Because all people of color look alike

"Lines of fact and fiction blurred," Walter Ellis, Belfast Telegraph

Earlier in the year, another fraud unwound in America that encapsulated much that is true about publishing in this country. Kaavya Viswanathan, a 19-year-old Zadie Smith lookalike studying English at Harvard, was given an advance of $$500,000 by Little Brown for her novel, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life.


Kaavya Viswanathan


Zadie Smith

Admittedly, there are some photos where the plagiarist might have more of a "resemblance" with the novelist, but still, what's up with the lazy shorthand way of saying she's a person of color? I just would never look at a photo of Viswanathan and think that. Also, well, Smith is Jamaican and English and Viswanathan is Indian-American. Not that that precludes them from looking alike, but it just seems odd to throw that in like that rather than use another description of her looks (if one's necessary at all).


Zadie Smith