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Pastoralia

George Saunders

4.11 · Rating details · 16,814 ratings · 1,376 reviews

With this new collection, George Saunders takes us even further into the shocking, uproarious and oddly familiar landscape of his imagination.

The stories in Pastoralia are set in a slightly skewed version of America, where elements of contemporary life have been merged, twisted, and amplified, casting their absurdity-and our humanity-in a startling new light. Whether he wr ...more

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Paperback, 188 pages

Published September 8th 2001 by Bloomsbury Publishing (first published May 8th 2000)

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Jun 18, 2008 Rob rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommended to Rob by: Amy by way of Sarah

Shelves: ambulothanatophobia, bedside, own, collection, recommended, 2010, 2008

Imagine for a moment that you go into the up-scale liquor store around the block that is celebrated city-wide for its fabulous wine selection. You're a bit of a novice when it comes to wine and are a little embarrassed to be here because your wallet is that ballistic nylon stuff and not something truly exotic like alligator skin and with that in mind you decide not to ask the sommelier for any help. You browse around the store looking for a bottle of something called David Foster Wallace that wa Imagine for a moment that you go into the up-scale liquor store around the block that is celebrated city-wide for its fabulous wine selection. You're a bit of a novice when it comes to wine and are a little embarrassed to be here because your wallet is that ballistic nylon stuff and not something truly exotic like alligator skin and with that in mind you decide not to ask the sommelier for any help. You browse around the store looking for a bottle of something called David Foster Wallace that was recommended to you by your friend with the alligator skin wallet. You manage to find the bottle of DFW and admire the fancy bottle with its fancy label and its curlicues and footnotes and excellent leading. The bottle seems really heavy and big and everyone has told you how excellent it is. So you decide to try it but when you actually get to the counter you discover that you've picked up a bottle of something called George Saunders by mistake. The George Saunders bottle isn't as big or as fancy as the DFW and in fact it looks a little bit like a down-market or off-label knock-off of the vintage DFW but at the same time you believe that there is maybe something authentic and distinct about it anyway. The sommelier gives you a funny look as he rings you up but you don't say anything because you don't want to look stupid in front of him and anyway you're probably just being self-conscious about the whole thing like the time you had a glass of Pynchon at your friend's house and you said that it was a good Vonnegut and everyone laughed and your friend explained that the Vonnegut has a much sharper finish and you'll notice how the Pynchon seems to hang around in your mouth so much longer but he could see how you might make that mistake. And you try to think about that night on your drive home because it's that same friend with the alligator skin wallet that is coming over for dinner tonight with his wife and you remember how he plays golf with your boss and this is an important event to get right. So that night before the main course you pour everyone's glass in the kitchen so that no one will see the bottle and the secret will be safe with you. And your wife brings out the entree and you bring out the wine and everyone digs in and finds it delicious. Your friend with the alligator skin wallet remarks on how delicious the wine is and did you have any trouble finding the David Foster Wallace at the store? And was the sommelier there helpful? And what year did he recommend because this is really really quite good? And you smile and try to decide whether or not to say anything because you know that you'll need to say something but how are you going to make up something plausible on the spot. But then your wife blurts out that it's really a George Saunders and don't you just love it? Because she slurped down her glass of George Saunders and it was her third of the night anyway because she and your friend's wife managed to down a whole bottle of David Sedaris as a warm-up but they both agreed it was too dry for them even though you and your friend think that it's the perfect middle-of-the-week wine. For a moment you're paralyzed with fear because this was your shot, your chance to show off and really shine and display your competence and you blew it because you were too chicken shit to tell the sommelier at the counter that you picked up the wrong bottle by mistake. But instead your friend raises an eyebrow and says that it's wonderful, just delightful, and he'd never tried it before and though maybe it's not as dry as the DFW, does it ever have a great finish and it's just perfect for a dinner party, isn't it? ...more

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Mar 17, 2019 Vit Babenco rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

“Bread and circuses,” ancients used to say… And George Saunders smartly turns the art of modern entertainment into an effervescent absurdist comedy.
Pastoralia is some sort of luna park or freak show established to educate and amuse the public. The protagonist works there impersonating a caveman.
And the ways the society is being entertained tell everything about society as such too…

“Remember I told you about Chief Joseph, who never stopped walking? You’re like him. My brave little warrior. Bibby,

“Remember I told you about Chief Joseph, who never stopped walking? You’re like him. My brave little warrior. Bibby, give him a juice box. Also he’s got some goo-goo coming out of his nosehole.”
“Jesus Christ,” Janet mumbles.
I give her my sternest look.
“What was that?” says the dad. “I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you. What did you just say?”
“Nothing,” Janet says. “I didn’t say nothing.”
“I heard you very clearly,” says the dad. “You said Jesus Christ. You said Jesus Christ because of what I said about the goo-goo in my son’s nosehole. Well, first of all, I’m sorry if you find a little boy’s nosehole goo-goo sickening, it’s perfectly normal, if you had a kid of your own you’d know that, and second of all, since when do cavepeople speak English and know who Jesus Christ is? Didn’t the cavepeople predate Christ, if I’m not mistaken?”
“Of course they did,” the mom says from outside. “We just came from Christ. Days of Christ. And we’re going backwards. Towards the exit.”
“Look, pal, I got a kid,” says Janet. “I seen plenty of snot. I just never called it goo-goo. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Bibby, get this,” the dad says. “Parenting advice from the cavelady. The cavelady apparently has some strong opinions on booger nomenclature. For this I paid eighty bucks? If I want somebody badly dressed to give me a bunch of lip I can go to your mother’s house.”
“Very funny,” says the mom.
“I meant it funny,” says the dad.
“I was a good mom,” Janet says. “My kid is as good as anybody’s kid.”
“Hey, share it with us,” says the dad.
“Even if he is in jail,” says Janet.
“Bibby, get this,” says the dad. “The cavelady’s kid is in jail.”
“Don’t you even make fun of my kid, you little suckass,” says Janet.
“The cavelady just called you a suckass,” says the mom.

Winky is an acrid fable of religion and hatred…

From out of his suit he pulled a bowl and a box of oatmeal, and filled the bowl with the oatmeal and held the bowl up.
“Simple, nourishing, inexpensive,” he said. “This represents your soul in its pure state. Your soul on the day you were born. You were perfect. You were happy. You were good.

Sea Oak is a blasphemously weird tale of an unholy resurrection.
The Barber’s Unhappiness is a story of a dork dreaming to have a kiss of his life…

In the mirror was a skeletal mask of blue and purple and pink that the barber knew was his face but couldn’t quite believe was his face, because in the past his face had always risen to the occasion. In the past his face could always be counted on to amount to more than the sum of its parts when he smiled winningly, but now when he smiled winningly he looked like a corpse trying to appear cheerful in a wind tunnel. His eyes bulged, his lips were thin, his forehead wrinkles were deep as sticklines in mud.

Misfits and losers – they have a special niche reserved for them in this world. ...more

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Nov 29, 2011 Paquita Maria Sanchez rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: literature, usa

I think that if the arrangement of this collection had been reversed I would be singing a different tune right now, but as it stands I am a bit torn regarding rating this thing. Man, these stories are well-written. Saunders is darkly witty, and clearly his heart is in the right place. His main point of contention with the modern world is the reckless hammer of Capitalism, an easy target to be sure, but that is arguably all the more reason to call it into question. The injuries that it inflicts a I think that if the arrangement of this collection had been reversed I would be singing a different tune right now, but as it stands I am a bit torn regarding rating this thing. Man, these stories are well-written. Saunders is darkly witty, and clearly his heart is in the right place. His main point of contention with the modern world is the reckless hammer of Capitalism, an easy target to be sure, but that is arguably all the more reason to call it into question. The injuries that it inflicts are almost universally felt.

In Pastoralia, Saunders has created a series of near-future worlds sprinkled with Dystopian and Horror elements, in which the voyeuristic tendencies and indiscriminately exploitative undercurrents of modern society are heightened in such a way that they become grossly comical. The name of the game is satire, and he pulls out all the stops while driving home just how pathetically isolating, spirit-breaking, and hedon-making the process of staying above water in today's Western World has become for its majority. Saunders has the panache of a Gilliam, Burgess, or Huxley, most effectively executed in the phenomenal title story which composes the first half of the book. However, his sardonic message eventually gets to feeling a bit redundant, and the stories seem to grow weaker and weaker as you move forward. For one, he is not really in the habit of crafting likeable characters. This is not generally a deal-breaker for me (if you know me on gr, that should be clear enough), but it begins to feel short-sighted after a while. Then again, I suppose that if you continuously grind a person down, there eventually won't be much left other than his or her most vile, base desires and tendencies. Enter George Saunders...

I dunno; maybe the novella Pastoralia just outshines the rest of the stories by far too many watts. Still, the collection is a fast and surprisingly breezy read for its dark content. I would strongly recommend Saunders to anyone with a stomach of steel and the heart of a cynic. Or anyway, that's me, and I thought this was pretty damn good indeed.

*Just imagine a fourth star, but its bulb is perpetually burning out in that way that makes it erratically flicker on and off. Deal? ...more

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Jan 08, 2013 Madeleine rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: blogophilia, head-in-the-clouds-nose-in-a-book, our-libeary, 2013

Based on the opinions of people with excellent taste in books, I knew I was in for something good when I grabbed Pastoralia from the shelf the other day. I didn't know what to expect beyond that but it sure wasn't the sardonic giggles this collection gave me. Does everyone find their first foray into Saunders's mind this darkly endearing? 'Cause.... lemme tell you, you all led me somewhere I can't wait to revisit.

There is something off about the worlds Saunders creates. Not off-the-charts unbeli Based on the opinions of people with excellent taste in books, I knew I was in for something good when I grabbed Pastoralia from the shelf the other day. I didn't know what to expect beyond that but it sure wasn't the sardonic giggles this collection gave me. Does everyone find their first foray into Saunders's mind this darkly endearing? 'Cause.... lemme tell you, you all led me somewhere I can't wait to revisit.

There is something off about the worlds Saunders creates. Not off-the-charts unbelievably weird (view spoiler) but there's this vertiginous element to them that makes being jarred from such a mercilessly absorbing reading experience by, say, the unwelcome intrusion of your job (whyyyyyyy do you people keep assuming I'm here to proofread your ineptitude when I'm so clearly lost in something that is infinitely more rewarding than your refusals to grasp the nuances of proper comma usage and pica distances WHYYYY?) a little disorienting upon reentry. I encountered a thing that doesn't happen often enough while reading this short-story collection: I forgot I was reading because I was so engrossed in the tales Saunders was weaving. Picturing the story that was taking shape right in front of me was equal parts riveting and really quite disturbing. Kind of like the clown car on fire that you'll snap photos of as you pass the gruesome scene but fuck no you're not stopping to help because it's a car full of clowns and everyone knows that clowns are evil but then the sadness of the whole thing hits you when you post the picture (along with an appropriately glib comment) on Twitter later but you're still snickering about the image for days.

And then there is something distinctly, deliciously Vonnegut-flavored here, too, but Saunders even makes that all his own. While Vonnegut's humor seemed like that of a cranky but avuncular relative whose lessons seem harsh at the time but are driven by an overriding love and a desire to emphasize the necessity of self-improvement, who softens the blow of reality with a satirical wit, Saunders seems more interested in pointing out the flaws so they can be turned into a long-running joke that derives its comedy from the dichotomy between a thing's inherent potential for dark humor and the deadpan subtlety in observing it from such an angle. It's realizing the hopelessness of a situation and having a good laugh at its expense because, otherwise, the void wins and everything is rendered too meaningless to face just one more insignificant day.

Pastoralia, ultimately, is a collection of stories that proves if you're taking life too seriously, you're doing it all wrong. Tragedy is just comedy that tests your resolve to arrive at the punchline. ...more

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Jun 25, 2010 Joshua Nomen-Mutatio rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: short-stories, fiction

Like other folks I know and respect on Goodreads, I loved the opening, titular story but found the rest of the book to be middling. Like, disappointingly, forgettably, middling. I know the stories were kinda weird and stuff but for the life of me I can barely even remember what they were about or even distinguish them from each other. I don't think I've ever felt so uneven about a short story collection. It's so strange that it makes me curious enough to give them a reread at some point, despite Like other folks I know and respect on Goodreads, I loved the opening, titular story but found the rest of the book to be middling. Like, disappointingly, forgettably, middling. I know the stories were kinda weird and stuff but for the life of me I can barely even remember what they were about or even distinguish them from each other. I don't think I've ever felt so uneven about a short story collection. It's so strange that it makes me curious enough to give them a reread at some point, despite the less than flattering description I've just given. I feel like I must have read them incorrectly somehow, since the opening story was so engaging and fun, which is where the ~~four~~ three stars come from.

I love books and films that utilize facades and museum-like tableaux and the story "Pastoralia" does this with great effect. This quality plus the cover image of my copy of this book has established itself so firmly in my mind that when I see things like fake trees indoors or big landscape/nature murals (think of the paintings placed around City Hall on the TV show Parks and Recreation) that I think of them as being "Saunders-like" in the instant-association segment of my brain. I haven't yet totally over-analyzed what my attraction to certain uses of facades and replicas is all about yet (though there's been a more extended musing on this elsewhere) but I guess it might just have something to do with fond childhood memories of visiting museums and being enthralled by the displays of animals and humans, made to be lifelike but frozen into place behind glass. I still experience a powerful mix of sentimentality with a healthy dose of Ineffability when I revisit the Milwaukee Public Museum, a place I've wandered around many times over the years, each time worrying that I'll drain the magic of the childhood memories on this visit, but each time managing to still feel wrapped in an almost mystical euphoria and nostalgia.

Saunders tale is surreal and dark and playful and some of its main devices called this feeling up from the inner depths.

This is still the only Saunders I've read. I assumed his work would be so up my alley that I ordered three of his short story collections last year, had my weirdly uneven experience with this one and haven't exactly felt compelled to make the others a priority yet. I still have a sense that I'll like more of his work, but this experience was just such a strange disappointment in a way I can't really explain at all. At least I have a case to solve now, so I'll be back to Saundersville to snoop around for clues and answers later. ...more

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Dec 09, 2016 Peter Boyle rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: short-stories

''His childhood dreams had been so bright, he had hoped for so much, it couldn't be true that he was a nobody.''

These stories, wacky as they may be, don't paint a very flattering portrait of modern life. A father takes a job as a grunting caveman at a run-down theme park in order to pay his son's exorbitant medical bills. A male stripper earns a meagre wage to support his ungrateful family, who spend their day watching reality TV like How My Child Died Violently and The Worst That Could Happen, ...more

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Mar 16, 2008 Heidi Mckye rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Any person who does not deeply love George Saunders is not allowed to be my friend. Even a little bit.

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Feb 24, 2017 Julie rated it really liked it

Almost two decades before George Saunders published the everybody's-talking-about-it book, Lincoln in the Bardo, he published Pastoralia.

Pastoralia is a collection of six short stories, and they are some of the weirdest, bleakest, and most well-written ones I've ever encountered.

As I worked through (struggled through) each one of them, I kept asking myself, "Are these dystopian?" I tend to think of "dystopian" as futuristic, or containing more futuristic elements, of government-imposed rations, Almost two decades before George Saunders published the everybody's-talking-about-it book, Lincoln in the Bardo, he published Pastoralia.

Pastoralia is a collection of six short stories, and they are some of the weirdest, bleakest, and most well-written ones I've ever encountered.

As I worked through (struggled through) each one of them, I kept asking myself, "Are these dystopian?" I tend to think of "dystopian" as futuristic, or containing more futuristic elements, of government-imposed rations, restrictions, etc, and these stories are not like that. However, when I looked up the actual definition of the adjective "dystopian," this is what I found: "relating to or denoting an imagined place or state in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmentally degraded one."

Okay. So, yes, they're dystopian.

The first one, Pastoralia, the lead story of the collection, is the longest and the weirdest. I think his editor made a mistake placing this in the first position. I found the story beyond quirky and unrelatable, and I would have been done with the entire collection after this weird tale, had I not told my sister I would read this book.

The second, third and fourth stories were so dark and depressing, I wished I'd had a cup of Kool-Aid and a cyanide capsule to go along with the book. Reading about the people in these stories is like having a nightmare in which a former reality-tv host is the president of the most powerful country in the world, and waking up to discover it's true.

In the fifth and sixth stories, I finally got to sit back a little and think, "Damn, Mr. Saunders, when you're not depressing the hell out of me, you can be funny and a little bit romantic, too. It made me hopeful to read Lincoln in the Bardo.

But, of course, the last sentence of the collection left me sucker-punched in the gut. Who is this guy?

I'm hesitant to recommend this, unless you're a reader who likes to smack your shoulders up against the edge, or if good writing supercedes all else for you.

Four stars for excellent writing, originality and memorable, though disturbing perspectives on humanity. . . that I hope, despite our current despair, are not true. ...more

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Jan 10, 2019 Marchpane rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: short-stories, 19-20-19

The stories in Pastoralia were pretty great. Saunders definitely has a schtick here – sad-sack characters worn down by the unfairness of life in (mostly) comedic situations – but as there’s just six stories, it doesn’t get a chance to wear thin. The satire is goofy yet melancholic and it never feels mean. Such a short book though, reading it all in one go means it’s over too soon.

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May 27, 2008 Mykle rated it liked it

Recommends it for: Wal-Mart employees contemplating suicide

Shelves: can-t-decide

I finished this last night when I couldn't sleep ... I adore George Saunders in small doses, he is so very funny and has such an ear for the pathos of our sad American industrial poverty.

But there's a kind of story that he writes over and over again ... not exactly the same story but the same kind of story. A story about a hilariously awful job, a hilariously difficult life and a sad, pathetic person stuck within. I don't even object to the repetition, but when I read it all back to back the re ...more

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May 21, 2017 britt_brooke rated it really liked it

Shelves: short-stories-essays

This collection was totally up my alley. Saunders' writing kind of reminds me of Vonnegut, who I later realized was one of his inspirations. I was not a fan of Lincoln in the Bardo, but I'm so happy I gave his short stories a chance. Can't wait to read more of his work!

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Nov 03, 2010 MJ Nicholls rated it it was ok

Shelves: short-stories, merkins

‘Pastoralia’ (the opening story) shows what Saunders can do. How his prose can be funny and surreal and warm and satirical and touching. Unfortunately, having done this, the other stories in this collection seem like shticky filler. ‘Winky’ was another strong piece, but I found myself snoozing through ‘Sea Oak’ which does a surrealist dance in a ra-ra skirt, and getting annoyed by his rhythms in ‘The Barber’s Unhappiness.’ His repetition, his rambling passages of superfluous detail, how he goes ...more

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May 14, 2016 Jon rated it really liked it

This is the second collection of Saunder’s short stories I’ve read and Pastorlia is cut from the same cloth as the first. Think of the cartoon strip, The Far Side, in story form and you’ll get the idea of what his writing is like. His stories are weird and funny, with a pronounced absurdist edge to them. Saunders often populates his stories with a menagerie of misfits who are life’s punching bags. While their struggles are played for laughs, there is, at times, an underlying pathos to his charac This is the second collection of Saunder’s short stories I’ve read and Pastorlia is cut from the same cloth as the first. Think of the cartoon strip, The Far Side, in story form and you’ll get the idea of what his writing is like. His stories are weird and funny, with a pronounced absurdist edge to them. Saunders often populates his stories with a menagerie of misfits who are life’s punching bags. While their struggles are played for laughs, there is, at times, an underlying pathos to his character’s determined efforts to remain optimistic in the face of a cosmos equally determined to give them metaphorical wedgies. In the end, however, life usually grinds them down and even death doesn’t bring relief:

“We bury her at St. Leo’s, on the hill up near BastCo. Her part of the graveyard’s pretty plain. No angels, no little rock houses, no flowers, just a bunch of flat stones like parking bumpers and here and there a Styrofoam cup. Father Brian says a prayer and then one of us is supposed to talk. But what’s there to say? She never had a life. Never married, no kids, work, work, work.

Sometimes she comes to me in dreams. She never looks good. Sometimes she’s wearing a dirty smock. Once she had on handcuffs. Once she was naked and dirty and this mean cat was clawing it’s way up her front. But every time it’s the same thing.

“Some people get everything and I got nothing,” she says. “Why? Why did that happen?”

Every time I say I don’t know.

And I don’t”

Sauders is a savage satirist and takes careful aim at American society. One of his frequent motifs is the seedy amusement park as a microcosm for America. The title story is yet another foray into that theme. Pastorlia is a historical amusement park where living people play act in dioramas of the past. As a threatened restructuring looms, the story becomes a Dilbert-like skewering of corporate culture:

“And in terms of mass firings, relax, none are forthcoming, truly, and furthermore, if they were, what you’d want to ask yourself is: Am I Thinking Positive/Saying Positive? Am I giving it all I’ve got? Am I doing even the slightest thing wrong? But not to worry. Those of you who have no need to be worried should not in the least be worried. As for those who should be worried, it’s a little late to start worrying now, you should have started months ago, when it could’ve done you some good, because at this point, what’s decided is decided, or would have been decided, if those false rumors we are denying, the rumors about the firings which would be starting this week if they were slated to begin, were true, which we have just told you, they aren’t”

I liked the book, but it’s not for everyone. The stories are often freakish and bizarre, filled with satire sharp enough to draw blood and a bleak view of American society. Saunders does have a unique voice and an original style, but I have to admit I did find his 1st book, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, to be somewhat repetitive, largely due to four of the stories being set in amusement parks. There’s a little more variation in setting and themes in this collection and even a couple of stories that could be considered to have “happy endings” or what passes for a happy ending in Saunder’s world view.
...more

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Apr 08, 2015 TK421 rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: short-stories

This collection is easily the best collection of stories I have had the pleasure to ever read. Dark. Cynical. Horrific. And, yet, these stories possess a level of truth in each one that resonates long after the story ends. Simply put: George Saunders is brilliant.

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Jan 16, 2013 Jason Pettus rated it it was amazing

Shelves: postmodernism, stories, dark, personal-favorite, funny, hipster, smart-nerdy, alt-history

(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)

I had the pleasure of getting to talk with legendary author George Saunders for CCLaP's podcast last week, a rare treat given how in demand he is on this latest tour even among the major media; but that meant I had to do some serious cramming in the few weeks leading up to our talk, in that (I guiltily con ...more

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Feb 02, 2017 Mattia Ravasi rated it liked it

Video review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yh04b...
Featured in my Top 5 George Saunders Books: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Bc7g...

The opening novella is exquisite and there are a few very strong pieces in here, (and it's not like the others suck or anything really), but overall there's a certain redundancy in themes and characters through the collection that damages the overall effect.
I'd suggest reading it one story at a time every once in a while, rather than in a single / a few sittin ...more

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Apr 17, 2017 Axolotl added it

This might just be the epitome of-what Justin Isis refers to as "White Dad Fiction", though I'm not sure if this is precisely the sort of thing he had in mind with that designation. The stories in Pastoralia, while bookended with stories featuring white dads as protagonists (at least I think they're white; their skin tone is never mentioned), are certainly weirder than most of what passes for "weird fiction" from what I've read. The stories are heavy on social satire and existential queasy uneas This might just be the epitome of-what Justin Isis refers to as "White Dad Fiction", though I'm not sure if this is precisely the sort of thing he had in mind with that designation. The stories in Pastoralia, while bookended with stories featuring white dads as protagonists (at least I think they're white; their skin tone is never mentioned), are certainly weirder than most of what passes for "weird fiction" from what I've read. The stories are heavy on social satire and existential queasy uneasiness, both of which are in general pluses for me and I found myself sporting a wry smile, though notably never wood, at several moments during the proceedings. I thought the title story about the salary man paid to be a caveman and trying his level-best to be the best gosh-darned caveman he can be, all while performing a precarious balancing act with faux-prehistoric office politics and spectacularly failing to maintain a healthy "work-life balance", and is really about how we are all chipped away at and ground down by the seemingly inescapable clutches of capitalism, was well done. This story is the sort of what is conjured in my mind by the title of another of Saunders's stories/collections: "Civilwarlad in Bad Decline", so I'm pretty keen on finding out if there is any intextuality going on between these stories or not, when I get to it.
Very interesting...in many ways it could be easy be titled "The Further Adventures of Ignatious J. Reilly", with only minor confusion ensuing, as in many of these stories Saunders has what I perceive to be a distinctly Tooleian vibe. Saunders is always entertaining and humorous even when acknowledging subjects not usually mentioning in the same sentence as "entertaining and humorous". One example of this is that "The End of FIRPO in the World" might be the most sobering story about children and the internalisation of neglect and abuse ever written--it is all the more powerful for not shying away from the inherent absurdity of "being anything at all" here on Earth. Saunders is many things but he is, thankfully, never glib. ...more

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Dec 01, 2008 Will rated it it was ok

Shelves: short-story

Good grief. After reading Civilwarland in Bad Decline, I thought, "It might be a hokey throwback to Vonnegut, but by Samuel Clemens' ghost, George has got something here..." Of course, after reading Pastoralia, I have become strangely skeptical of his growth as an author.

Sure, what Saunders has produced is worthy of attention, but is he a one-trick pony? I want to see him change his style a bit between books. Even in In Persuasion Nation, Saunders sounds like a copy of himself--albeit one who h ...more

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Jan 08, 2017 Igrowastreesgrow rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: short-story, free, 2017

A very entertaining short story.

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Nov 04, 2008 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: short-stories, read08

Terrific, even better than CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, but with similar themes. I shared the unanswered question at the end of Sea Oak, for sure. Don't crap in my oatmeal, okay?

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Feb 24, 2013 Petergiaquinta rated it liked it · review of another edition

A year ago I'd never heard of George Saunders, and now I've got two of his short stories collections under my belt.

Reading Pastoralia I can see the groundwork being laid for the better Tenth of December. There's the awful theme park with its put-upon employees; there's the smarmy, dickbag bosses, the memos from management, the collection of losers who are forced to choose between a terrible job and their human decency; there's the misfits and retards and losers and geeks and qweebs and losers an A year ago I'd never heard of George Saunders, and now I've got two of his short stories collections under my belt.

Reading Pastoralia I can see the groundwork being laid for the better Tenth of December. There's the awful theme park with its put-upon employees; there's the smarmy, dickbag bosses, the memos from management, the collection of losers who are forced to choose between a terrible job and their human decency; there's the misfits and retards and losers and geeks and qweebs and losers and retards and fat-ass losers and retards; there's the lower-middle class fathers wracked with self-doubt and losers and retards filled with self-delusion that makes their lives just barely livable. There's the shifting perspective and the strange melange of genre just when you aren't expecting it. And did I mention the losers and retards? There are more losers and retards in a collection of short stories by George Saunders than you can shake a stick at.

There's even a rescue attempt by one of these losers in the final story...it makes me wonder if after the end of "The Falls" the two young girls in the capsized canoe are going to have to pull Morse's drowning fat pimply ass out of the river he's gone into to save them.

My personal favorite? It's not the title story of minimum-wage Paleolithic re-enactors forced to endure the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes; it's "The Barber's Unhappiness" and its pathetic title character missing the toes on one foot who lives with his mother and can't even exert control over his own pathetic fantasies which turn against him as he sits outside his crappy shop ogling the neighborhood women walking past. He meets the girl of his dreams in traffic school. (Maybe she wanted someone old enough to really appreciate her, who didn't come too quickly and owned his own business and knew how to pick up after himself. He hoped she was a very strict religious virgin who'd never even had a roll in the hay. Not that he hoped she was frigid. He hoped she was the kind of strict religious virgin who, once married, would let it all hang out, and when not letting it all hang out would move with quiet dignity in conservative clothes so that no one would suspect how completely and totally she could let it all hang out when she chose to, and that she came from a poor family and could therefore really appreciate the hard work that went into running a small business, and maybe even had some accounting experience and could help with the books.) But instead he can't really appreciate her and finds once his traffic-school beauty stands up that "her body seemed scaled to a head twice the size of the one she had." He felt a little miffed at her for having misled him and a little miffed at himself for having ogled such a fatty.

As you might guess, happy endings don't abound here...

In Tenth of December Saunders wields a tighter control over his craft, his language and characters, and the growth in that craft over the ten-plus years between the two collections is evident. However, one thing that bothered me about December is the way the voices of all the different characters kind of run together into a single voice. And that shouldn't be the case if you ask me. Here in Pastoralia the voices sound quite different; the voice of the traffic-school instructor is clearly not that of the miserable barber, and the voice of the delusional Cummings in "The Falls" is markedly different from that of Morse. I don't know why Saunders didn't work harder at establishing his different characters' voices in December, but the only time they really shift is under the influence of designer pharmaceuticals.

I'm looking forward to reading more Saunders; the success of Tenth of December translates to his earlier books being readily available at area bookstores, and that's not a bad thing. ...more

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Feb 19, 2017 Anita Pomerantz rated it liked it

6 stories, one 5 star, two 4 stars, two 3 stars, and one 2 star = 3.5. I'm rounding to a three despite my LOVE for this author. One of the issues is the stories appeared in the order of best to worst (in my opinion), so that left you feeling a little bereft at the end instead of elated. Had the order been reversed, I probably would have gone with 4 stars.

Saunders' stories make fun of the mundane in very creative ways, and I really enjoy his weird characters. But you can tell this was his first b ...more

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Jan 14, 2018 Leo Robertson rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Worth it for the title story alone. It had quotes I swear I'd heard from the mouths of my own managers last week, which hit my ear wrong for reasons this story helped me to understand. A perfect marriage of incomplete real-life observations brought to the table of fiction for illumination. I am improved as a human.

George Saunders: putting the rest of us to shame since he got good.

Briefly has you believing that the world is some big crazy distraction-machine filled with squishy little compassion ...more

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Oct 26, 2018 Anthony Panegyres rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: spec-fic, collection, fiction, favourites

A fine collection. Pastoralia is stylistically more ambitious than CivilWarLand in Bad Decline with lengthy ‘run-on’ sentences throughout. The satirical themes and arcs, however, are very similar as Saunders again explores those on the societal fringe; those slightly confused by the world’s madness and needing a little assurance. While celebrating humanity, Saunders also condemns the lunacy of the American psyche and landscape by lampooning, yet also sentimentalising, what some may consider the ...more

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Sep 08, 2007 Leftbanker rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: humor

Comic Genius

The only American publication I still receive here in Spain is The New Yorker. It gets here a little late so you'll have to excuse the late news. Probably my favorite funny person in the world, George Saunders, has a story in the May 28 issue. Not to spoil this mess of a story for you but I found this part laugh-out-loud funny. Why did I find it laugh-out-loud funny? It just is.

But if no one took the pup he’d do it. He’d have to. Because his feeling was, when you said you were going Comic Genius

The only American publication I still receive here in Spain is The New Yorker. It gets here a little late so you'll have to excuse the late news. Probably my favorite funny person in the world, George Saunders, has a story in the May 28 issue. Not to spoil this mess of a story for you but I found this part laugh-out-loud funny. Why did I find it laugh-out-loud funny? It just is.

But if no one took the pup he’d do it. He’d have to. Because his feeling was, when you said you were going to do a thing and didn’t do it, that was how kids got into drugs.

I will probably steal this line, not in print but in conversation. When I do I doubt that I will get a laugh, just a blank stare and a "I think I have to go now."

I sent this out last year as a bulk email so I'll stick it in here, too. This is one of the funniest fucking things that I have ever read. It's taken from a George Saunders story in Pastoralia called The Barber's Unhappiness. A group of people are forced to take a remedial driver's education course for speeding violations. The instructor gives this tortured discourse on safety:

"What I was saying was that, our aim is, we're going to be looking at some things or aspects, in terms of driving? Meaning safety, meaning, is speeding something we do in a vacuum, or could it involve a pedestrian or fatality or a family out for a fun drive, and then here you come, speeding, with safety or destiny of that family not held firmly in your mind, and what happens next? Who knows?"

"A crash?" said someone.

"An accident?" said someone else.

"Crash or accident both could," said the instructor. "Either one might or may. Because I've seen, in my CPR role, as a paramedic, when many times, and I'm sorry if you find this gross or too much, I've had to sit in our rescue vehicle with a cut-off arm or hand, even of a kid, a really small arm or even limb, just weeping as if I hadn't been thoroughly trained, as I know none of you have, but I have, and why was I holding that small arm or limb and bawling? Because of someone like you yourselves, good people, I know you are, I'm not saying that, but you decided what? What did you decide? Or they. That person who cut off that kid's arm I was carrying that day I was just saying."

No one knew.

"They decide to speed is what you did," said the instructor sadly, with pity for both the armless child and the otherwise good people who on that fateful day had decided to speed, and now sat before him, lives ruined.

"I didn't hit nobody," said a girl in a T-shirt that said Buggin'. "Cop just stopped me."

Why is this funny? Don't know, just is. ...more

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Jul 13, 2015 Andrew added it

Shelves: 2000s-american-fiction, american-fiction, american-short-stories

As much as I hear about Saunders' role as an excoriating satirist of our late-capitalist culture, I'm still not fully convinced. It's not that he's a bad writer-- on the contrary, I was generally impressed with the quality of both his prose and dialogue. And his conceits were, at the very least, amusing, and often rather delightful. But somehow, I keep finding that he's good, not great. And as far as contemporary satire goes, I find Gary Shteyngart far more interesting, probably because he write ...more

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Oct 10, 2011 Eric T. Voigt rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: fall-eleven

When is Apple.com going to stop reminding me Steve Jobs is dead? Certain stories in this collection are favorites. "Sea Oak," which I'd started in some sci-fi collection called "Feeling Very Strange," is almost my favorite Saunders story now, now that I've finished it, although "CommComm" may be my absolute favorite ever, yet, and "The Barber's Unhappiness" was borderline incredible. All were great. I'm just sayin', it wasn't AS full of toppest of top as, say, "CivilWarLand..." even if it was ye ...more

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Dec 27, 2014 Thomas rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: read-for-college

3.5 stars

"Sea Oak" by George Saunders could have a trigger warning for every page. The piece revels in its awfulness, its hilarity, its satiric prose and its off-putting analysis of poverty in America. The story contains a male stripper whose aunt comes back from the dead, and it incorporates quite a few witty lines that make you want to laugh and cringe and take a shower all at the same time. Recommended to those who want a short story with punch and themes about consumerism, and I would warn t ...more

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Jun 03, 2016 Thekelburrows rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

George Saunders is not an earth human.

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May 07, 2019 Josh rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Probably 4.5 but I’m rounding up to 5 because Saunders is awesome and more people should read him.

Overall I would describe this as the funniest Saunders collection I’ve read. On the inside cover he’s given accolades comparing him to every humorous person to pick up a pen from Groening to Pynchon. If that’s the spectrum I put up closer to Groening than Pynchon or Crumb...though his use of the grotesque is reminiscent of Crumb or maybe Pekar. I’m too lazy to look it up, but I think this is one of Probably 4.5 but I’m rounding up to 5 because Saunders is awesome and more people should read him.

Overall I would describe this as the funniest Saunders collection I’ve read. On the inside cover he’s given accolades comparing him to every humorous person to pick up a pen from Groening to Pynchon. If that’s the spectrum I put up closer to Groening than Pynchon or Crumb...though his use of the grotesque is reminiscent of Crumb or maybe Pekar. I’m too lazy to look it up, but I think this is one of his earlier collections as well because Civilwarland and Tenth of December both feel more refined and play more with narrative voice. They’re also a hell of a lot darker, which I guess given the state of the world...
Anyway here are some reviews and thoughts of the stories themselves.
Pastoralia- The titular novella predicts pretty much all of what is to come in Civilwarland. At first I thought it was going to be commentary on the modern husband and wife, but I was quite wrong. Workplace satire meets corporate satire meets the capitalist paranoiac employee nightmare. Slow burn, but strong message.

Winky- Powerless wuss and the crazed sister he lives with. Nice character writing. The monsters we grow to love hurt us the most.

SeaOak- Absolute banger. Saunders’ funniest work. Avoids some of the navel-gazing that is in a lot of these stories which can be endearing but also kind of tiresome if it’s the only means of characterization. But yeah, this story doesn’t do that and kicks ass with Doc Martens all the way up the freeway instead.

The end of FIRPO in the World- Does feature some navel gazing but in probably the most appropriate way as it’s basically a lonely kid day dreaming while he shreds lawns on his bike. Short and sweet, like your mom.

The Barber’s Unhappiness- A story about a miserable person, but it isn’t hopeless and that’s what I appreciates about Saunders. A lot of people would make this a bummer and a bummer only. This one...well... you’ll see.

Overall, there isn’t a bad story in the bunch. You could do a lot worse than spending a few (and I mean 2-2.5) hours getting inside the minds of Saunders’ characters. They’re a unique place to inhabit, but they feel familiar at the same time.
...more

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About George Saunders

George Saunders

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George Saunders was born December 2, 1958 and raised on the south side of Chicago. In 1981 he received a B.S. in Geophysical Engineering from Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colorado. He worked at Radian International, an environmental engineering firm in Rochester, NY as a technical writer and geophysical engineer from 1989 to 1996. He has also worked in Sumatra on an oil exploration geophysi ...more

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“Down in the city are the nice houses and the so-so houses and the lovers making out in dark yards and the babies crying for their moms, and I wonder if, other than Jesus, has this ever happened before. Maybe it happens all the time. Maybe there's angry dead all over, hiding in rooms, covered with blankets, bossing around their scared, embarrassed relatives. Because how would we know?” — 15 likes

“Good God, but life could be less than easy, not that he was unaware that it could certainly be a lot worse, but to go about in such a state, pulse high, face red, worried sick that someone would notice how nervous one was, was certainly less than ideal, and he felt sure that his body was secreting all kinds of harmful chemicals and that the more he worried about the harmful chemicals the faster they were pouring out of wherever it was they came from.” — 9 likes

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