This book is everything. I have read books on death, on loss, on ghosts, on the supernatural. But I have never read anything with a thread connecting all of these.
Set in 1862, at the time of the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln's eleven-year-old son Willie dies after an illness. Willie doesn't realize he's dead. His soul is not ready to go to heaven yet along with the other ghosts who populate the cemetery and are stuck at that transitional phase. Lincoln goes back to the crypt and ‘visits’ his dead son. The ghosts watching this encounter start to talk one by one and we come to know a bit of their past. Each of them are halfway to their final abode because of something unfinished on earth. In the course of the novel we read about them too. So it's not a story about Lincoln alone. The ghosts, all wise and old and adults, do not deem it fit that a child is in this phase as them. They want him to be ‘pushed’ to heaven. And so they start having a conference.
That's it. Is that the whole novel…..which won the ManBooker prize of 2017?
Which parts of the novel are true? Ofcourse, lets have a conference too! Any good book is worth being discussed. Any weird, Pultizer winning book is definitely worth being discussed!!
A bit of background first. Any acclaimed novel will always have an inspiration as to why the author wanted to write it. Saunders, heard from verified newspaper accounts and from his wife’s cousin, that Lincoln was so grieved by his son’s early demise that he used to visit the cemetery many times. This story and it’s paranormal element stayed with Saunders for many years. When he decided to finally turn it into a novel, he did not want to give it a Gabriel Marquez’ magic realism style. That is why the newspaper sources are cited in it. Yet, the conversations of the ghosts were a figment of Saunders’ perception of the afterlife - heaven, hell, final resting place. So while you read, at various points there are short formats of writing and then there are cited paragraphs. Back and forth we go forever seeing the tender love of father and son and equally comical ‘chats’ of the ghosts.
"bardo" is the state of existence between two lives on earth, according to Tibetan tradition.
Writing style
Written as a play and in short format writing, some parts are excerpts of sources like newspapers, media etc.
Conversational
Cited sources extracts from supposed letters and reports of the 1860s.
First person narrative in parts.
What were the broad themes of the novel ?
Depression from loss - the aching heart of Lincoln is not totally buried in the conversations. We see him as a father, a helpless husband and a human being who only has his visits to the crypt as his outlet of grief. There are so many hints of human sadness throughout the novel - unrequited love, a priest’s moral uncertainty, a slave’s sad and unfair death, a couple’s fight.etc
Duty over family - the novel takes place during the war and Lincoln is torn away from his mourning time to take tough decisions for the country. The weight of his grief and of the casualties of war is heavy on him, but the fact that he considers both at the time of his loss is a statement to true presidency.
Afterlife -how poetically and funnily has the novel shown the state of afterlife. I, for one, have always been curious about the transience of life and the state of things in the other world. Even though the novel takes place in a single night, the conversations of the ghosts give a picture of the place.
Unfinished business/ goals of life - The tendrils which drop from heaven to ‘rope’ back a soul stuck in transition is a symbolic aspect of unfinished business of the ghosts. Each of them have a story to say, an appreciation of life they had which they denied or were unaware before.
Characters
Hans Vollman
A former printer who couldn't consummate his marriage to his wife. On the first night he dies unfortunately. His unfinished lusty excitement is why he is in the bardo. He walks around as a naked man with his desire clearly on his manhood! He is not just a lusty animal here though.
Along with his friends, he does everything in his ability to convince Willie that children aren’t meant to “tarry”. To make his point clearly, he even enters President Lincoln’s body hoping hat the president will be able to convince and instruct (as a father ) the child into leaving.
Roger Bevins III
A young man who slashed his wrists because he was heartbroken. Bevins is gay and has a preference for men. Just when he is about to die, with the blood already on the floor, realized that life is a wonderful gift that shouldn’t be just wasted on a mere lover. As such, his time in the bardo is a perception of the physical world’s beauty, riches, urban sense. Whenever he talks about the sensory pleasures of his past worldly existence, his body parts multiply, into thousands of body parts. Probably a metaphor that if you love the world too much, your senses are all over the place. For eg. even if we can’t visit Prague, our minds are there, our eyes seek its beauty even though we are physically in our home.
The Reverend Everly Thomas
Unlike his friends the Reverend has no misconceptions regarding the fact that he is dead. But he is not sure that ,if as a priest, he was morally upright. And so he is afraid of God’s judgement. He tries to run back and is stuck in the bardo.
The Reverend is the one who tries hard to save Willie, ultimately sacrificing himself and ascending from the bardo so that the child can make his way too.
Willie Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln’s son, who died of typhoid during the Civil War. He is in the bardo, where he resolves to wait for his father. He is ‘greedy’ to see his father and go back to the life he knew and to the comfort of his home. ‘Willie eventually enters his father while the president remembers his funeral, and this experience helps the boy realize that he is dead. Exiting Lincoln, he tells the Bardo-dwellers the truth about their situation, yelling, “Everyone, we are dead!” As a result, souls begin departing in great numbers.’
Abraham Lincoln’s son, who died of typhoid during the Civil War. He is in the bardo, where he resolves to wait for his father. He is ‘greedy’ to see his father and go back to the life he knew and to the comfort of his home. ‘Willie eventually enters his father while the president remembers his funeral, and this experience helps the boy realize that he is dead. Exiting Lincoln, he tells the Bardo-dwellers the truth about their situation, yelling, “Everyone, we are dead!” As a result, souls begin departing in great numbers.’
Abraham Lincoln
The president of the United States during the Civil War, and Willie Lincoln’s father.
He must find a way to move ahead bravely in his duty as the leader of the Union, though many of the citizens he represents are against his efforts to keep the South from seceding and free the country’s slaves.
As he fusses over his son, Lincoln wonders how he can possibly go on under the weight of his grief. Throughout the night—which he spends walking through the cemetery, returning to the crypt, and visiting the graveyard chapel—Lincoln periodically lets his mind turn to the War, and he is torn between the right step for the War and the grief which pulls him down.
Upon Willie’s final departure, Lincoln feels as if a weight has been lifted. With this sense of closure, he leaves the cemetery, newly resolved to lead the country and “freshly inclined” to fight for equality, a sentiment perhaps instilled in him by Thomas Havens (also a character), a former slave who jumps into his body and refuses to leave.
The president of the United States during the Civil War, and Willie Lincoln’s father.
He must find a way to move ahead bravely in his duty as the leader of the Union, though many of the citizens he represents are against his efforts to keep the South from seceding and free the country’s slaves.
As he fusses over his son, Lincoln wonders how he can possibly go on under the weight of his grief. Throughout the night—which he spends walking through the cemetery, returning to the crypt, and visiting the graveyard chapel—Lincoln periodically lets his mind turn to the War, and he is torn between the right step for the War and the grief which pulls him down.
Upon Willie’s final departure, Lincoln feels as if a weight has been lifted. With this sense of closure, he leaves the cemetery, newly resolved to lead the country and “freshly inclined” to fight for equality, a sentiment perhaps instilled in him by Thomas Havens (also a character), a former slave who jumps into his body and refuses to leave.
Elise Traynor (or “The Traynor Girl”)
A fourteen-year-old girl
A fourteen-year-old girl
Litzie Wright - A former slave
Lieutenant Cecil Stone -A racist lieutenant
Eddie Barron
A poor white man who exists in the Bardo with his wife, Betsy Barron. Eddie is vulgar and crass.
Eddie Barron
A poor white man who exists in the Bardo with his wife, Betsy Barron. Eddie is vulgar and crass.
The Three Bachelors
Three young men who never fell in love in the living world and are thus intent upon finding romance in the Bardo. The only Bardo-dwellers who can fly, the Bachelors detest commitment,
Others identified by their voices - bass/ British /female/ Vermont accent
Lincoln in the Bardo is not easy to read. It needs a bit of knowledge of American history, an appreciation of the supernatural aspects and opening your mind to a different genre of writing. This novel is listed as an ‘ experimental novel ‘ and rightly so. It is unique and makes you blink many times while you read. But then what's reading without pushing your boundaries?
Author - George Saunders
Noted awards - 2017 Man Booker Prize
Year of publishing- 2017
Genre - experimental, historical
My rating- 4/5
Books like this - The Black Cathedral by Marcial Gala , The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold , The Seventh Day by Yu Hua.
Three young men who never fell in love in the living world and are thus intent upon finding romance in the Bardo. The only Bardo-dwellers who can fly, the Bachelors detest commitment,
Others identified by their voices - bass/ British /female/ Vermont accent
Lincoln in the Bardo is not easy to read. It needs a bit of knowledge of American history, an appreciation of the supernatural aspects and opening your mind to a different genre of writing. This novel is listed as an ‘ experimental novel ‘ and rightly so. It is unique and makes you blink many times while you read. But then what's reading without pushing your boundaries?
Author - George Saunders
Noted awards - 2017 Man Booker Prize
Year of publishing- 2017
Genre - experimental, historical
My rating- 4/5
Books like this - The Black Cathedral by Marcial Gala , The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold , The Seventh Day by Yu Hua.
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