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A good essay collection reveals something new about its subjects, while a great collection also reveals something about its author. Zadie Smith’s excellent Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays falls into the latter category. In a collection divided into four sections—Reading, Being, Seeing and Feeling—Smith brings deep knowledge and stunning wit to these nomadic pieces and in the process, brings the curtain up on herself.

 

A question running throughout the book is how someone, at age 34, gets to be so smart about so much. Smith writes a…