{"id":173,"date":"2007-09-28T10:46:03","date_gmt":"2007-09-28T15:46:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/?p=173"},"modified":"2012-02-25T21:49:23","modified_gmt":"2012-02-26T02:49:23","slug":"bss-139-george-saunders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/bss-139-george-saunders\/","title":{"rendered":"George Saunders (BSS #139)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>George Saunders is most recently the author of <i>The Braindead Megaphone<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/09\/georgesaunders.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"georgesaunders\" width=\"360\" height=\"241\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-2436\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/09\/georgesaunders.jpg 360w, http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/09\/georgesaunders-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 600px) 91vw, (max-width: 900px) 600px, (max-width: 1060px) 50vw, (max-width: 1200px) 520px, (max-width: 1400px) 43vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_282\"><!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-173-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\">http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\">Listen: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/?powerpress_pinw=173-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"segundo139.mp3\">Download<\/a> (Running Time: 45:36 &#8212; 41.7MB)<\/p>\n<p><b>Condition of Mr. Segundo:<\/b> Feeling a little dead down there.<\/p>\n<p><b>Author:<\/b> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.georgesaundersland.com\/index.html\">George Saunders<\/a><\/p>\n<p><b>Subjects Discussed:<\/b> Writing fragmentary travelogue pieces, trying not to pre-process experiences, observational criteria, Dubai, responding to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.latimes.com\/features\/printedition\/books\/la-bk-ehrenreich2sep02,0,1610085.story?coll=la-headlines-bookreview\">Ben Ehrenreich&#8217;s claim<\/a> of &#8220;pulled punches,&#8221; journalistic integrity, on taking people to task, writing comprehensive journalistic accounts vs. one-week accounts, Saunders&#8217;s &#8220;limited talent,&#8221; on &#8220;liking to be liked,&#8221;  the difference between fiction and nonfiction, Minutemen on the US\/Mexico border, on taking on a persona, Bob Dylan, the response that came from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/archive\/2006\/12\/04\/061204sh_shouts\">&#8220;&#8216;Borat&#8217;: The Memo,&#8221;<\/a> on being called a &#8220;tool&#8221; and a &#8220;young fogey,&#8221; cheap edits, mean satire, political labels and satire, generalizations about everything between Los Angeles and New York, not going beyond the first impression, Donald Barthelme, Freitag&#8217;s triangle and rising action, why Saunders is savage in fiction, and writing rules vs. writing voice.<\/p>\n<p><b>EXCERPT FROM SHOW:<\/B> <\/p>\n<p><b>Saunders:<\/b> Each one of the <i>GQ<\/i> trips was an eight to ten day thing.  So really, in a certain way, the form would follow the experience.  You know, you go to a place and you&#8217;re taking notes like crazy for eight days.  And you don&#8217;t really know what&#8217;s good or what&#8217;s interesting and then you come home and start writing them up.  And as certain things &#8212; you know how it is when you&#8217;re writing &#8212; sometimes, a certain thing would just lurch forward and it&#8217;s writable in some way you didn&#8217;t anticipate when you were there.  So in a way, it was kind of like taking X number of those things, the ones that would sort of step forward and allow themselves to be polished, and then kind of trust that that was happening for a reason.  <\/p>\n<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_283\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-173-2\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3?_=2\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\">http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\">Listen: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/?powerpress_pinw=173-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"segundo139.mp3\">Download<\/a> (Running Time: 45:36 &#8212; 41.7MB)<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>George Saunders is most recently the author of The Braindead Megaphone. Condition of Mr. Segundo: Feeling a little dead down there. Author: George Saunders Subjects Discussed: Writing fragmentary travelogue pieces, trying not to pre-process experiences, observational criteria, Dubai, responding to Ben Ehrenreich&#8217;s claim of &#8220;pulled punches,&#8221; journalistic integrity, on taking people to task, writing comprehensive [&hellip;]<\/p>\n<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_284\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-173-3\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3?_=3\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\">http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\">Listen: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/?powerpress_pinw=173-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/_mp3\/segundo139.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"segundo139.mp3\">Download<\/a> (Running Time: 45:36 &#8212; 41.7MB)<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1084],"tags":[16,70,71,68,69,9],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2435,"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions\/2435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.edrants.com\/segundo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}