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February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returned to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy's body. Willie Lincoln finds himself in a strange purgatory, where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel, and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state, called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo, a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie's soul.… (more)
This widely acclaimed fiction was a disappointment for me. Yes, Saunders shows great inventiveness and displays a broad and inquiring vision. How does one capture Lincoln body and soul immediately after the death of his son, Willie? First you include the many commentaries and histories gathered over the years into telling quotes. Then take the Tibetan tradition of Bardo to try to get closer to the trials and sorrows of Lincoln by having spirits enter the poor man. All this is very effective but all of this prodigious effort falls short of getting me nearer to the President and makes one wonder if the book was worth the effort. “All the sound and fury signifying nothing.”
Quotes: (page 151) “'Young Willie Lincoln was laid to rest on the day that the casuality lists from the Union victory at Fort Donelson were publicly posted, an event that caused a great shock among the public at the time, the cost of life being unprecedented thus far in the war.' In 'Setting the Record Straight: Memoir, Error, and Evasion,' by Jason Tumm, 'Journal of American History.' The details of the loses were communicated to the President even as young Willie lay under embalmment. Inverness, op. cit. More than a thousand troops on both sides were killed and three times that number wounded. It was 'a most bloody fight,' a young Union soldier told his father, so devastating to his company that despite the victory, he remained 'sad, lonely and down-hearted.' Only seven of the eighty-five men in his unit survived. Goodwin, op. Cit. The dead at Donelson, sweet Jesus. Heaped and piled like threshed wheat, one on top of two on top of three. I walked through it after with a bad feeling. Lord it was me done that, I thought. In 'These Battle Memories,' by First Lieutenant Daniel Brower”
(page 306) “...as we trod that difficult path we were now well upon, blunder, blunder farther (we had blundered so badly already) and, in so blundering, ruin more, more of these boys, each of whom was once dear to someone. Ruinmore, ruinmore, we felt, must endeavor not to ruinmore. Our grief must be defeated, it must not become our master, and make us ineffective, and put us even deeper into the ditch. roger bevins iii We must, to do the maximum good, bring the thing to its swiftest halt and...' hans vollman Kill. roger bevins iii Kill more efficiently. hans vollman Hold nothing back. roger bevins iii Make the blood flow. hans vollman Bleed and bleed the enemy until his good sense be reborn. roger bevins iii ( )
Ugh. The Goodreads scale is not really the right way to measure this one. The truth is, I didn't really like it all that much - I actually was ready to DNF at 98 pages in (almost a third of the book) when no story had yet emerged. That said, it was a powerful book, with beautiful writing and a concept that was...original. I am glad I slogged through to get to the philosophical part ("We must see God not as a Him (some linear rewarding fellow) but an IT, a great beast beyond our understanding, who wants something from us, and we must give it, and all we may control is the spirit in which we give it and the ultimate end which the giving serves."). ( )
The story is told by numerous characters. It feels like a play, with the characters speaking in turn as much to the audience as to each other. It reads like an e.e. cummings poem. There is humor and deep grief within the story. It both inspires and satisfies curiosity about history during the Civil War period. I absolutely loved this book. ( )
On our wedding day I was forty-six, she was eighteen.
Quotations
I will never forget those solemn moments—genius and greatness weeping over the love's lost idol.
Having never loved or been loved in that previous place, they were frozen here in a youthful state of perpetual emotional vacuity; interested only in freedom, profligacy, and high-jinks, railing against any limitation or commitment whatsoever.
In truth, we were bored, so very bored, so continually bored.
Birds being distrustful of our ilk.
Any admiration we might once have felt for their endurance had long since devolved into revulsion.
The crowd, having suspended its perversities, stood gaping at Mr. Bevins, who had acquired, in the telling, such a bounty of extra eyes, ears, noses, hands, etc., that he now resembled some overstuffed fleshly bouquet. Bevins applied his usual remedy (closing the eyes and stopping as many of the noses and ears as he could with the various extra hands, dulling, thereby, all sensory intake, thus quieting the mind) and multiple sets of the eyes, ears, noses, and hands retracted or vanished (I could never tell which).
Walk-skimming between (or over, when unavoidable) the former home-places of so many fools no longer among us.
These were a chirpy, tepid, desireless sort, generally, and had lingered, if at all, for only the briefest of moments, so completely satisfactory had they found their tenure in that previous place.
The two now comprised one sitting man, Mr. Vollman's greater girth somewhat overflowing the gentleman, his massive member existing wholly outside the gentleman, pointing up at the moon.
The dead at Donelson, sweet Jesus. Heaped and piled like threshed wheat, one on top of two on top of three. I walked through it after with a bad feeling. Lord it was me done that, I thought.
The dead lay as they had fallen, in every conceivable shape, some grasping their guns as though they were in the act of firing, while others, with a cartridge in their icy grasp, were in the act of loading. Some of the countenances wore a peaceful, glad smile, while on others rested a fiendish look of hate. It looked as though each countenance was the exact counterpart of the thoughts that were passing through the mind when the death messenger laid them low. Perhaps that noble-looking youth, with his smiling up-turned face, with his glossy ringlets matted with his own life-blood, felt a mother's prayer stealing over his senses as his young life went out. Near him lay a young husband with a prayer for his wife and little one yet lingering on his lips. Youth and age, virtue and evil, were represented on those ghastly countenances. Before us lay the charred and blackened remains of some who had been burnt alive. They were wounded so badly to move and the fierce elements consumed them.
(So why grieve? The worst of it, for him, is over.) Because I loved him so and am in the habit of loving him and that love must take the form of fussing and worry and doing.
Mr. Vollman bearing his tremendous member in his hands, so as not to trip himself on it.
Some blows fall too heavy upon those too fragile.
Regarding a face & carriage so uniquely arranged by Nature, one's opinion of it seemed to depend more than usual on the predisposition of the Observer.
Oh, the pathos of it!—haggard, drawn into fixed lines of unutterable sadness, with a look of loneliness, as of a soul whose depth of sorrow and bitterness no human sympathy could ever reach. The impression I carried away was that I had seen, not so much the President of the United States, as the saddest man in the world.
Strange, isn't it? To have dedicated one's life to a certain venture, neglecting other aspects of one's life, only to have that venture, in the end, amount to nothing at all, the products of one's labors utterly forgotten?
Well, what of it. No one who has ever done anything worth doing has gone uncriticized.
He came out of nothingness, took form, was loved, was always bound to return to nothingness. Only I did not think it would be so soon. Or that he would precede us. Two passing temporarinesses developed feelings for one another.
The thousand dresses, laid out so reverently that afternoon, flecks of dust brushed off carefully in doorways, hems gathered up for the carriage trip: where are they now? Are some yet saved in attics? Most are dust. As are the women who wore them so proudly in that transient moment of radiance. (7%)
Trap. Horrible trap. At one's birth it is sprung. Some last day must arrive. When you will need to get out of this body. Bad enough. Then we bring a baby here. The terms of the trap are compounded. That baby also must depart. All pleasure sshuld be tainted with that knowledge. But hopeful, dear us, we forget. (46%)
Strange, isn't it? To have dedicated one's life to a certain venture, neglecting other aspects of one's life, only to have that venture, in the end, amount to nothing at all, the products of one's labors utterly forgotten? (60%)
He came out of nothingness, took form, was loved, was always bound to return to nothingness. (70%)
We were that way at the time, and had been led to that place not by any innate evil in ourselves, but by the state of cognition and our experiences up until that moment. (78%)
At the core of each lay suffering, our eventual end, the many losses we must experince on the way to that end. (87%)
Must end suffering by causing more suffering. (88%)
He was an open book. An opening book. That had just been opened up somewhat wider. By sorrow. And -- by us. By all of us, black and white... (89%)
Last words
And we rode forward into the night, past the sleeping houses of our countrymen. thomas havens
February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returned to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy's body. Willie Lincoln finds himself in a strange purgatory, where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel, and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state, called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo, a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie's soul.
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#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - WINNER OF THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE The "devastatingly moving" (People) first novel from the author of Tenth of December a moving and original father-son story featuring none other than Abraham Lincoln, as well as an unforgettable cast of supporting characters, living and dead, historical and invented
One of The Atlantic's Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years - One of Paste's Best Novels of the Decade
Named One of the Ten Best Books of the Year by The Washington Post, USA Today, and Maureen Corrigan, NPR - One of Time's Ten Best Novels of the Year - A New York Times Notable Book - One of O: The Oprah Magazine's Best Books of the Year
February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. "My poor boy, he was too good for this earth," the president says at the time. "God has called him home." Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returns, alone, to the crypt several times to hold his boy's body.
From that seed of historical truth, George Saunders spins an unforgettable story of familial love and loss that breaks free of its realistic, historical framework into a supernatural realm both hilarious and terrifying. Willie Lincoln finds himself in a strange purgatory where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel, and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state--called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo--a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie's soul.
Lincoln in the Bardo is an astonishing feat of imagination and a bold step forward from one of the most important and influential writers of his generation. Formally daring, generous in spirit, deeply concerned with matters of the heart, it is a testament to fiction's ability to speak honestly and powerfully to the things that really matter to us. Saunders has invented a thrilling new form that deploys a kaleidoscopic, theatrical panorama of voices to ask a timeless, profound question: How do we live and love when we know that everything we love must end?
"A luminous feat of generosity and humanism."--Colson Whitehead, The New York Times Book Review
"A masterpiece."--Zadie Smith
Haiku summary
Unread I hold it, a new Saunders book is come. My evening expands. (SomeGuyInVirginia)
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Quotes: (page 151) “'Young Willie Lincoln was laid to rest on the day that the casuality lists from the Union victory at Fort Donelson were publicly posted, an event that caused a great shock among the public at the time, the cost of life being unprecedented thus far in the war.'
In 'Setting the Record Straight: Memoir, Error, and Evasion,' by Jason Tumm, 'Journal of American History.'
The details of the loses were communicated to the President even as young Willie lay under embalmment.
Inverness, op. cit.
More than a thousand troops on both sides were killed and three times that number wounded. It was 'a most bloody fight,' a young Union soldier told his father, so devastating to his company that despite the victory, he remained 'sad, lonely and down-hearted.' Only seven of the eighty-five men in his unit survived.
Goodwin, op. Cit.
The dead at Donelson, sweet Jesus. Heaped and piled like threshed wheat, one on top of two on top of three. I walked through it after with a bad feeling. Lord it was me done that, I thought.
In 'These Battle Memories,' by First Lieutenant Daniel Brower”
(page 306) “...as we trod that difficult path we were now well upon, blunder, blunder farther (we had blundered so badly already) and, in so blundering, ruin more, more of these boys, each of whom was once dear to someone.
Ruinmore, ruinmore, we felt, must endeavor not to ruinmore.
Our grief must be defeated, it must not become our master, and make us ineffective, and put us even deeper into the ditch.
roger bevins iii
We must, to do the maximum good, bring the thing to its swiftest halt and...'
hans vollman
Kill.
roger bevins iii
Kill more efficiently.
hans vollman
Hold nothing back.
roger bevins iii
Make the blood flow.
hans vollman
Bleed and bleed the enemy until his good sense be reborn.
roger bevins iii (