared in the New Yorker in February 2013. It tells the story of a young woman, Fatou, who has fled the Ivory Coast to make a better life for herself in the west. She works as a maid for a wealthy Pakistani family, the Derawals, in Willesden, North West London – familiar Smith territory – near the Embassy of Cambodia. Every Monday, Fatou manages to slip out of the house for a few precious hours of freedom, when she uses the family’s guest passes to swim at a local club. As she walks past the Embassy there is the constant noise of a badminton game going on behind the wall, and the story is structured as a badminton game itself, with numbered sections showing the score from 0-1 to 0-21, cleverly reflecting the lack of power of one of the players, or perhaps Fatou herself who never manages to score in response to her situation.
This is a powerful and multi-layered story. It explores issues of power and inequality, human suffering and genocide, loneliness and isolation. There are no real villains in Fatou’s small world, her family are not overly cruel to her, but the looming presence of the Cambodian Embassy obviously calls to mind the abuse of power, and through her own small-scale suffering she can relate to greater human tragedies.
For such a short work, Smith has packed in a great deal and it is a story that rewards close attention to the text and much re-reading. Well observed, compassionate and perceptive, a real gem.
This is a powerful and multi-layered story. It explores issues of power and inequality, human suffering and genocide, loneliness and isolation. There are no real villains in Fatou’s small world, her family are not overly cruel to her, but the looming presence of the Cambodian Embassy obviously calls to mind the abuse of power, and through her own small-scale suffering she can relate to greater human tragedies.
For such a short work, Smith has packed in a great deal and it is a story that rewards close attention to the text and much re-reading. Well observed, compassionate and perceptive, a real gem.
January 29, 2020
“She was cleaning toilets in a Catholic girls’ school. She did not know Jesus then, so it made no difference what kind of school it was – she knew only that she was cleaning toilets.”
Would cleaning toilets in a Catholic school with Jesus in your heart be a fundamentally different experience from cleaning toilets in the same place without corresponding religious convictions? Would it be less of a drudge, more of a mission? I naturally did not stop at that, musing on the degree of elation Catholicism might fill you with when doing a menial task for your community, but I went on asking myself if I’d really embrace a tax on carbon dioxide Pollyanna-style if only I were more deeply steeped in the accompanying creed. Would I, on the whole, be a more compliant member of society, or better even: a happier person, if I believed more of what other people tell me?
Zadie Smith’s novella The Embassy of Cambodia has lots of similar clever observations that made me pause and think, partly about the plot and its characters themselves, partly – as you see – about other stuff, and I think that is one of the features characterizing good literature. It’s also quite surprising that a comparatively short work like The Embassy should give me so much difficulty deciding on where to start my review, but I honestly just don’t know where to make a beginning. I might, though, by saying that Zadie Smith is a marvellous story-teller although The Embassy does not really tell a story but rather gives a glimpse into the life of a young woman named Fatou who comes from Ivory Coast but has migrated to England, after working in a holiday resort in Accra and then going to Italy. In Britain, she ends up in Willesden, London, with the Derawals, a Pakistani middle-class family, who employ her as a household aid, but take away her passport and deny her any wages on the grounds that she has board and lodging with them. Even though Fatou seems to passively accept this kind of treatment – she may sometimes wonder whether or not she is a modern type of slave but waives any qualms eventually –, she has her own ways of ensuring some spells of liberty to herself, especially when she uses Mrs. Derawals guest passes to get access to the swimming pool of a nearby health club. For Fatou swimming is an act of self-determination, and she learned it in a place quite different from that lukewarm, tepid pool where most people even do not want to swim but just stand around and relax – namely in ”the cold and treacherous sea” in Accra, which was shunned by the tourists for its lack of safety and comfort.
The motif of swimming, the ”[R]ising and sinking, rising and sinking, on the dirty foam”, a movement the swimmer can control despite the powers they are subject to, tells us a lot about Fatou’s resilience and determination, and it is counterpoised by the badminton players in the mysterious Embassy of Cambodia. The players cannot be seen, but the shuttlecock can, and whenever Fatou passes the premises, she is drawn in by the eternal match of badminton in which one of the players always smashes the shuttlecock, whereas the other continually lobs it, thus keeping it in everlasting motion. Well, Fatou, are you a swimmer or a shuttlecock? Who are the two players – you would have the answer ready, if you stick to what you say in a conversation with your friend, Andrew from Nigeria:
I don’t know how exactly Smith does this, but with the help of credible and likeable characters, cross-connections between motifs, metaphors and events and by touching various ethical questions, she manages to present a rather sad and serious topic in a way that does not come over as moralizing, finger-wagging and preachy but intellectually and emotionally intriguing, with even some touches of humour in it. One of the most original voices in the story is that of the narrator, who claims to speak for the people of Willesden as a whole and therefore routinely indulges in the majestic plural. At times, this narrator sounds rather priggish, but there are moments when he poses questions that maybe every single one of us is at a loss to answer for anyone else, and that it takes a fair amount of honesty and courage to bring up:
The Embassy of Cambodia – you might even ask what the embassy as such has to do with Fatou – could be seen as a brilliantly-crafted version of the old story of Job: Why do we have to suffer? Why do some people suffer infinitely more than others? Who makes them suffer? God, the Devil, their own passivity? What are my chances to take my life into my own hands, and is it better to swim in the sea, which may be cold, stormy and hostile, and to be proud of my achievement, or to swim within the safe confines of a pool that other people enjoy their cocktails in?
Would cleaning toilets in a Catholic school with Jesus in your heart be a fundamentally different experience from cleaning toilets in the same place without corresponding religious convictions? Would it be less of a drudge, more of a mission? I naturally did not stop at that, musing on the degree of elation Catholicism might fill you with when doing a menial task for your community, but I went on asking myself if I’d really embrace a tax on carbon dioxide Pollyanna-style if only I were more deeply steeped in the accompanying creed. Would I, on the whole, be a more compliant member of society, or better even: a happier person, if I believed more of what other people tell me?
Zadie Smith’s novella The Embassy of Cambodia has lots of similar clever observations that made me pause and think, partly about the plot and its characters themselves, partly – as you see – about other stuff, and I think that is one of the features characterizing good literature. It’s also quite surprising that a comparatively short work like The Embassy should give me so much difficulty deciding on where to start my review, but I honestly just don’t know where to make a beginning. I might, though, by saying that Zadie Smith is a marvellous story-teller although The Embassy does not really tell a story but rather gives a glimpse into the life of a young woman named Fatou who comes from Ivory Coast but has migrated to England, after working in a holiday resort in Accra and then going to Italy. In Britain, she ends up in Willesden, London, with the Derawals, a Pakistani middle-class family, who employ her as a household aid, but take away her passport and deny her any wages on the grounds that she has board and lodging with them. Even though Fatou seems to passively accept this kind of treatment – she may sometimes wonder whether or not she is a modern type of slave but waives any qualms eventually –, she has her own ways of ensuring some spells of liberty to herself, especially when she uses Mrs. Derawals guest passes to get access to the swimming pool of a nearby health club. For Fatou swimming is an act of self-determination, and she learned it in a place quite different from that lukewarm, tepid pool where most people even do not want to swim but just stand around and relax – namely in ”the cold and treacherous sea” in Accra, which was shunned by the tourists for its lack of safety and comfort.
The motif of swimming, the ”[R]ising and sinking, rising and sinking, on the dirty foam”, a movement the swimmer can control despite the powers they are subject to, tells us a lot about Fatou’s resilience and determination, and it is counterpoised by the badminton players in the mysterious Embassy of Cambodia. The players cannot be seen, but the shuttlecock can, and whenever Fatou passes the premises, she is drawn in by the eternal match of badminton in which one of the players always smashes the shuttlecock, whereas the other continually lobs it, thus keeping it in everlasting motion. Well, Fatou, are you a swimmer or a shuttlecock? Who are the two players – you would have the answer ready, if you stick to what you say in a conversation with your friend, Andrew from Nigeria:
”’Listen, we are friends to each other. In this world you need friends. But, Fatou, listen to my question. It’s a counterpoint to what you have been saying. Tell me, why would God choose us especially for suffering when we, above all others, praise his name? Africa is the fastest-growing Christian continent! Just think about it for a minute! It doesn’t even make sense!’
‘But it’s not him,’ Fatou said quietly, looking over Andrew’s shoulder at the rain beating on the window. ‘It’s the Devil.’”
I don’t know how exactly Smith does this, but with the help of credible and likeable characters, cross-connections between motifs, metaphors and events and by touching various ethical questions, she manages to present a rather sad and serious topic in a way that does not come over as moralizing, finger-wagging and preachy but intellectually and emotionally intriguing, with even some touches of humour in it. One of the most original voices in the story is that of the narrator, who claims to speak for the people of Willesden as a whole and therefore routinely indulges in the majestic plural. At times, this narrator sounds rather priggish, but there are moments when he poses questions that maybe every single one of us is at a loss to answer for anyone else, and that it takes a fair amount of honesty and courage to bring up:
”The fact is if we followed the history of every little country in this world—in its dramatic as well as its quiet times—we would have no space left in which to live our own lives or to apply ourselves to our necessary tasks, never mind indulge in occasional pleasures, like swimming. Surely there is something to be said for drawing a circle around our attention and remaining within that circle. But how large should this circle be?”
The Embassy of Cambodia – you might even ask what the embassy as such has to do with Fatou – could be seen as a brilliantly-crafted version of the old story of Job: Why do we have to suffer? Why do some people suffer infinitely more than others? Who makes them suffer? God, the Devil, their own passivity? What are my chances to take my life into my own hands, and is it better to swim in the sea, which may be cold, stormy and hostile, and to be proud of my achievement, or to swim within the safe confines of a pool that other people enjoy their cocktails in?
December 29, 2014
One of the consequences of the globalisation of labour markets has been an increasing number of the quasi-legal as service workers in the major cities of the world – people like Fatou, at the centre of this short story. She has been brought to London under dubious circumstances, kept in utter dependency by a wealthy Willesden family and, just like the Cambodian Embassy nearby, slightly out of place.
The best stories humanise major issues and can take us behind the generic to find the particular that tells us much more about the general – sociologists, following the work of C Wright Mills in The Sociological Imagination , call this the general in the specific. I doubt that Smith necessarily sees this as an act of the sociological imagination, she is, after all, a novelist, but it is a superb piece of sociological imagining. Fatou’s story is disturbing, unsettling, challenging to all those of us who never see (and in many cases I fear seldom ask) about the stories of the migrant workers that surround us; Smith brings to life the experiences of many.
This is not a bleak tale, but it is a grim one – a tale of a young woman unable to exercise any control to speak of over her life and of her small attempts at the interstices of the operation of power to retain her autonomy. She uses her ‘employers’, like many she is unpaid so that label is the wrong one, guest passes for the local leisure centre for a daily swim when she is out shopping; she seizes a hour on Sunday after church (even going to church become more important as a space of independence) to have coffee and cake with her friend, but he has to pay… Fatou is, after all, unpaid.
This is not a bleak tale, but it is a sparse life told sparsely in Smith’s restrained style – a style well suited to a story that evokes experience in a way that brings to life the experiences of many. There are times when I feel that Smith’s novels need a better editor – this is not the case here; Fatou’s tale is tight, focussed, elegant, efficient and all the more powerful for it. It is a fine piece of fiction that I hope is widely read (ignore those, including on this site, who complain that the size and format means that they are paying novel-prices for a 70 page book that takes less than an hour to read; it is an hour well spent).
The best stories humanise major issues and can take us behind the generic to find the particular that tells us much more about the general – sociologists, following the work of C Wright Mills in The Sociological Imagination , call this the general in the specific. I doubt that Smith necessarily sees this as an act of the sociological imagination, she is, after all, a novelist, but it is a superb piece of sociological imagining. Fatou’s story is disturbing, unsettling, challenging to all those of us who never see (and in many cases I fear seldom ask) about the stories of the migrant workers that surround us; Smith brings to life the experiences of many.
This is not a bleak tale, but it is a grim one – a tale of a young woman unable to exercise any control to speak of over her life and of her small attempts at the interstices of the operation of power to retain her autonomy. She uses her ‘employers’, like many she is unpaid so that label is the wrong one, guest passes for the local leisure centre for a daily swim when she is out shopping; she seizes a hour on Sunday after church (even going to church become more important as a space of independence) to have coffee and cake with her friend, but he has to pay… Fatou is, after all, unpaid.
This is not a bleak tale, but it is a sparse life told sparsely in Smith’s restrained style – a style well suited to a story that evokes experience in a way that brings to life the experiences of many. There are times when I feel that Smith’s novels need a better editor – this is not the case here; Fatou’s tale is tight, focussed, elegant, efficient and all the more powerful for it. It is a fine piece of fiction that I hope is widely read (ignore those, including on this site, who complain that the size and format means that they are paying novel-prices for a 70 page book that takes less than an hour to read; it is an hour well spent).
June 21, 2019
This is the best short novel I've read this year. Fyi, reading short works is my new method for deciding whether I want to read more of . a particular author - very little investment of time required, and one gets a sense of the author. In the case of Zadie Smith, I will definitely be reading more of her work in the future. The Embassy of Cambodia is a simple story about a woman, Fatou, an immigrant from Ghana, who is working in virtual servitude for an Indian(?) couple who treat her as a non-entity, someone to be monitored, suspected, watched. Fatou's one solitary pleasure is swimming at the health center down the street, but even this she must do surreptitiously, using guest passes she lifts from her employers' house. She also meets Andrew, the only African man she has contact with, and their meetings are chaste and occur at the Tunisian cafe'.
I thought the character development was excellent. Fatou's "otherness" in the midst of England is emphasized by the Greek Chorus style commentary in some chapters by "the people of Willesden", and by her own lack of worldly knowledge, exposed in the course of her discussions with Andrew. But she has wisdom of a practical nature, and strength, as we come to find out. A very engaging book from an author I am glad to have discovered.
I thought the character development was excellent. Fatou's "otherness" in the midst of England is emphasized by the Greek Chorus style commentary in some chapters by "the people of Willesden", and by her own lack of worldly knowledge, exposed in the course of her discussions with Andrew. But she has wisdom of a practical nature, and strength, as we come to find out. A very engaging book from an author I am glad to have discovered.
August 2, 2025
This is a short story by award-winning writer Zadie Smith, dealing with some of her main topics again: race and gender (that is, mostly racism and sexism) as well as freedom/self-determination vs. belonging. The author uses irony, omissions and hints to tell her story and to get her message across, so that the plot leaves some room for interpretation. The reader has to read between the lines and to do some intellectual work themselves to understand Smith’s intention. Food for thought.
4.5 stars.
4.5 stars.
March 22, 2022
❝Was it wrong to hope to be happy?❞
This is my first time reading anything by Zadie Smith, and the hype is definitely deserved. I seriously need to read one of her full-length novels soon, because I really enjoyed her writing in this!
The Embassy of Cambodia is a relatively short piece of fiction, and it left me wanting more… I feel like the story ended just as things were taking a turn and becoming more interesting.
I can understand why the author ended the story the way she did, though, like it makes sense but I still want more 😂
I guess Zadie Smith leaves me no choice but to pick up one of her much longer books next hehe
❝He was a dreamer. But there are worse things, Fatou thought, than being a dreamer.❞
April 11, 2022
Il mio primo incontro con Zadie Smith, autrice a cui volevo avvicinarmi da tanto, è con questo ottimo racconto breve che in poche pagine riesce a toccare diversi temi importanti (come schiavitù, immigrazione, tensioni razziali e sessismo), senza però risultare superficiale.
"To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss."
"To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss."
March 11, 2017
The Embassy of Cambodia is a short story by British author, Zadie Smith. Fatou’s passage out of Ivory Coast, via Ghana and Libya, included a sojourn in Italy before she landed a job with the Derewals in NW London. While they withhold her passport and her wages, and she is certainly is not well treated, her not-quite-slavery does allow her a certain amount of freedom.
The Derewals live in Willesden, and her freedom includes being able to attend church with her friend Andrew Okonkwo on Sundays, and going swimming on Mondays. Her trip to the pool, undertaken without her employers’ knowledge, takes her past the Embassy of Cambodia, where a game of badminton is always in progress. And then, one tiny incident changes everything for Fatou.
In twenty-one very short chapters, the narrative from Fatou’s perspective is interspersed with commentary by an anonymous Willesden resident. Within her succinct prose, Smith touches on issues topical and timeless: cruelty and inequality, the plight of refugees, prosperity and poverty, dependence and independence. This little tale leaves the reader wanting more.
The Derewals live in Willesden, and her freedom includes being able to attend church with her friend Andrew Okonkwo on Sundays, and going swimming on Mondays. Her trip to the pool, undertaken without her employers’ knowledge, takes her past the Embassy of Cambodia, where a game of badminton is always in progress. And then, one tiny incident changes everything for Fatou.
In twenty-one very short chapters, the narrative from Fatou’s perspective is interspersed with commentary by an anonymous Willesden resident. Within her succinct prose, Smith touches on issues topical and timeless: cruelty and inequality, the plight of refugees, prosperity and poverty, dependence and independence. This little tale leaves the reader wanting more.
July 22, 2015
A beautiful short story by Zadie Smith, The Embassy of Cambodia was originally published in the New Yorker. In 69 short pages, this stout little book offers an insight on modern-day slave trade, and the ways in which systemic racism affects the safety, security, and prosperity of immigrants in the Western world. The book's namesake embassy plays the role of a reflecting pool; our heroine, Fatou, weighs the atrocities in Cambodia to the atrocities her own Ghanian (and African) ancestors faced. While she decides she is not a modern-day slave, Smith illustrates the blurred line that Fatou must face each day. This is a short story to break barriers, unapologetically confirming the standard treatment of immigrants in the West who act as housekeepers and nannies.
December 12, 2013
This is a short story that Zadie Smith wrote and had published in The New Yorker. This is the story more elaborated but it is being marketed as a small book. Actually it's a short story or novella. Nevertheless I enjoyed it and wished it was much longer. It is the story of Fatou a live-in maid and baby-sitter that is working for a wealthy Arab family living in Willesden a borough of Brent i North West London, which is a borough of Brent in North West London. They have taken her passport so she isn't really free. Every afternoon Fatou steals free passes from a drawer in the hallway (which no one notices) to go to the Olympic sized swimming pool in town. there she swims laps and observes the people around her. the book is only 69 pages and composed of 21 chapter which are labeled 0-1, 0-2, etc. Each chapter is a look into Fatou's life and a critique of society. Smith's writing is minimalist but brilliant. She manages to tell this story with very few words and the meaning somehow shines through. That's the genius of Smith's writing. Smith touches on many themes such as religion, relationships between men and women, the plight of modern day slaves, social class, illegal immigrants, etc. I'm thrilled to have picked this one up but as it was so short I was left wanting to know more about Fatou. Henceforth the problem I have with reading short stories. I recommend this one to lovers of Zadie Smith. For those who haven't had the pleasure of the Smith experience, I suggest On Beauty since it is a story with a more typical story line, although I don't think it's one of her best works. As a whole it's more accessible. Actually I would have given this 3,5 stars. Wish Goodreads would get that half star business sorted already.
July 23, 2016
If you're going to market what is essentially a 20 page short story (and if you removed the "chapter" breaks and printed this in a more standard format that is what it amounts to) as a hardback book for £7.99, it better be a fantastic story, worthy of Munro or Carver. And whilst I like Zadie Smith's writing (I've read and enjoyed all four of her novels) this is alas pretty run-of-the-mill stuff. As part of a collection I'd perhaps look on it more favourably, but in this format the reader is being asked to consider it in isolation, to give it the weight of a novella, and on those terms (for me at least) it doesn't stand up. It's a decent enough story, with some good themes, but it is a bit disposable - read in half an hour, I doubt it will linger in memory more than a few days, whereas the best stories (and I read a lot of short fiction) can haunt the reader for weeks, months, more, and will be returned to again and again.
So: an okay book, but I also feel a little cheated by it: at best a literary stocking filler.
So: an okay book, but I also feel a little cheated by it: at best a literary stocking filler.
May 18, 2018
Beginning and ending outside the Embassy of Cambodia, which happens to be located in Willesden, NW London, Zadie Smith's absorbing, moving and wryly observed story suggests how apparently small things in an ordinary life always raise larger, more extraordinary questions.
The Embassy of Cambodia is a multi-layered story. On the surface we are following the daily life of an Ivory Coast immigrant named Fatou. The little pleasures and benefits she found while working for a rich Pakistani family in London. Beneath that surface lie questions about how race, gender and status influence one's situation in life. Despite Fatou's level of education, she is not allowed to prosper. The only job she can find is as a housekeeper to the Derawal family. Likewise her lone friend Andrew, an educated Nigerian, does menial labor in an office. Zadie Smith makes it very clear that the treatment of African immigrants (to England) has nothing to do with the dream-like vision with which most immigrants arrive in Western countries.
Tens of millions of women and girls around the world are employed as domestic workers in private households. They clean, cook, care for children, look after elderly family members, and perform other essential tasks for their employers. Despite their important role, they are among the most exploited and abused workers in the world. They often work 14 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, for wages far below the minimum wage. They may be locked within their workplace and subject to physical and sexual violence. Children and migrant domestic workers are often the most vulnerable. (source: Human Rights Watch)
Zadie Smith opened me up to problems that I was, if at all, dimly aware of. It hurts to admit that, but before reading this short story, I didn't really care about domestic workers. I didn't care to inform myself, and didn't care about how, maybe, I could help. I very strongly believe that art (and thus literature) shouldn't just be for our entertainment, it should educate us. And Zadie Smith definitely achieved that with this short story. Chapeau!
'Are we born to suffer? Sometimes I think we are born to suffer more than all the rest.'The Embassy of Cambodia is my first exposure to Zadie Smith's writing. I don't know what it is about her, but her novels seem to be either hit or miss for people. I didn't wanna commit to a 400+ pages book, if I wasn't sure if she is my kind of writer. After reading this short 70-pages novella, I can definitely say that I am very inclined to check out some of her other writings. I got along with her language and her narrative style quite well.
The Embassy of Cambodia is a multi-layered story. On the surface we are following the daily life of an Ivory Coast immigrant named Fatou. The little pleasures and benefits she found while working for a rich Pakistani family in London. Beneath that surface lie questions about how race, gender and status influence one's situation in life. Despite Fatou's level of education, she is not allowed to prosper. The only job she can find is as a housekeeper to the Derawal family. Likewise her lone friend Andrew, an educated Nigerian, does menial labor in an office. Zadie Smith makes it very clear that the treatment of African immigrants (to England) has nothing to do with the dream-like vision with which most immigrants arrive in Western countries.
It was not the first time that Fatou had wondered if she herself was a slave, but this story, brief as it was, confirmed in her own mind that she was not. After all, it was her father, and not a kidnapper, who had taken her from Ivory Coast to Ghana, and when they reached Accra they had both found employment in the same hotel. [...] And nobody beat Fatou, although Mrs Derawal had twice slapped her in the face, and the two older children spoke to her with no respect at all and thanked her for nothing. (Sometimes she heard her name used as a term of abuse between them. 'You're as black as Fatou.' Or 'You're as stupid as Fatou.') On the other hand, just like the girl in the newspaper, she had not seen her passport with her own eyes since she arrived at the Derawals', and she had been told from the start that her wages were to be retained by the Derawals. [...] If she did not go out in the evenings that was only because she had no money with which to go out, and anyway knew very few people in London.Fatou is a strong woman, determined. However, she is objectified and at the mercy of her employers, who have taken her passport and pay her no wages. She has no way to break out of that injust and inequal system. Her key to surviving is to make her own arrangements. We learn about all the sacrifices she had to make, how she tried to stay away from the trap that is prostitution. We learn about her struggle with religion, how she wants to find solace in God, but how that doesn't work out for her, because of all the suffering she sees and she herself had to endure.
Tens of millions of women and girls around the world are employed as domestic workers in private households. They clean, cook, care for children, look after elderly family members, and perform other essential tasks for their employers. Despite their important role, they are among the most exploited and abused workers in the world. They often work 14 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, for wages far below the minimum wage. They may be locked within their workplace and subject to physical and sexual violence. Children and migrant domestic workers are often the most vulnerable. (source: Human Rights Watch)
Zadie Smith opened me up to problems that I was, if at all, dimly aware of. It hurts to admit that, but before reading this short story, I didn't really care about domestic workers. I didn't care to inform myself, and didn't care about how, maybe, I could help. I very strongly believe that art (and thus literature) shouldn't just be for our entertainment, it should educate us. And Zadie Smith definitely achieved that with this short story. Chapeau!
November 12, 2017
3.5 rounded down
My first Zadie Smith! This short story comes in at 60-something pages in book form, but I'm pretty sure you can still read it online as it was originally published in the New Yorker. We follow Ivorian domestic servant, Fatou, who works for a well-off family in Willesden, London. She often passes the Embassy of Cambodia on her way to the health centre of which the family are members, where she goes swimming using their guest pass (something the family are unaware of).
As other reviewers have stated, this gives an interesting insight into the lives of African immigrants in London, and is impressively multi-layered for such a short story. I look forward to reading some of Zadie Smith's novels based on the strength of this.
My first Zadie Smith! This short story comes in at 60-something pages in book form, but I'm pretty sure you can still read it online as it was originally published in the New Yorker. We follow Ivorian domestic servant, Fatou, who works for a well-off family in Willesden, London. She often passes the Embassy of Cambodia on her way to the health centre of which the family are members, where she goes swimming using their guest pass (something the family are unaware of).
As other reviewers have stated, this gives an interesting insight into the lives of African immigrants in London, and is impressively multi-layered for such a short story. I look forward to reading some of Zadie Smith's novels based on the strength of this.
August 8, 2017
Kurze Geschichte über eine vermeintliche Botschaft, erzählt aus der Sicht einer jungen Frau, die von der Elfenbeinküste stammt. Eine Geflüchtete ohne Rechte und Papiere, die viel über ihr direktes Umfeld und die Welt nachdenkt. Das Ende liest sich wie der Auftakt zur eigentlichen Geschichte.
January 24, 2016
Short story that can be completed in less than an hour. I enjoyed this and would rate it a 3.5/5 stars. This author's writing is great. Definitely will check out more of her work.
Fatou is a great character in this book and the whole slavery and self identity issues were great to read.
Fatou is a great character in this book and the whole slavery and self identity issues were great to read.
March 4, 2014
Flawless. A wonderful gift to your head between longer books. Reminds me of The Ocean at the End of the Lane for the sheer economy of language and captivation of my attention
April 7, 2017
That was soooo good. Zadie Smith is an amazing writer; she has that balance between descriptive and bland writing. It was so easy to get attached this story, Fatou's story, and to her as a main character.
I enjoyed the diversity too, which wasn't the emphasis on this short story but obviously where the characters came from effected their positions (Fatou was really a refugee coming to work). When I first started the story I thought Fatou was a young, white male or something, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that she was an African girl instead.
I wanted to see what was going to happen next to Fatou and what more we would find out about her past, what she would approach and overcome in the future. It was interesting reading about her tales back when she worked at a hotel in Accra.
Smith easily colors in a world for us, both bright but dampened by the realness of this story, which is neither a saddening or brightening one. I've found only a few authors who can pull off that eerie sense of realism through words.
It's one of those that leaves you both satisfied and wanting to know more, a story that lingers at the back of your mind. What happens to Fatou? Who were the unknown people playing that game of badminton?
I would really like to know why this story revolves around the Cambodian Embassy-the story is named after this after all.
Yet I am also left knowing that that's how it's supposed to be-that stories continue and there never really is an end to someone's story.
Fatou's story moves on, and that is evident once you finish. There is so much more out there for her, at least in my eyes.
While I could easily see this being a full-length novel, Zadie smith wants to keep this short and sweet, the way it's supposed to be.
Some doors just need to be closed I guess.
I enjoyed the diversity too, which wasn't the emphasis on this short story but obviously where the characters came from effected their positions (Fatou was really a refugee coming to work). When I first started the story I thought Fatou was a young, white male or something, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that she was an African girl instead.
I wanted to see what was going to happen next to Fatou and what more we would find out about her past, what she would approach and overcome in the future. It was interesting reading about her tales back when she worked at a hotel in Accra.
Smith easily colors in a world for us, both bright but dampened by the realness of this story, which is neither a saddening or brightening one. I've found only a few authors who can pull off that eerie sense of realism through words.
It's one of those that leaves you both satisfied and wanting to know more, a story that lingers at the back of your mind. What happens to Fatou? Who were the unknown people playing that game of badminton?
I would really like to know why this story revolves around the Cambodian Embassy-the story is named after this after all.
Yet I am also left knowing that that's how it's supposed to be-that stories continue and there never really is an end to someone's story.
Fatou's story moves on, and that is evident once you finish. There is so much more out there for her, at least in my eyes.
While I could easily see this being a full-length novel, Zadie smith wants to keep this short and sweet, the way it's supposed to be.
Some doors just need to be closed I guess.
"Naturally, we wondered what this girl was doing, sitting on damp pavement in the middle of the day.....As if one player could imagine only a violent conclusion and the other only a hopeful return."
December 16, 2017
”Sicuramente ci sono dei vantaggi nel tracciare un cerchio intorno alla propria attenzione e rimanerci dentro. Ma quanto dev'essere grande questo cerchio?”
A cosa facciamo caso?
Cosa, invece, escludiamo a priori dalla nostra attenzione?
Fatou dalla Costa d'Avorio arriva a Londra a fare la domestica in una famiglia che non le mostra né attenzioni né rispetto.
All'entrata di una villa del quartiere periferico compare all'improvviso una targa di ottone che dice:«Ambasciata di Cambogia ».
Una novità che incuriosisce alimentata dalle alte mura dove si percepisce qualcuno che gioca a badminton: Poc, smash. Poc, smash...
Il rumore del volano che colpisce ed il mistero di chi ci sia là dentro.
Un racconto che riesce in poche pagine a parlare di questioni fondamentali: genocidio, schiavitù, immigrazione...e direi che non è poco!
A cosa facciamo caso?
Cosa, invece, escludiamo a priori dalla nostra attenzione?
Fatou dalla Costa d'Avorio arriva a Londra a fare la domestica in una famiglia che non le mostra né attenzioni né rispetto.
All'entrata di una villa del quartiere periferico compare all'improvviso una targa di ottone che dice:«Ambasciata di Cambogia ».
Una novità che incuriosisce alimentata dalle alte mura dove si percepisce qualcuno che gioca a badminton: Poc, smash. Poc, smash...
Il rumore del volano che colpisce ed il mistero di chi ci sia là dentro.
Un racconto che riesce in poche pagine a parlare di questioni fondamentali: genocidio, schiavitù, immigrazione...e direi che non è poco!
January 23, 2014
This book is way out of the range it should charge its readers, but I did like it. It is much better written than NW. The maid reminds me a lot of maids I met or saw in Hong Kong and Macau, either they are struggling with their lives, or they are enjoying their "meeting" in Victoria Park. How's their lives? Like a shuttlecock? I don't know. But Zadie's short story brought me to her imagination of a "one-day" life of this maid, maybe any maid. It's just, maybe, too simple their lives, but you are not a maid, how do you know?
November 1, 2019
When is a book a novel and not an essay, novella or short story?
This is a short story packaged and sold as a stand-alone book. Nonetheless it packs a punch to remind those living privileged lives to show a bit of kindness to those less fortunate.
The story is of a young woman from Ivory Coast works for an unfriendly newby-rich family. She receives no pay, has little time off but considers herself lucky. Luck, security, safety are all relative issues explored simply but will great power.
This is a short story packaged and sold as a stand-alone book. Nonetheless it packs a punch to remind those living privileged lives to show a bit of kindness to those less fortunate.
The story is of a young woman from Ivory Coast works for an unfriendly newby-rich family. She receives no pay, has little time off but considers herself lucky. Luck, security, safety are all relative issues explored simply but will great power.
August 13, 2021
One short story, hardcover, $12 in Canada. How many pieces of standard writing advice does Smith break in this one story? There is a narrator, who is mysterious and unrevealed. We never find out who is playing badminton.
All in all, many so-called rules are broken, and an excellent demonstration why rules are not really rules whenever one is talking about literature.
Is it a rule then—that in literature (and in art in general) that rules are made to be broken?
All in all, many so-called rules are broken, and an excellent demonstration why rules are not really rules whenever one is talking about literature.
Is it a rule then—that in literature (and in art in general) that rules are made to be broken?
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