george saunders

i think i liked it best of his books, the writing is very virtuoso

that's the worst thing about it

that doesnt make any sense

spiderhead = testing emotion drugs on people

i. i think saunders is worse now that the purpose of each sentence is not to communicate the interiority of the american lower-middle and working classes and instead to communicate how good george saunders is at communicating the interiority of etc.
ii. there's been a real flattening of idea and of sentiment that's gone along with this

though i think 'tenth' is probably less bad than the one that came out when i was an undergraduate, which i overrated at the time, because of how i was an undergraduate

the semplica girl diaries is--to use a phrase which seems to be becoming so much popular on ilx that we could probably abbreviate it--a little too on the nose

i think saunders is worse now that the purpose of each sentence is not to communicate the interiority of the american lower-middle and working classes and instead to communicate how good george saunders is at communicating the interiority of etc.

this is the sentence that killed david foster wallace

(not a disagreement. i haven't read saunders recently.)

fair

I don't really like his sci-fi stories. The final story in Tenth is completely devastating though. Otherwise the ones that have stuck with me are the first story with the child abduction, and the one with the puppy and the kid tied to the tree.

i. i think saunders is worse now that the purpose of each sentence is not to communicate the interiority of the american lower-middle and working classes and instead to communicate how good george saunders is at communicating the interiority of etc.

― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Sunday, October 11, 2015 3:59 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

idk he always seemed a lil too literal and proud of himself to really communicate any sort of deep ~interiority~ or w/e he is often an astonishingly good writer tho and funny

I read him for the yuks tbh -- that affected affectlessness.

fairly tepid review of the novel

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/03/the-sentimental-sadist/513824/

I'm guessing that's a deliberate hit job, but it doesn't really encourage me to pick up the novel, either.

There was a point when Persistent Gappers of Frip came out, and I started to think, "You know, maybe this guy isn't very good anymore" and the voice kind of curdled on me. I haven't read Tenth of December, but is it fair to say everything since Pastoralia is just more of the same? Even at the time (although it's very good) Pastoralia felt like a retread. At this point it seems like his interviews are more enjoyable than his writing.

pretty much

tenth of december is great imho, and i went in thinking i was kinda sick of him, similar themes to his earlier work but the prose is more dynamic or something

A bit more than "similar" IMO. I thought it was rotten. I liked that one page story called "pole" though.

Have enjoyed most of his work, but 400p is not the length at which i want to read it.

Most of Tenth of December seemed overwrought and and/or too crafty, also maybe not crafty enough, re pattern recognition---if a hyper and otherwise goofy boychild and an old man with dementia are wandering the same landscape, of course they're eventually going to come into proximity and have A Saunders Moment, very painterly. But did like for instance when the way the Unstable War Vet, the kind that used to be standard on TV etc. before vets pretty much vanished from TV etc, gets re-absorbed into the family dynamic, for a while--and of course might actually freak out etc. later, with family members getting some measure of blame, suspicion etc; Saunders does always seek some kind of verisimilitude, and there he gets it. But overall, I think Karen Russell's Vampires In The Leomon Grove is much better at social commentary x imaginative writing, with no overselling.

D'oh! The Lemon Grove, of course. I'll prob read some more Saunders----Civilwarland In Bad Decline was pretty good, I take it?

I read CivilWarLand when the paperback came out in the mid-90s, when it was a good bridge between the sci-fi I read as a teenager and the Proper Literature I pretended to like in my twenties. Anyway, it's amazing (or so I remember) but the shtick probably doesn't come across as original as it seemed at the time, if only because it's been imitated so often (especially by Saunders).

That Lemon Grove thing seemed fun in the excerpt on Amazon.

I've only read 10th of December but found it fantastic, especially The Semplica-Girl Diaries which can be read online http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/10/15/the-semplica-girl-diaries

should probably read his older stuff

The NYorker has a ton of Saunders stuff avail to read

Lincoln in the Bardo was an inspiring read. Can't think of another contemporary American author with such an impressive grasp of language and style. It's both straightforward and experimental, postmodern and touching, even spiritual. I'm going to check out his early work when I get the chance.

Oh yeah, and of course it's very funny too.

The cacophony of voices and styles is elegantly integrated with the themes and narrative, really just a very clever way of telling the story, surprisingly easy to follow.

I've heard so-so things about it but you've just convinced me to give it a shot

Great! I'm not sure I'd want to argue that it's perfect in every way, but I def think it's an enjoyable read all the way - and even though it's labeled as a novel, it's really more written in the style of a drama which means you read it in no time

this story is very lovely!

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/oct/21/george-saunders-fox-8-short-story-man-booker-prize-lincoln-bardo

oh yeah, and he won the Booker Prize.

did anyone other than niels on here read lincoln in the bardo? i picked it up the other day and there is no way in hell i could read that book. that looked like the kind of book that people buy and then never finish but maybe i'm just dumb.

Same. I’ve read his other stuff but could only make it through the beginning

i read it and loved it, but i could totally see picking it up and not finishing it.

i like his style a lot but, like carver, he's spawned a lot of imitators, and his style has some limits.

his turns toward the sentimental can be heartbreaking and also veer toward sap

I liked it a lot, but it took a minute to get going iirc.

you aren't alone, scott. I got about halfway through it and realized I had no desire to continue down that path. It felt like a song stuck on repeat.

it does take a minute to get going, and to figure out that most of the characters are talking to themselves and not really responding to other characters. it's a series of overlapping narratives, which makes sense from a writer of short stories.

I mean, it is about purgatory.

xp

I listened to the full cast audiobook. I think that's the way to get it done. Although, I will say that our book club (we are all Saunders fans) liked it in any format.

xp - Not quite purgatory. That's where one expiates one's sins in order to become purified and ascend to heaven, but the bardo, where regrets and desires keep one tethered to a past life, unable to move on to the next. So the bardo is a fruitless stasis. That makes for a tough challenge in terms of narrative and Saunders means of handling that challenge bogged down too much to repay me for the effort of finishing it.

His mix of gleeful cruelty and sappy sentimentality sets my teeth on edge. Liked the first couple of collections but it's been diminishing returns since then.

i finished L in the B, it did seem like a short story idea stretched out to novel length. Some of it was quite moving, some of it struck me as emotionally manipulative, either way it didn't make me want to read anything more by him.

i had never read any Saunders until Lincoln in the Bardo & i really loved it, i found it very moving.