Culture & Arts
• Analysis
Zadie Smith tells Dua Lipa inequality has made culture clashes feel 'existential'
In a Zadie Smith Dua Lipa interview at the Southbank Centre's London literature festival, the novelist argued that inequality has made culture clashes feel 'existential', linking divisions to the decline of Britain's welfare system.
By Haut Monde Post
• October 25, 2026
• 3 Min Read
Zadie Smith said inequality has made culture clashes feel "existential" during an interview with Dua Lipa, part of the Southbank Centre's London literature festival. The novelist traced the hardening of uk attitudes to multiculturalism to the demise of Britain's "incredible, historic" welfare system, which she argued has led to greater divisions.
Why differences became existential
Smith pointed to increased inequality and unemployment when explaining the shift in the UK immigration "dividing line". Where people once had decent housing and healthcare, meeting others produced a different response altogether.
then the differences [with others] become interesting, sometimes annoying, but not existential
That has changed, she said, when your schools are falling apart, when the hospitals are falling apart – now it feels existential. In such conditions, she argued, hostility follows a structural logic.
It becomes very, very natural to look to your left and think 'who the fuck are you?' That is an economic and structural question
White Teeth and a changing Kilburn
Smith placed the argument against the backdrop of her debut, White Teeth, which was published in 2000 and primarily set in the last three decades of the 20th century. The novel traces three families – the Joneses, the Iqbals and the Chalfens – in Kilburn and Willesden in north-west London, where Smith grew up.
She praised the state education she received there, saying it has stood her "in incredibly good stead".
- •"I can talk to anyone. The posh kids up the hill? Not so much."
- •Returning to the same area now, she sees the same schools but deeper hardship: "everything is harder, everybody is poorer, everybody is struggling more".
A nostalgia for the left
Smith encouraged developing "a nostalgia for the left" - while being clear about what should not be brought back. She said no one should want the LGBTQ+ politics of the 80s or the racial prejudice depicted in White Teeth, but asked: do you want the healthcare and the schools and the education? I think you do.
She valued a functioning social democracy, one that "might function again if people cared about it, wanted it, believed it could happen again".
On criticism and the festival stage
The conversation also turned to dealing with reviews. Lipa said learning to live with reviews – bad reviews, good reviews was "one of the hardest things for me to learn to deal with". Smith defended the critics, saying literary criticism is "absolutely essential" because it "helps develop taste", and added that if it's well written, if it's intelligent … I quite love 'takedowns' - even of her own work.
The event sits within a wider programme of speakers selected by Lipa including Patti Smith, Malorie Blackman and Hisham Matar. Lipa runs a book club, Service95, through which she interviews authors on a monthly basis. The London literature festival runs until 1 November.
