George Saunders

Infinite.

I was kind of thinking I'd gotten the message that it wasn't the year for an American.

And so I was just there for the party.

And then as the words Lincoln and the Bardo came across the room, I got a jolt.

You know, it was really unforgettable.

It was one of the best nights of my life.

I had first become aware of the source material some 20 years before, and it just scared the heck out of me because it was a little more earnest than I was used to doing.

I thought, oh, that's a good book for somebody to write.

Literally driving past a cemetery in D.C.

where Lincoln's son was buried.

Exactly.

Yeah.

So we were driving by this Oak Hill Cemetery and my wife's cousin just casually pointed up and said, oh, that's the crypt where Willie Lincoln was.

And I said, who's Willie Lincoln?

I didn't know.

It's in the historical record that Lincoln apparently did visit the crypt at night alone, which just kind of blew my mind.

So over the next 20 years, I was reading about it just as an amateur historian.

And then over that time, I guess I just got enough confidence to think, all right, I can try to be a little more earnest and a little more historical.

And so at 55 or so, I thought, you know...

If I don't do this now, I'm never going to do it.