George Saunders

Products they talk about

• 

  I Will Bear Witness, Volume 1👍 Recommends

  …book recommendation for understanding historical persecution and slow constriction of freedoms

  “Well, there's one, I'm sure you read this, but I will bear witness by Victor Klemper. It's a book. somebody described it as the first book that shows the Holocaust in color, as opposed to black and white. So he's a professor, and I think he's in Dresden, and there's this unforgettable scene where he goes into the butcher, who he's known for years, and the butcher says, hey, professor, I'm so sorry, but it's not me, it's Berlin, and he can't sell meat anymore.”

  on The Ezra Klein Show

• Red Cavalry👍 Recommends

  …book recommendation reflecting on chaos and changing perspectives on institutions

  “And then the other one I would recommend, I maybe have recommended it before because I love it so much, but it's Red Cavalry by Isaac Babel, the Jewish Russian writer. And I think what speaks to me about that book right now, it's so chaotic. It's written from different points of view, and it doesn't really underscore who's speaking to you. And the kind of very, very understated through line of the book is this Jewish kid throws him at the revolution and they go back and forth over Poland mistreating Jews, you know, and mistreating everybody.”

  on The Ezra Klein Show

• The Place of Tides👍 Recommends

  …book recommendation as meditative antidote to speed of modern life and technology

  “And then the third one would be maybe more of an antidote. It's a beautiful book called The Place of Tides by James Rebanks, nonfiction. And he goes to an island, I think it's off Iceland, and he lives with this woman who is, her job is to collect Eiderdown. And there's an elaborate process where you lure the ducks in by being very quiet, basically, and setting up little environments that they'll like.”

  on The Ezra Klein Show