Scan barcode
A review by cheesy_hobbit
Liberation Day: Stories by George Saunders
4.0
For anyone familiar with Luis Valdez, the playwright and ally of the United Farm Workers’ strike and friend of Cesar Chavez, this collection of experimental realism stories will make you think of his disturbingly satirical play, “Los Vendidos”, which his theater company, El Teatro Campesino, produced while marching with the grape farm workers in the late 1970’s.
The short stories all center around characters struggling for liberty, but in a dark, Black Mirror type of way (see Netflix series of same name). There are struggles for individual freedom, sometimes characters struggling for literal physical autonomy, and these struggles are also woven into a larger backdrop of an existential struggle for liberty and freedom against a cascading unnamed, unspoken, but very present force of conformity for conformity’s sake.
Doubtless, many readers will find the stories confusing to follow, as, if I’m speaking correctly, there is no direct dialogue anywhere in these stories. Some are told in the first person, some in the second, and some in the third. But no matter what the perspective, the lack of direct dialogue makes the stories seem all to exist over each other, but it also feels like each story is walking back over itself, with no guiding points or set direction, leaving the reader feeling directionless, hopeless, and desperate to find a foothold to help them make sense of everything.
And I think Saunders is intentional about this. These stories are clearly a reflection, if not directly a commentary, on the feeling that may be prevalent in society of having freedom, but not feeling particularly autonomous. These are eerie stories with confusing, sometimes unlikeable characters, but there is a captivating dread released when the stories are read that clamps onto the reader and forces them underwater, gasping for air, gasping for a sense of comfort.
But there is no comfort to be found in these stories. Saunders wants us to feel drowned in the overwhelming waves of utter meaninglessness of the characters in spite of their desperate hope for better presents and better futures.
This collection of stories would be suitable for a college course on human identity, sociology, and liberty.
The short stories all center around characters struggling for liberty, but in a dark, Black Mirror type of way (see Netflix series of same name). There are struggles for individual freedom, sometimes characters struggling for literal physical autonomy, and these struggles are also woven into a larger backdrop of an existential struggle for liberty and freedom against a cascading unnamed, unspoken, but very present force of conformity for conformity’s sake.
Doubtless, many readers will find the stories confusing to follow, as, if I’m speaking correctly, there is no direct dialogue anywhere in these stories. Some are told in the first person, some in the second, and some in the third. But no matter what the perspective, the lack of direct dialogue makes the stories seem all to exist over each other, but it also feels like each story is walking back over itself, with no guiding points or set direction, leaving the reader feeling directionless, hopeless, and desperate to find a foothold to help them make sense of everything.
And I think Saunders is intentional about this. These stories are clearly a reflection, if not directly a commentary, on the feeling that may be prevalent in society of having freedom, but not feeling particularly autonomous. These are eerie stories with confusing, sometimes unlikeable characters, but there is a captivating dread released when the stories are read that clamps onto the reader and forces them underwater, gasping for air, gasping for a sense of comfort.
But there is no comfort to be found in these stories. Saunders wants us to feel drowned in the overwhelming waves of utter meaninglessness of the characters in spite of their desperate hope for better presents and better futures.
This collection of stories would be suitable for a college course on human identity, sociology, and liberty.