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Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo
Service95 Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo

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Playlist: George Saunders’ Writing Soundtrack For Lincoln In The Bardo

Lincoln In The Bardo by George Saunders – Dua’s Monthly Read for October – is set in 1862, one year into the American Civil War, when Abraham Lincoln loses his son to a severe illness. In this ghostly historical reimagining, Saunders takes this moment to contemplate grief and familial loss, as we follow Willie into the next life. Here, Saunders shares the music he listened to while writing this experimental book.  

“I finished Lincoln In The Bardo one fall, up at our house outside of Oneonta, NY.  I was teaching that semester and writing long hours on my non-teaching days, and listening to a lot of music between sessions, for two reasons, really.  

“First, to keep my spirits up and maintain high standards; I listened to certain pieces over and over, in a spirit of ‘I want my book to be as intense as these works, so don’t let up and don’t get tired.’ In this category, among the things I was listening to were”:

One Sunday Morning  – Wilco

Via Chicago  – Wilco

Jumpers  – Sleater-Kinney

Vaseline Machine Gun  – Leo Kottle

Red House  – Jimi Hendrix

Freddie The Freeloader  – Miles Davis

Paranoid Android  – Radiohead

In the Aeroplane Over the Sea  – Neutral Milk Hotel

String Quartet No. 8 in C Minor  – Dmitri Shostakovich

Easy Way Out  – Elliott Smith

Speed Trap Town  – Jason Isbell

“I listened to a second category of music for mood, really – to try to immerse myself in a certain pastoral, 19th-century vibe in hopes that this would translate into the book somehow.  I also found that listening to orchestral or operatic pieces made me shoot higher, somehow, especially in the way these works have lots of voices, competing and contradicting and moving around, which was an aspiration I had for the book.  In this category were pieces like:

Appalachian Spring – Aaron Copland

Lincoln Portrait – Aaron Copland

The American Scene – Manhattan Chamber Orchestra

Appalachia Waltz – Mark O’Connor, Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer

First Impressions – Mark O’Connor, Yo-Yo Ma, and Edgar Meyer

Century Rolls – John Adams

Mass in B Minor – Johann Sebastian Bach

First Symphony – John Corigliano

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3ipT5lpffUTamC2t6aKA87?si=95f279fc9ac94c32&pt=8f375f9d64d1954823954d74b6dd4c39

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