The Aching Banality of Our Times-- George Saunders

"Short story master George Saunders is fascinated by one of the great stories of the modern age — and it’s not climate change, not the world at war. Rather: It is the aching banality of our times. The pervasive McCulture. And how it robs us of our humanity, contorts our moral bearings, separates us from true feeling."

"In fiction and his essays, Saunders examines the ways in which the forces of corporate capitalism — and our own material urges — numb us, dumb us and humiliate us. He commands us to take a hard look at the absurd logic-language of Group Think or Management Speak. Then, in the spirit of communal recognition, he invites us to laugh out loud at it."

Read more by Brad Buchholz in the Austin American-Statesman:  http://www.statesman.com/news/entertainment/books-literature/humor-and-hurting/nTs4c/

Saunders visits UAlbany today:  http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/saunders_george13.html

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George Saunders, An Old Friend As It Turns Out

Next week's guest, bestselling short story writer George Saunders used to visit the Writers Institute office from time to time in the 1980s, when Toni Morrison shared our space in the Humanities Building. Here's why (via an interview in the New Yorker):

"When we had our first daughter, Paula was on a fellowship, studying with Toni Morrison at SUNY Albany, and I had just started working for a pharmaceutical company as a tech writer. But then her fellowship ended and that job played out, and, at the same time, it started to dawn on us that this writing thing might take longer to pay off than we’d expected."

More in the New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/01/on-tenth-of-december-an-interview-with-george-saunders.html

More on Saunders' upcoming visit:  http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/saunders_george13.html

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"The Best Book You'll Read This Year"

George Saunders, who visits Albany this coming Wednesday, is achieving a kind of popular renown and name recognition that is usually unknown to literary short story writers.

This January 2013 New York Times article certainly helped introduce him to a wider readership:

George Saunders Has Written the Best Book You’ll Read This Year

It’s the trope of all tropes to say that a writer is “the writer for our time.” Still, if we were to define “our time” as a historical moment in which the country we live in is dropping bombs on people about whose lives we have the most abstracted and unnuanced ideas, and who have the most distorted notions of ours; or a time in which some of us are desperate simply for a job that would lead to the ability to purchase a few things that would make our kids happy and result in an uptick in self- and family esteem; or even just a time when a portion of the population occasionally feels scared out of its wits for reasons that are hard to name, or overcome with emotion when we see our children asleep, or happy when we risk revealing ourselves to someone and they respond with kindness — if we define “our time” in these ways, then George Saunders is the writer for our time.

Read more here:  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/magazine/george-saunders-just-wrote-the-best-book-youll-read-this-year.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Read more about Saunders' visit to the New York State Writers Institute on Wed., Feb. 20th here:
http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/saunders_george13.html

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Criminal Justice Scholar to Moderate Film Discussion

Dr. Christina Lane will lead audience discussion following this Friday's screening of Homeland: Four Portraits of Native Action, as part of the Justice & Multiculturalism in the 21st Century Film Series, cosponsored by the NYS Writers Institute and the School of Criminal Justice.

A faculty member at the College of Saint Rose and alumna of the UAlbany School of Criminal Justice doctoral program, Professor Lane is a multiple year honoree in America’s Who’s Who Teachers of Excellence. She teaches courses in Criminal Justice, Behavior & Law, Forensic Psychology, and Forensic Science.

HOMELAND: FOUR PORTRAITS OF NATIVE ACTION
February 15 (Friday)Film screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus
Directed by Roberta Grossman
(United States, 2006, 88 minutes, color)

An artful and moving example of documentary filmmaking, HOMELAND follows the stories of Native American activists fighting to protect their lands against corporate exploitation and environmental destruction. Variety called the film, “Beautifully crafted...,” and said “Roberta Grossman skillfully intersperses vastly varied archival clips with quietly impassioned testimonials by tribal leaders and stunning lensing showcasing both the natural wonders and the man-made degradation of the landscape.”

More on the film series:  http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/programpages/cfs.html

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Valentine's Day Cocktails from Women Authors

Bestselling novelist Ann Hood (The Knitting Circle) who visits the Institute 2/26, offers her favorite Valentine's Day cocktail:

“A lime mint Rickey: I recently returned from Cartagena Colombia and fell hard for their local concoction of fresh lime juice, mint and simple syrup over crushed ice. Also very tasty with dark rum in it!”

Cowboys Are My Weakness author Pam Houston, who visited in 2005, offers this: “Pretty in Pink: San Pellegrino (2 parts), pomegranate-cherry juice (1 part), slice of Meyer lemon, and lots of ice in a tall tumbler. It’s pretty, pink, and comforting (in case Valentine’s Day sucks).”

For more cocktails, go to http://www.prweb.com/releases/DrinkingDiaries/02/prweb10426112.htm

More on Hood's upcoming visit:  http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/mirabelli_hood13.html

More on Houston's 2005 visit: http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/houston_pam.html

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Homeland Film Tomorrow: "Visually Stunning"

Tomorrow, Friday 2/15 at Page Hall, 7:30PM, we will screen Homeland, winner of numerous prizes at documentary festivals around the world. The film follows the battles of Native American activists to save the natural beauty and resources of their reservations from corporate exploitation.

"Beautifully crafted... Roberta Grossman skillfully intersperses vastly varied archival clips with quietly impassioned testimonials by tribal leaders and stunning lensing showcasing both the natural wonders and the manmade degradation of the landscape... Homeland merits a wider audience than provided by scattershot PBS airings... At a time when 30 years of environmental protection laws are being rapidly dismantled, Homeland militantly proposes America's First Peoples as the vangaurd of resistence." -- Variety

"Visually stunning... [Homeland] is a perfect blend of visuals, words, musical background, and thought-provoking issues related not only to Native Americans but to the environmental crisis facing America. " -- School Library Journal

"The story of a U.S. tragedy -- multinational companies doing their deadly work in Native peoples' backyards -- and of the brave few who stand up to combat it." -- The Utne Reader

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Jorgen Randers Last Night

Influential futurist Jorgen Randers, author of 2052: A Global Forecast for the Next Forty Years (2012), spoke last night to a packed Lecture Center audience of approximately 400.

Audience members remarked on the sharp contrast between Randers' sunny disposition and the terrifying implications of his data.

For more on Randers, go to http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/randers_jorgen13.html.

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