George Saunders

As long as we take the timeframe down a bit, you know, for that 40 seconds after you've been nailed by a story, you're kind of a little bit different.

So I think what I probably believe in is, I think we discussed it, sort of the idea of the sacramental value, which is if you get your bell rung once, and in that moment of having your bell rung, you are more expansive or whatever I said, then the next time you're

not that, then you might just go, oh yeah, okay, I'm not fixed as this lower version of myself.

There's a way back, you know?

So in my calmer moments, I think my views of literature are more specific and more local.

And every now and then I get a little bit revved up.

Carried away.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You're exactly right.

As soon as you say this justifies art,

you've made it have to earn its dinner.

And some autocrat is gonna come in and say, oh, I don't think your art is doing what we want it to do.

So I agree with you.

And in the end, art answers to nobody.

I totally agree with that.

However, I think there are ways in which in our time,

We've sort of poo-pooed the power of literature and made it kind of a niche sort of quaint thing, even in our educational structure.

So I actually do believe, and this is, I'll reverse all my, but I do think, you know, imagine, okay, this is, imagine a world where fourth and fifth graders read a Chekhov story a week.

And you have to pick the stories, but there are some really beautiful ones that any fourth and fifth grader could get.

Then through that doorway, you teach them to unpack a text.