120 Questions for... George Saunders

Any notable personage can answer twenty questions -- even Keith Richards. But only the exceptional ones can tackle more; like, six times more. Here at The Feed, it's not about harvesting the thoughts of interesting people; it's about finding out how long they can tolerate One Hundred and Twenty Questions. You're probably thinking to yourself: This is going to be better than any reality TV show or James Lipton interview ever. And, you're absolutely right.

We are proud and lucky to have George Saunders, author of some of our favorite writings, like his latest: In Persuasion Nation. Mr. Saunders is one of the smartest and funniest guys on the planet. He publishes in the fancy-pants publications like the New Yorker and was recently interviewed in the New York Times (where they only asked him like 11 questions or so... cowards!) He survived! (Read the first batch, then the second batch and then the all-important third batch and then mind-altering FOURTH BATCH and then the perspective altering FIFTH BATCH! What bliss, no?).

This, dear friends, is the last installment of this monsterous media pop-art piece.
Read it. Savor it. Put it in time capsule for future generations. And, most importantly, but his books. All of them. With a heavy heart, we give you....

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109. What's one thing you would just love to hear Andy Rooney say?

"I love you, Judy Garland, and want to marry you."

110. What's your dream concert?

I am on-stage with Led Zeppelin, naked, and have forgotten all the words to "Over the Hills and Far Away." Also, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant have both gained weight and are around 60 years old and are shirtless. Also, America has morphed into a country that is so hysterically fearful that we have invaded another country in retribution for a horrible evil act which that country, turns out, had nothing to do with, and, having invaded the country, are now in the crazy position of either 1) bolting prematurely and thereby leaving that country in even worse shape, or 2) staying indefinitely, which seems to be making things worse. Also a recent hurricane has made us see that the present administration is not only incurious and naïve and frighteningly conceptual in its approach to the world, it is also astonishingly inefficient, and has almost three years left.

Then I wake up and go: Thank God it was only a dream! I still know all the words to "Over the Hills and Far Away!"

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Buy: IN PERSUASION NATION | CIVILWARLAND IN BAD DECLINE

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112. Have you ever been in a hot air balloon?

Just one. It was back in the seventies and it happened so quickly. One minute I was driving past a farm field, next minute our eyes met, and soon we were living together - oh wait, sorry. Misread the question. I thought it said: Have you ever been in LOVE WITH ahot air balloon?

And yes, I have been "in" a hot air balloon. But that is a little personal. And, as I said above, I WAS in love with it at the time. It wasn't just some cheap thing in the middle of a field. I loved its colors, its thatch basket, the crowd of other balloons around it…just loved the whole thing. A very rich time of my life. But then she took off, soaring high above the clouds. I've heard she's married now, and lives in a junkyard in Nevada, totally deflated, her colors faded, her thatch basket now hanging in a TGIF restaurant near Bakersfield.

113. Where's a guy get a drink in this town?

You? AOL Guy? Down by the river, near the floating truck tires and the little swells of medical waste.

114. Who wants to marry a millionaire?

The woman in love with the millionaire.

Wow. That was good, AOL guy. Like a Zen koan. I'm going to try to do that again.

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Buy: PASTORALIA | THE BRIEF AND FRIGHTENING REIGN OFPHIL

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115. Is Ed McMahon still laughing?

The woman in love with a millionaire.

Huh. Not so great. What do you think? Maybe we should just scrub that last answer, what do you thin--

115. Is Ed McMahon still laughing?

I hope so. I always thought he was a nice guy. Even that time he came to my house with a big check. Turns out, part of the reason he was always laughing is, when you take that check down and cash it, they give you this big pile of oversized money. And the only thing you can buy with that money is big oversized things.

116. How many bags are you checking?

Well, that was the problem. I bought a bag with that oversized money and it's so big they only let you check like half of it. So whenever I travel, I can only bring half my stuff. So I get up onstage to do a reading and I can't concentrate, because I'm half-naked.

No wonder Ed is still laughing.

117. What bad habit would you like to not have anymore?

Agreeing to answer 120 questions.

118. What's your fondest memory of childhood?

The long halcyon days of summer, when I would run blissfully across the meadow behind our estate, not answering any questions at all, except the consistent imploring inquiries of the whippoorwill, such as: Seenanyworms? Seenanyworms? Heyseenanywormskid?

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Buy: IN PERSUASION NATION | CIVILWARLAND IN BAD DECLINE

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119. Who was your date to the prom?

Oddly, that whippoorwill, who that night was inquiring: Gotanyhash? Gotanyhash?

120. How do you feel about Lawrence Welk?

Well, he never asked me 120 questions, that's one thing I'll say for him.

121. Do you hate us?

You are one question over the limit. But hate you? I don't even KNOW you. I've never even SEEN you. You are just THE VOICE. It would be like hating OXYGEN, or MUSIC IN AN ELEVATOR or A CONSTANT RINGING IN ONE'S EARS or the GUY WHO HAS BEEN TORTURING YOU FOR EIGHTEEN STRAIGHT HOURS and is NOT EVEN PAYING YOU.

BONUS QUESTION:
Hobo Uprising Pool
When will the hobo uprising take place?

For your information, hobos have decided they do not like being called 'hobos' as this is degrading and evokes an image of a sad-sack clown holding a bandanna on a stick. Henceforth they will be called "bindle-stiffs" and will be represented, especially in porcelain figurines, as muscular, forward-leaning men, holding laptops, their eyes infused with a manly hunger for the road. And furthermore, the "uprising" is henceforth to be known as the "entirely reasonable casting off of oppressive stereotypes," and the phrase "taking place," invoking, as it does, a feeling of passivity/beast-like acquiesence, has been replaced with "moving forward boldly as if willed by God himself." So I think what you meant to ask is: "When will the bindlestiff's Entirely Reasonable Casting Off of Oppressive Stereotypes move boldly forward as if willed by God himself?" Right? Is that it? Is that what you're asking? Hello?

Hello?

Well, too bad for you, AOL Guy. The bindlestiffs will cast off all oppressive stereotypes with or without your approval. For your information, brother, there is a world that operates beyond the influence of huge media-controlling corporations. A decent world, a world of individuals, who make decisions on a simple, human basis. Perhaps you'd know about that world, AOL Guy, if you ever left the luxurious confines of the Time-Warner-AOL-Disney-Newsweek-McDonalds building there in Midtown Manhattan and ventured forth into the greater world outside, like up here, where I am, in Syracuse, where there are no corporations or big buildings, just small intellectual huts.

Right? Do you agree? Will you come down from your gleaming corporate mountaintop, AOL Guy(s), and visit me in Syracuse, and, looking into my eyes, face-to-face, man-to-man, ask me where I get my ideas?

Will you?

Just as I thought. Nothing.

Isn't that just like a Guy? Ask 120 questions and as soon as he gets what he wants, he's gone, and won't answer your calls? And the toilet seat is up? How did you do that, AOL Guy? I was sitting here in the absolute quiet of my study, and suddenly Vlad and I started at the loud CLICK sound of the toilet seat being thrust up! Truly, you are indeed all-powerful, much more so than the other Internet access companies!

And there, wow, you hath made the seat CLICK back down again!

Up again! Down again! You are driving the cat nuts!

I want to close by saying, honestly, how enjoyable this has been for me. I really do want to say it. I do, I do. But somehow, I can't.

You have beaten me, AOL Guy(s), I am weary. My singed fingers, gone stiff with carpal tunnel, are weary, and discouraged, and it occurs to me that you have won, Omniscient Corporate Master: I shall never write again. I shall henceforth never raise my voice against you or your ilk, via satire. You have shown me the error of my ways, and I am grateful.

If you could just, as a last act of mercy, help mesell moreof my new book, so that me and my humble family can live out the remainder of our days on the trifling proceeds, it would be much appreciated.

No?

Not even that?

All right. I accept thy mighty judgment. I accede to thy ways.

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Buy: PASTORALIA | THE BRIEF AND FRIGHTENING REIGN OFPHIL

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122. Where do you get your ideas?

IN PERSUASION NATION, RIVERHEAD BOOKS, ISBN 1-59448-922-X, http://www.inpersuasionnation.com).

Read: Part I, where you'll learn: Why the new Chevy Impalas look so much worse than the old ones

Read: Part II, where you'll learn about: Mini-Kiss or Tiny Kiss

Read: Part III , where you'll learn: What Queen Elizabeth carries around in her little purse

Read: Part IV, where you'll learn: If George is Swayze Krazy

Read: Part V, where you'll learn: How much George paid for his haircut

- More on GeorgeSaunders
- Buy IN PERSUASION NATION
- Buy CIVILWARLAND IN BAD DECLINE
- Buy PASTORALIA
- Buy THE BRIEF AND FRIGHTENING REIGN OFPHIL
- Enter the George Saunders PHOTO CHALLENGE:Bring IT!

thefeedblog at 10:32:00 AM EDT Blog about this entry

This entry has 2 comments: (Add your own)

#2 Comment from johnmac665
5/11/06 6:24 PM | Permalink

George Saunders has left the Garden of Eden and obviously was slipped an apple of the Tree of Knowledge. Apple pie is good and is an American favorite food where Americans not only embrace the Tree of Knowledge we will make its fruit desert. One of the issues with having the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge is we lose our innocence and then can identify sin, and this leads to something interesting and that is observing the burlesque show of life that leads to comedy and satire as we condemn each other, but to have righteousness we have standards and civil rights--not everything is automatically bad. Every generation finds solutions, and then the next generation repeats the problems and solutions of the prior generation, and repeat; and in a parody you can embody the sins of the grandfather, father, and son all in one, because there are patterns to our lives as we are born in innocence--and for Americans bite so deep into the apple of the Tree of Knowledge that not only do we know sin we embrace sin with the knowledge--and know sin with the knowledge, and this leads us to be good to each other because we truly know what happens when we sin without proper time and place to control sin, and still be good to each other for choice, liberty, and freedom, among other things. The burlesque show is in America and in the Universe, but by time and place we embrace the forbidden and learn it, understand it, get entertained by it, and enjoy it, and then turn around and do our best to allow proper time and place: time and place can be in the temple of mall, temple of theatre, temple of pub, temple of bookstore, temple of government center, temple of game center, your personal temple of employment, temple of entertainment, temple of military base, and, among other things, temple of university. George Saunders has left the Garden of Eden and found the burlesque show of life and now reports upon it.
#1 Comment from johnmac665
5/11/06 11:00 AM | Permalink

The gods laugh when you just ask for money.

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120 Questions for... George Saunders - The Finale