Saturday Samplers Book Group to Discuss "Lincoln in the Bardo"

Bernardsville Library’s book group, Saturday Samplers, will meet on Saturday, March 3 at 11:00 am to discuss "Lincoln in the Bardo: A Novel" (2017) by George Saunders. [The author will not be present.]

In his long-awaited first novel, Mr. Saunders delivers his most original, transcendent, and moving work yet. Unfolding in a graveyard over the course of a single night, and narrated by a dazzling chorus of voices, "Lincoln in the Bardo" is a literary experience unlike any other.

In 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 returned to the crypt several times alone 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 thrilling, 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. Saunders has invented a thrilling new form that deploys a kaleidoscopic, theatrical panorama of voices—living and dead, historical and invented.

Saturday Samplers is a book discussion group dedicated to sampling various kinds of literature, including short stories, nonfiction, new and old novels, and teen fiction. Its goal is to search out interesting, noteworthy, and sometimes overlooked literary and narrative works. No sign-up is needed to join the discussion. Call the library at 766-0118 for more information.