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When something really bad is going on in a culture, the average guy doesn’t see it. He can’t. He’s average and is surrounded by and immersed in the cant and discourse of the status quo.

George Saunders

So, good news/bad news: good news that I’m progressing; bad news that life is short and art is long.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Art Life Long Short
Do all the other things, the ambitious things – travel, get rich, get famous, innovate, lead, fall in love, make and lose fortunes…but as you do, to the extent that you can, err in the direction of kindness.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Falling In Love Graduation Kindness
In my case, when I am trying to be “kind” I often default in a sort of toothless loving-all stance that is, actually, not kind, because it is not truthful.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Be Kind Truthful Trying
I was trained in seismic prospecting. We’d drill a deep hole and put dynamite in the bottom and blow it up remotely, which would give you a cross-sectional picture of the subsurface, which tells you where to drill.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Deep Dynamite Remotely
Art is not some inessential frippery – it is the nation’s means of intelligently regarding itself. To cripple or stigmatize the arts is to doom one’s nation to a life of incuriosity, dullness, literalness and the worst kind of rank materialism.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Art Kind Literalness Mean Notion
As the writer of this book [Lincoln in the Bardo], what I loved was the feeling of having so many surprises come at the end that I hadn’t really planned or planted.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Book Feelings Surprise
Whatever happens when we die, it would be really weird if it was what we had expected. Even if you were a lifelong Christian believer, it would be kind of weird if there actually were pearly gates.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Christian Kind Process Writer
I’m turning 58, and you get that kind of weird, old-guy feeling of you don’t have an infinite number of years left and if there’s anything you want to say or represent, it’s time to try it.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Guy Numbers Years
When we talk about adversity, this is the moment when character really gets tested. When things aren’t going the way you want and you can’t see anyway that they’re going to go the way you want. That’s kind of when those old virtues really become valuable and vulnerable also.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Adversity Character Want
Anyone can be shamed, but feeling guilt requires empathy within.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Empathy Feelings Guilt
When you talk about a reader being emotionally moved, a feeling of empathy, I think that comes out of that line-by-line respect for reader. That’s actually where it all comes from.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Empathy Feelings Thinking
Since, according to me, your life is going to be a gradual process of becoming kinder and more loving: Hurry up. Speed it along. Start right now.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Advice Confusion Medicine
I’m fascinated with actors, and I’ve never quite understood the process.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Actors Never Quit Process
If you have a friend, what’s the best way you can experience her beauty? It’s to really accept her. She’s weird in this way,
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Judging Thinking Trying
Compassion doesn’t have to be weak or enabling; it can also be quite bold.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Compassion Enabling Weak
So here’s something I know to be true, although it’s a little corny, and I don’t quite know what to do with it.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Advice Corny Littles

When something really bad is going on in a culture, the average guy doesn’t see it. He can’t. He’s average and is surrounded by and immersed in the cant and discourse of the status quo.

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When something really bad is going on in a culture, the average guy doesn’t see it. He can’t. He’s average and is surrounded by and immersed in the cant and discourse of the status quo.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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