Autumn by Ali Smith
Published 2017 · 224 pages · 46,877 words · about 3 hours at an average pace · Literary Fiction
How hard is Autumn to read?
Autumn scores 50 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it quite demanding. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 38 out of 100
- Smith's playful vocabulary with cultural references.
- Sentence structure: 45 out of 100
- Characteristic flowing, associative sentences.
- Abstraction: 50 out of 100
- Post-Brexit Britain and time explored.
- Information density: 45 out of 100
- Dense with cultural allusion and Brexit context.
- Narrative indirection: 55 out of 100
- Associative structure requires assembly.
- Symbolic density: 55 out of 100
- The seasons, Hepworth, time carry symbolic weight.
- Ironic distance: 45 out of 100
- Smith's sympathy and critique intertwine.
- Resolution withholding: 55 out of 100
- Life continues; Brexit remains.
- Structural complexity: 55 out of 100
- Associative, non-linear seasonal structure.
How Autumn is regarded
Autumn holds a literary regard score of 68 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.