Weekend Listen: George Saunders Imagines an Oil Exec’s Deathbed

Summary

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Big Take Podcast: "Weekend Listen: George Saunders Imagines an Oil Exec’s Deathbed"

Host: Akshat Rathi (Bloomberg)
Guest: George Saunders
Date: February 8, 2026
Episode Focus: Exploring the intersection of fiction, climate change, and empathy through George Saunders' latest novel, "Vigil"

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Episode Overview

This episode delves into how fiction can address the climate crisis, drawing on the imagination and unique approach of award-winning author George Saunders. Through a discussion of his new novel "Vigil," Saunders and host Akshat Rathi explore how literature grapples with guilt, regret, empathy, and the complexities of climate change denial. The conversation also expands into the challenges facing the written word today, the role of AI in creativity, and practical writing advice.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Why Tackle Climate Change in Fiction?

[03:38–05:22]

• Saunders reflects on setting his new book, "Vigil," around an aging oil executive's deathbed experience, with the climate crisis subtly woven in.
• He sees fiction as a way to approach big, significant topics:
  “If you put significant things on the table, at least the book won't be trivial.” (Saunders – 04:22)
• The premise: What honest reflection might someone deeply complicit in climate denial have at the end of their life?

2. Research & Personal Connection

[05:22–08:00]

• Saunders describes his research process: deep reading followed by deliberate forgetting, to let the story breathe rather than become a “book report.”
• Personal background shapes the narrative:
  • Father worked in coal, Saunders is a trained engineer, worked in oil exploration in Sumatra.
  • This gave him an insider’s perspective:
    “It made me have a little taste as a young man of what it would be like to be part of that group... an embattled but noble crew of technocrats...” (Saunders – 06:55)

3. The Art of Character Creation

[08:00–10:10]

• Saunders does not directly interview people like oil executives for authenticity. Instead, he trusts his “internal person generator”:
  “The working assumption is that we contain everybody... I can imagine being anyone.” (Saunders – 08:16)
• Fiction is a playful, shared experiment between reader and writer.

4. Climate Change as a Literary Challenge

[10:41–13:31]

• Literary fiction faces structural challenges representing the slow, diffuse nature of climate change.
• Saunders argues the novel’s purpose is to raise questions and immerse the reader, not to preach or deliver a straightforward message:
  “The book that might need to be written about climate change might not have climate change in it at all. It might be about denial, mindset, corporate hegemony...” (Saunders – 12:31)
• Climate is a backdrop—only three mentions of the word “climate” appear in "Vigil."

5. Guilt, Regret, and Empathy

[15:18–21:03]

• Discussion of guilt and regret in the context of the novel and real life.
• Saunders resists a didactic approach:
  “I think of myself more as a roller coaster designer. I don’t have to know your profession to make you gasp at the bottom of a steep hill.” (Saunders – 16:06)
• Empathy’s limits:
  “There’s not a limit to the interest we can feel in another human being, even the most terrible... But sometimes in the West we confuse that activity with permission giving.” (Saunders – 18:30)

6. The Problem of Platforming & Understanding the “Other Side”

[21:03–23:03]

• On interviewing or writing about controversial figures:
  “Understanding another person’s point of view is always a superpower, even if your intent is to resist them.” (Saunders – 21:52)
• Warns against both-sides false equivalence in journalism:
  “This side says hippos can fly, this side says they can’t, okay, we’ll meet in the middle. They fly sometimes.” (Saunders – 22:17)

7. The Value of Uncertainty

[24:02–26:16]

• Writers tend to say “I don’t know” more often, embracing uncertainty as a strength.
• The current culture prizes strong opinions, but Saunders finds value in withholding judgment:
  “An opinion costs you... it nails you down at a certain point in a world that is always changing and always uncertain.” (Saunders – 24:46)

8. Is the Written Word Losing Ground?

[28:55–30:20]

• Saunders contends deep readers are influential:
  “If you have a handful of dedicated readers who really know how to read, that’s a kind of super dense pot of potential influence.” (Saunders – 29:31)
• The abundance of shallow digital content doesn’t have the same effect.

9. AI and Human Creativity

[30:20–33:39]

• Saunders believes AI-generated writing lacks the “qualia” of human experience: “AI can imitate that all it likes, but it isn’t the same, it can’t be the same.” (Saunders – 31:35)
• Concern that AI could erode standards and diminish human involvement, especially if over-relied on:
  “That’s your job... to come up with that menu.” (Saunders – 32:28)
• Skeptical but open to some practical uses (e.g., brain surgery).

10. Critical Thinking, Empathy, and the Decline of Reading

[33:39–37:08]

• Studies show decreased reading reduces critical thinking and empathy.
• Saunders has personally experienced the transformative power of deep, attentive reading:
  “From an intense period of reading... my mind shifted, my vocabulary improved, my ability to express myself improved and therefore the world changed.” (Saunders – 35:26)
• Advocates for claiming time and space for in-depth, patient reading.

11. Writing Exercise and the Generative Power of Constraints

[38:06–41:02]

• Saunders shares a writing exercise: 200-word story, with only 50 unique words, in 15 minutes.
• Constraints force creativity and bypass usual anxieties:
  “A lot of the normal anxieties associated with writing go away under the pressure of the rules.” (Saunders – 38:57)
• Host shares positive experience doing a Saunders-inspired exercise with his wife.

12. Advice for Nonfiction Climate Writers

[41:19–45:27]

• “Ground it in the cost to actual people”—moving beyond abstract ideas to concrete impacts.
• The challenge: often “preaching to the choir”—how to reach beyond one’s own audience or bias?
• Host reflects that conducting fair, honest, challenging interviews with those outside the climate mainstream can sometimes earn respect and foster better understanding, even when disagreements remain.

13. Realities of Climate Denial within the Oil Industry

[44:07–45:27]

• Oil executives in public companies no longer deny climate change, due to shareholder reality:
  “If you’re going to make money, you need to know reality. That needs to go on a bumper sticker.” (Host and Saunders exchange, 44:36–44:42)
• There remains denial in some private sectors, but transparency and accountability have shifted public discourse.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It gave me a sense that I could write this character... the oil business...made me have a little taste as a young man of what it would be like to be part of that group, to have adventure.” (Saunders – 06:43)

• “The book that might need to be written about climate change might not have climate change in it at all...it might be about denial, mindset, corporate hegemony...” (Saunders – 12:31)

• “If you write a novel or a story and it ends up being about what you thought it was going to be about, you probably failed because the reader feels that condescension.” (Saunders – 12:12)

• “Empathy’s tricky... the words empathy, compassion, sympathy, those are sometimes confusing. I think there’s not a limit to the interest we can feel in another human being...The tricky part is that sometimes...we confuse that activity with permission giving.” (Saunders – 18:21)

• “Understanding another person’s point of view is always a superpower, even if your intent is to resist them.” (Saunders – 21:52)

• “For me... it was so much easier just to say I have no idea than to falsify an answer that later I would regret.” (Saunders – 24:30)

• “If you have a handful of dedicated readers who really know how to read, that's a kind of a super dense pot of potential influence. People who really read deeply... it affects their actions.” (Saunders – 29:31)

• “AI can imitate that all it likes, but it isn’t the same, it can’t be the same.” (Saunders – 31:35)

• “From an intense period of reading... my mind shifted, my vocabulary improved, my ability to express myself improved and therefore the world changed.” (Saunders – 35:26)

• On climate and reality in business:
  Host: “If you’re going to make money, you need to know reality.”
  Saunders: “That needs to go on a bumper sticker. Amen.” (44:36–44:42)

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Key Timestamps

• [03:38] – Saunders on why he wrote "Vigil"
• [05:35] – Saunders' research approach
• [06:43] – Impact of personal background
• [08:10] – On character creation (internal person generator)
• [10:41] – Literary challenges of climate fiction
• [15:18] – Guilt, regret, and what fiction can do
• [18:21] – On empathy and its limits
• [21:52] – Value of understanding the “other side”
• [24:46] – The power of withholding opinion
• [29:31] – Value of committed readers vs. viral content
• [31:35] – Human creativity vs. AI
• [35:26] – Transformative power of reading deeply
• [38:06] – The 200-word/50-unique-word writing exercise
• [44:36] – Climate reality and shareholder pressure

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Tone and Style

The conversation is reflective, witty, and philosophical, marked by Saunders' humility, self-deprecating sense of humor, and deep commitment to exploring complexity over certainties. The host brings insightful, probing questions and shares personal experiences that illuminate the subject further.

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To summarize:
This episode is a rich dive into the complexities of representing climate change through fiction, literary empathy, the pitfalls and promises of AI in creative work, and the enduring value of reading and writing deeply. Whether you're a writer, reader, or climate observer, Saunders' candor and nuanced thinking make this discussion both practical and inspirational.

Transcript

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[Akshat Rathi]

Welcome to zero. I am Akshat Rathi. This week, an oil CEO in the Bardo. A decade ago, the Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh gave a series of lectures titled the Great Derangement where he argued that contemporary fiction in all forms has has been ignoring the climate crisis and that was adding to the peril humans already faced. Many have heeded his call since in the form of books, movies, plays, even oratorio. So this year on zero, we are running a series called Imagine to delve into what some of our most creative minds can do to help us better understand our predicament. My guest today is George Saunders, one of America's best storytellers. You may know him for his 2017 novel Lincoln in the Bardo, which won the Booker Prize. This week, George has a new novel out titled Vigil.

[George Saunders]

In a Nutshell, we find ourselves at the bedside of somebody who I imagine to be kind of a 1998-2000 era oil executive. The last night of his life, the last hours of his life. We're joined by a woman, the ghost of a woman who died in 1976. So somewhat, I guess, like as in A Christmas Carol, she's there to help him, but Then it kind of goes. It goes a little sideways from there.

[Akshat Rathi]

I wanted to bring George on the show to ask him how he approached writing this book and what his exploration of climate change revealed. The first half of my interview focuses largely on visual, and in the second half we broaden the conversation, hearing George's takes on AI while literature matters, and even get to talk about games to get writing. As a beginner, this conversation was a lot of fun and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Send your suggestions and book reviews on zeropodoomberg.net and sorry about this voice.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

I have a little bit of a cold. George, welcome to Zero.

[George Saunders]

It's very nice to be here. Thank you for having me.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Fiction opens up a vast expanse of subjects that a writer can touch on. Throughout your career, you know, you've touched on things like theme parks and the afterlife, but in Vigil, you put climate at the heart of the conversation. Why climate change and why now?

[George Saunders]

Well, honestly, I was starting this book back when Biden was still president, and when it looked like some strides were being made, maybe in the direction of at least acknowledging the reality of climate change, little did I know where we were headed. But at that time I thought, well, it's kind of the. The most important thing for the world and in the world, so I'll try to put climate on the table. I don't think I, you know, the idea of climate change novel seems a little bit daunting. So I think sometimes you put a topic on the table and you don't really know what the novel will be about or what it will end up being. But if you put significant things on the table, at least the book won't be trivial. So my thought was, what would it be like? Some of these people who were so working so hard to deny climate change, now they're getting old. If one of those guys was dying and he looked back at his life's work, would there be a shred of honesty about what he had done? Or, you know, is he still feel like he's in. In the right place? Which then raises the question of how much does a person like that know? When do they know it? So it opened out into all kinds of questions that are probably, I think, relevant for anybody who's lived a life and expended their energy. And at the end you get to look back and go, how did you know? How did I do so? It seemed an intriguing challenge, at any rate. And at this stage of my career, I just want a challenge that's going to Be some fun.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

One of the funnest part of writing is to do the research to try and find out more about the world as you describe it to the reader. While working on visual, what kind of research did you end up doing?

[George Saunders]

I did some, I would say medium intense research at the beginning. And what I tend to do is I do a deep dive and I read nothing but that topic for quite a while. I compile it all in a folder and then I put the folder away and never look at it again. Because as a fiction writer, you know, one of the big problems is you could become sort of attached to your research to the extent that the book just becomes a book report about your researchers nobody wants. So my thought is, and this was true in my previous novel, Lincoln and the Bardo, I thought just get as well informed as a pretty well informed amateur so that when you invent, you're not inventing. Totally divorced from reality, you know. So there was probably two or three months of intense reading and then just okay, you know something, and now you can go ahead and make up some crazy stuff.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

There's also the fact that your father, I understand, worked for a coal company, that you yourself are an engineer, you studied at the Colorado School of Mines, and that for a period you worked in Sumatra, in Indonesia, on an oil exploration project crew. How did that experience shape any of this that's come in the novel?

[George Saunders]

It gave me a sense that I could write this character. In other words, if I, if I had chosen, you know, given my background, a very wealthy politician, I don't really know where to start with somebody like that. I don't, I don't have a way in. But with the, the oil business especially the stuff that I did, it made me have a little taste as a young man of what it would be like to be part of that group, to have adventure. I worked in Sumatra and we had some really, you know, for a 22 year old, great adventures in the jungle and tigers and, you know, all kinds of the things that you. That would seem appealing to a young person. And I also got a taste of that feeling of kind of being, you know, even then in the 80s, part of an embattled but noble crew of technocrats, you know, that we were doing something that was keeping the world turning and no one appreciated it, you know, so I, and I also worked in the Texas oil fields quite a bit. So I knew that some of the, some of the technical stuff, some of the jargon, but mostly the mindset, you know, so again, that it for me the weigh in is always, I use the word fun. I don't know if it's really fun, but the idea that of overflow, like I could, I knew I could write about oil from that perspective with some overflow, given the people I'd known and the things I'd done.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

And do you have to speak to, especially for your main characters, the type of person who you're going to represent. So did you end up speaking to an oil executive, for example?

[George Saunders]

No, for me it's more. I really trust my internal person generator. It's funny, the working assumption is that we contain everybody. So even though I'm a progressive kind of new age college professor, I used to be a different person. And not only that, a lot of different people that I never actually was do exist within me. So one of the great thrills of being a fiction writer is you can say, okay, could I be a giggly 15 year old girl in Montreal? I'm like, yeah, I could do that. You know, I could try. I could, I could sort of imitate her. So for me to interview people is not. Again, it sort of pins you down a little bit, you know, if someone says something, you feel, okay, I have to be true to that. But the game of the novelist as I understand it, is much more kind of fanciful. It's almost like the Shakespearean jester, you know, you're just trying to make some sparks, make some laughs, by any means necessary. So for me that means just giving myself license to invent and at the same time trying to have a generosity of spirit and a precision so that I'm being specific about what I'm saying. And then I think, well, yeah, I can, you know, I can imagine being anyone. You as a reader are also part of this experiment that you're saying, oh, George is playing a game. He's pretending to be an 85 year old oil executive with different political views than he holds. Okay, I can play that game as well, since I'm also large enough and I contain all these multitudes of personalities. So I think it's a little bit playful. Both reader and writer sign up for this kind of parlor game in a certain way, and then the fun comes from there.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

And this is true of many of your pieces of work where the story is fantastic, there are these funny moments, and then at the end you also realize, oh my God, that was a dark story that I just read. So you touch on these themes in a very interesting way. But going back to this idea that you said, you know, a climate change novel Feels like a hard thing. This is something that others have expressed. So a decade ago, the Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh gave a series of lectures he called the Great Derangement, where he argued that contemporary literature and contemporary writers had really ignored the climate crisis and that ignorance is adding to the peril that humans face. Do you think in that 10 years since, and especially now that you were doing this research, that the literary world has improved in bringing climate change more into the conversation?

[George Saunders]

I think so, and I think there's more of an intention to do so. But for me, the question is, how does one do that, given the. The features of the form itself? So in other words, if I'm a writer of string quartets, you know, and someone says, oh, you know, your string quartets are ignorant of climate change, think, well, it's a. You know, the form has requirements and the form has certain ways of producing delight, and we ignore those at our peril. So again, to me, I think the idea is to. With this book, I think I started thinking, all right, I'm going to prove to all the skeptics that climate change is real. And then as you get into the research, you're like, that. That isn't one, that's not what a novel does. But two, anyone who looks into it is already convinced, so that's not it. Instead, I'm going to use it as a backdrop or kind of a feature in the same way that if you look at a novel like Schindler's List or the movie, people always say, oh, it's about the Holocaust. But actually it's not. It's set, it's immersed in the Holocaust, but it's about something much more specific and human and, and universal, which is, for example, how does one, within an evil system, how does one strive to do good? So anytime we start writing a novel, we find out that the thing we thought it was about, it's not about that. And what I found is if you write a novel or a story and it ends up being about what you thought it was going to be about, you probably failed because the reader feels that condescension. You know, okay, he's given me a lecture. He's still giving me a lecture. The lecture is finished. I wish I'd read a different book. But on the other hand, if we enter into it as teammates, let's try to stumble on some mystery, let's open some questions up that I think is more the valid function of the novel. The book that might need to be written about climate change might not have climate change in it at all. It might be about denial, mindset. It might be about corporate hegemony, or it might be three people on an island somewhere. So we don't know.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yeah, it is interesting. I noted that there were only three mentions of the word climate in the entire book, and one of them is not about climate change at all. So it is a very interesting way in which you touch on the subject without being so literal in many cases. So crises in general do make for interesting storytelling moments. Like, we have great novels that feature volcanoes and tsunamis and earthquakes. There are great novels about financial crises and terrorist attacks. War, of course, features in many, many great novels. Is there something about the disaster that is climate change that makes it difficult?

[George Saunders]

Maybe, and I'm just thinking this for the first time, but it might just be that it's in some ways gradual on the human scale, it's gradual. And it's also disseminated so widely in so many different places. So I think that's difficult to come up with a narrative stance that could describe that. Naturally. I think Richard Powers did a really great job in the overstory. But, you know, to say a crisis that's happening quite quickly, of course, in geologic time, but in human time, it can appear gradual. It's not happening everywhere, all the time. It's a little bit difficult. But again, for me, I would never. Even early in this book, I thought, okay, it's not a climate change novel. It's a novel about the end of life. And, you know, and then, because, you know, one of the things that will really block a writer up is pressure. You know, I must do this. I must communicate this. That's not a formula for fun. You know, if you went on a date, you know, I must make her love me. That's a very bad vibe, you know, So I think for writing a novel, a certain amount of relaxation. And also, also, you know, you really are, no matter how dark the topic, you really are trying to make some love, you know, make some. Some positive energy for the reader. And I think the. The end game of a novel is somehow to make both parties, reader and writer, feel a little bit more alert to the fact that they're still alive. That, you know, so that is, in a certain way, if you think of writers like Gogol or Flannery o', Connor, that's something that happens regardless of topic or regardless of darkness. You know, it's the. It's the. In the same way that a really, well, beautifully done horror movie can kind of make you feel Alive. It's. That's the game.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

So the other theme that I want to explore here is about guilt and regret, which feature in the book in interesting ways. And they don't have to be about climate related. They're just sort of at the end of your life, what do you feel regret for? What are you guilty about is something that all of us have thoughts about and not just at the end of your life. Sometimes as you go through life in trying to address the guilt, is there something that you hope to get out of it? You know, say an oil executive reads vigil, which I am sure they will, you know, what do you hope they might learn from it?

[George Saunders]

That's another question. I feel I have to. As a writer, I have to really be careful of that because it's. It puts me in an innately sort of condescending position for me to teach you something. I am not sure that I have much to teach, but I do feel I can put an oil executive or anybody through a certain experience. So in that way, I think of myself more as a roller coaster designer. I don't have to know your profession to make you gasp at the bottom of a steep hill. And then embedded in that is the idea that that's a fun. It's a. I suppose it's a positive experience to go through. And. And I think mostly what happens when. When I read fiction that's good. All my certainties get wobbly, you know, I'm made aware of how quickly I normally rush to judgment and from what a limited place, you know, it's a fairly small aspiration, but, you know, to say to somebody who come on this journey with me, I don't care who you are, I don't care what you've done, but at the end of it, we're both going to feel a little something, a little more, I'd say a little more open. But you can say it however you like. That really is it. I mean, if we think about a songwriter, what does a songwriter try to do? It tries to remind you you're alive for a couple minutes, you know, so, you know, I don't really have a sort of a tautological or a rather educational intent, really. I don't. Because that if I do that, I become a, you know, a pedant.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yeah. I mean, a great novel is also giving you an experience of being somebody else, putting yourself as a reader in somebody else's shoes for that period of time to really acknowledge the reality of another being. And that can be very powerful, regardless of the type of person you're empathizing with or what cause you're empathizing with them for. And in this case it's an oil executive. You know, it's very clear some of the dialogues are very direct, calling out the horrors that may have happened as a result of his direct actions. But the reader is empathizing with the characters. Is there a limit to that empathy? You know, because people can do horrible things and those horrible things are very real. But is there a limit? Do that?

[George Saunders]

Well, that's where I get in a bit of a tangle, because the words empathy, compassion, sympathy, those are sometimes confusing. I think there's not a limit to the interest we can feel in another human being, even the most terrible. And I think it's all positive phenomenon just to be more interested in somebody and therefore to understand them better. The tricky part is that sometimes I think in the west we confuse that activity with permission giving somehow or a kind of a pre forgiveness. So if I empathize with somebody, it doesn't matter what they do. To me, I think that's a misunderstanding of compassion, for example. So to me, I have no problem trying to imagine even the inner process of even the worst person in the world. The difficulty I think is it's almost like Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. When you narrate somebody from inside, you warm them up. You can't help it. You know, you have somebody in the SS and you narrate a childhood memory, they suddenly are warming up. And that's a really complicated question. It's one of the reasons that, I mean, this guy in the book is bad, but he's bad in that sort of 2000 George Bush kind of way. He hasn't rejected a rules based order. He gives lip service to enlightenment values and so on. So he's kind of a. Compared to some of the stuff that's going on now, he's kind of a lightweight. But that I feel I can do him. Could I do somebody worse, Would I want to? That's a really interesting question. And honestly I don't know until I try, but it would be interesting for me. I have the idea of trying to write something about the current administration and then you get into some tricky stuff. What does the mental phenomenon of megalomaniac look like? Can you do it? Is it interesting to read at all? You know, important questions?

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yeah, it's a difficult one as a journalist too. I mean, you know, I've had all executives on the podcast before and there is this immediate judgment that comes from a lot of the green climate crowd saying, you should never platform these people. You shouldn't give them a voice. They already have a platform of their own. And we've got into this sort of territory, especially with the conversation on the Internet where people don't want to hear the other side and a novel of yours kind breaks through and enables people to look at the other side. Are there other ways in which we could do this, not just a novel?

[George Saunders]

Well, I think the conversations that you're describing would be really interesting. But as someone who does these conversations, the trick is to get somebody off their shtick, you know, so if an oil executive comes in and he's just going to resist you, then, you know, I don't know. I mean, for me, the question that's in my mind right now is, okay, I'm a naturally conflict averse person. That's why I'm a writer. And I love to think the best of people and I love to pretend I can inhabit anybody's mind. But your earlier question really haunts me, you know, are there people, one that you couldn't inhabit and two, that you shouldn't, you know, and that's interesting, but I think, to me, okay, I think that understanding another person's point of view is always a superpower, even if your intent is to resist them. It's a great tool. You know, if you were in a football game or something and someone said, hey, would you like the chance to inhabit the mind of the opposing coach for five seconds? You'd be crazy not to take that chance. So to me, it's kind of a win win to try to empathize or sympathize with other people. As long as we don't slide over into enabling. For example. Now here in the US the press is really doing, in my opinion, a pretty poor job of dealing with these hegemons that are taking over. There's a lot of enacting of older models of journalism, which is, well, you know, we've got to show both sides. But it sometimes becomes, you know, this side says hippos can fly, this side says they can't, okay, we'll meet in the middle. They fly sometimes, you know, so there's a kind of institutional sternness that we're struggling with, I think, to call a spade a spade and describe these things that are being done. But it's difficult in the old model of journalistic fairness, I'd say. Does that seem true?

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yeah, it is definitely a challenge because as soon as you are firm about something, somebody will say, that's a biased point of view, and it's a tricky balance to play out. But maybe one other thing that I've. In preparation to talk to you, I read a bunch of your work, but I also listened to you talk and give interviews. And I've interviewed hundreds of people in my life. And there is a type of person who says, I don't know often, and that typically is a writer. And I've heard you say, I don't know. I don't know how I feel about that. I don't know. I am sure about that particular point of view. That uncertainty of not knowing is not comfortable for most people, and that's why we get so much judgment online. Is there a way in which you can make somebody be comfortable with that uncertainty without having to be what you and I are, which is writing, which is a writer, which is what our profession is?

[George Saunders]

I'm going to answer this question kind of backwards maybe, but it occurs to me that one of the reasons people have become uncomfortable with uncertainty is that there's so much space for opining. You know, we have the Internet and it seems to be saying, hey, what do you think? Even if you don't know anything, what do you think? And so there's a kind of an implied pressure that we never don't know. For me, as a lifelong anxious person, and when I started doing interviews, I found that it was so much easier just to say I no idea than to falsify an answer that later I would regret. So for me, it's kind of an anxiety reducing move. But I think for most people these days it's a sign of weakness to not have an opinion. Which actually some of the most powerful people I have ever known were quite, you know, reserved and they, they recognized that, you know, an opinion costs you, to have an opinion costs you because it nails you down at a certain point in a world that is always changing and always uncertain. So a person who can resist a facile opinion stays open 360 degrees and they also receive more, more data. That's a very, I think, a very powerful thing for someone to recognize that their integrity and ultimately their ability to act when needed are all improved by a certain sort of reserved quality. So, so I tried to make it a point not to express an opinion well when I don't know anything, that's a good one. But also when, when the opinion isn't needed, you know, the abstract opinion is a, a hallmark of contemporary life. What do you think about those idiots who climb Mount Everest? First of all, I don't know. And second of all, is the world really waiting for me to opine? I don't think so. And I found it really comforting to go you don't have to know everything. You don't have to know almost anything. And if you factor in time, like at what time do I need to know that thing about Mount Everest? The answer is probably never so. So much of the opinion we do online is speculative and abstract, and I think it also costs us something.

[Akshat Rathi]

After the break, I asked George what he thinks about AI and whether it complements or compromises human creativity. What do you think? Write to the [e-mail] and while you're at it, write us a review on Apple podcasts, Spotify and YouTube. It helps new listeners find the show.

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[George Saunders]

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[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

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[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

You know you've been writing at a time and you found success at a time where the written word in general is in perhaps the most fierce competition that it has been in against other type of media. It's not cinema or Netflix streaming these days, it's TikTok and Instagram and reels. Do you think that the written word is losing to audio and video? And if it is, then what are we losing as a result?

[George Saunders]

I think it kind of depends how you define losing. I figured out a long time ago that if you have a handful of dedicated readers who really know how to read, that's a kind of a super dense pot of potential influence. People who really read deeply, they go out into the world, they take that into themselves very deeply and it affects their actions. Whereas if you take 20 million people watching a cat fall off a counter, that's just, you know, as I say, like poop through a goose, you know, it doesn't, it doesn't. So those people have seen the cat fall off the counter and they go in the world and nothing. So. So I've become kind of a believer in super encoding my stuff with density and care. I give it to you, obviously, a deeply thoughtful person who's very involved in living. It comes to you, it opens up in your mind, and that's all I need to know.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

The other thing that has been encroaching on writing and reading and thinking these days is artificial intelligence. And a lot of good writing is about making somebody think. And when it comes from one human to the other, there's a level of transfer that is amazing. Whereas with AI you're getting these machine generated answers to questions that everyday people have. What is your view of AI and how do you think it complements or destroys human creativity?

[George Saunders]

This might be one of those, I don't know, questions. I mean, I don't have a strong. I don't have much knowledge about its use in math or science. But in writing I can just say de facto it shouldn't be a problem because as you intimated, I'm over here in California, I'm having my day, I'm feeling things, I'm tasting things, I'm touching things, I'm thinking things. I go to my desk, I somehow get all of that into a made up story, but it's so infused with qualia, you know, my experience of being in the world. Then I send it to you. And the magic is, even though we have completely different experiences, it opens up in your mind. AI can imitate that all it likes, but it isn't the same, it can't be the same. The danger, I think, is just that if as AI inundates the world, our standards go down and that part of the mind that can be developed to pick up that human message might go a little dull. And of course, economically, it means that a lot of human writers may be put out of work by the poor simulation of human writing. So I think that's worth fighting for. Fighting about. I mean, it's not. My sense is that AI is kind of just being driven by investments, but we're not really asking why we need it. You know, there's efficiency, but efficiency always means more money for somebody. You know, it doesn't. There's no, in the abstract, efficiency isn't necessarily better. I mean, if I, if I can get my garden done efficiently by a robot, that's nice, but it's nice to work in a garden. So. So I'm not a. I'm not a fan of AI for writing. And I think we should be very skeptical of it because in all the sort of fun around AI to see what it can do, every one of those experiments involves a sacrifice, of course, of resources, but also of human involvement. I saw something. There's a sort of a wave of commercials here where there's one where a man is having a woman over for dinner and he asks AI to design a menu that will indicate I'm interested but not ready for a commitment with a straight face. So the AI cranks out the sink, he cooks it, and you see the two of them dancing around the kitchen. I'm like, dude, that's your job, you know, that's your job to come up with that menu. So. Or another one is about a brother and sister going on a road trip and the brother asks AI to design the road trip. What a. What a default. Like what a giving up of responsibility. So those kind of things. I think intelligent people can look at that and go, I don't want, I don't want that. No thanks, I don't want it. So I'm not, I'm not a fan. But maybe when I need brain surgery, maybe when I need brain surgery, I will be. I don't know.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yes, that's true. There are other aspects of AI that might be quite interesting. Two other aspects of writing that I want to touch on. So one thing that good novels do, they're almost philosophical texts. While being entertaining. You don't have to read philosophy, but you learn things about life and how to be a person and how to be a good person in the world. It is also a tool of critical thinking because you've put yourself in somebody else's mind and you see how they have thought about a certain situation. And maybe you will never encounter the exact same situation, but that logical steps that you've taken teach you something about the world. Do you think the media landscape as it exists. We talked about how it's hard for a journalist, but do you think it's also a problem on the reader side that they are not critical thinkers today, that they are not seeing what is misinformation, what is disinformation, what it is that non responsible players of information are doing with information and if so, what could be done to improve critical thinking among readers?

[George Saunders]

Yeah, I think the studies show that what you're saying is true, that as you read less, read complex text less, your ability to follow along argument erodes. And I believe also there was some study that made a connection from that to the ability to empathize, which it all makes sense, you know. Of course it does. I think, yes, it's a big. I think it's a big problem. I think here in the States it's the biggest problem. You hear some of these things that our leadership says and you can't believe that anybody can get through that text without balking and yet people swallow it. So I don't know. But anecdotally in my lifetime I started out in Chicago as a young kid in a Catholic school and, and books were sacred. I've had experiences in my life where from and I know you have too, an intense period of reading. I could feel my, my mind shifting, my, my vocabulary improved, my ability to express myself improved and therefore the world changed. The world became a more workable place because of the internal change. I that's. I'm as sure of that as I am of my shoe size that that happened. So if that isn't happening, then that means that the millions of minds aren't being kicked up into this higher gear, aren't being made more confident and more empathy friendly. That has to have a cultural effect. There was a wonderful piece in the Times, Ezra Klein and I think Masha Gessen, talking about how important it is in a Time like this to claim this space. Meaning what we're doing right now, let's just say. Let's just say that reading long text is a gift to yourself and it's necessary for a culture. Let's just say that out loud. And other people who agree with us will go, yeah, that's right. I'm. Oh, good. I'm not wrong. It sounds like a small effect, but I think it can be world changing just for people to occupy the space of truth, of benevolence, of patience, of fellow feeling. And it's a time where I think demonstrations of those things are so meaningful. You know, on Instagram, you see somebody here standing up to ice and being articulate, and you can feel the thrill running through your body and a little surge of courage.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Another writing question for you. So I as a writer came out of the age during the Internet era, so I really started with blogging. All my life, my main form of writing has been typing on a screen. And then over the past year, I have actually started writing with pen and paper longhand. I'm writing letters, I'm writing sometimes first draft of my story. And it's really changed how I think and how I then convert my thinking into that writing. Because it's a physical action that is different from what I used to do. So just a variation has made a difference. But it's also improved my mental health. And I wondered, you know, you've taught writing for so many years. Obviously you treat, you teach creative writing, you teach them to some of the best writers out there. But if you had to give a fun exercise to someone who's not a writer just to get going on writing, what would that exercise be?

[George Saunders]

I have one that I give and it's kind of a party game. So the game is this. You're going to write a 200 word story. And it has to be exactly 200 words, not 199, not 201. But you can only use 50 words to do it. So the way you play is you get a piece of paper and you start your story and you say, the cat sat on the table. Well, that's the cat sat on. That's five words. You write those down at the bottom, enumerated at the bottom of the sheet. And this way you keep track of where you are. At some point you hit your 50 and there's no new words. So, and then the other thing is you try to do this in 15 minutes. It's a lot of, a lot of imposed pressure. And that exercise, for it to be at its best. I shouldn't say any more about it, but if someone tries to do that, what they'll find is that a lot of the normal anxieties associated with writing go away under the pressure of the rules, and people will find one of the key things in a work of fiction is rising action. You know, to have that feeling of increasing complexity that automatically happens in this exercise, for reasons I don't quite understand. So often, if I have a young writer at Syracuse who's kind of penned herself in with certain ideas and dictums and mantras about how she is as a writer, you give them this exercise, and they don't have time to think about those things. They're just trying to get the thing done. And often a different writer will emerge on the page, and it's very, very exciting if you can do it. The other condition is do it in a group and let everybody know that they have to read theirs at the end. So that introduces a kind of entertainment function. And so it's funny, you know, if you ever believe that we contain many writers within us, this is a great exercise to get a different one than usual to come out.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

I'll also tell you a little story that happened last night that you'd appreciate because you mention in A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, a book that you've written about writing and reading, that you could do some of these exercises that you do in the book with others. And you gave the example of doing it with the story of Ernest Hemingway called Cat in the rain, and it's 1200 words. And you said, cut it into six sections and do the exercise. And last night I was commuting back home with my wife, and I told her it's the perfect length. Can I do a story exercise with you? It was end of the day, she was tired. She's like, do you really want to. I'm like, yes. Jot Saunders has convinced me this is the exercise. I think you'll love it.

[George Saunders]

She sounds like a very good wife.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

And we did the exercise, and this morning she wakes up and she said, can we do it again when we commute back?

[George Saunders]

Oh, that's beautiful, Teller. Thank you. You know, if there's another of his stories called Indian Camp, and that's a darker story, but it works the same way. Yeah, that's a really. That's a fun exercise. Thank you for telling me that. That really is nice to hear.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

So one last sort of more advice for writers like me, for nonfiction writers, people who write about climate change, it's going to be a topic that we stick with for decades to come. It is going to go through as we are seeing political upswings and downswings. Thinking as a fiction writer, but from a nonfiction context, how do you think we can tell better climate stories?

[George Saunders]

Well, I'm always a big believer. In particularity, I've done some casual humor type pieces for GQ in the New Yorker, and I always go in with a big idea, but I'm looking for specific things to contradict or complicate that idea. So I think my thought is to ground it in the cost to actual people that, I mean, that seems to be the one thing that we, that we can't, we can't deny. You know, I'd actually be interested in your thoughts. One of the kind of unspoken hardships that I found in nonfiction writing, but also in fiction is that the people, I'll put it the people I would like to convert don't read my books. You know, they don't come to my events so often. You're preaching to the choir. And I wonder if you have any insights about, in your experience of how maybe success stories of when you've been able to reach across that divide and maybe not change somebody's mind, but communicate in a meaningful way with somebody who wouldn't be predisposed to your ideas.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

It is a constant struggle, I will say the fact that I have interviewed for this podcast, but in general, people who do not act in good faith on climate change, like oil executives, which as you said, it's an interview where it is an honest conversation, I'm going to push back. I'm not going to allow somebody to lie. But those conversations, the other side also walks away with respect because they've come back on the podcast because even though the questions were hard and there were pushback, they felt like it was a conversation where I heard them and that they felt it was a fair conversation. I think the value of fairness in journalism is being questioned all the time. But it's good to be questioning that value because that is a value that we need to live up to. Because that's one way at least, that I find you can break to the.

[George Saunders]

Other side, you know, with the oil executives you've interviewed at their core, are they, well, this is maybe too broad a question, but do they really believe that climate change isn't real or are they being strategically dishonest?

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

No oil executive I have interviewed now does not believe that climate change is real.

[George Saunders]

Now.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yes. And you know, I've been a journalist doing this for 10 years. So for the last 10 years, I have not met an oil executive that denies climate change. I will say I have mostly spoken to oil executives of multinational public corporations. And so they have shareholders and their shareholders are pension funds, are large asset managers who have clear understanding of the science. If you're going to make money, you need to know reality.

[George Saunders]

That needs to go on a bumper sticker. If you're going to make money, you have to understand reality. Amen.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

But there are of course, climate deniers in other places and I haven't yet interviewed a private oil company executives. I haven't interviewed the Koch Corporation executive, for example, or Harold Ham. And I would be very open to interviewing them if they'd ever be interested in coming on the show.

[George Saunders]

But that, you know, that for me this book was. The interesting part, especially towards the end, was what does, what does denial look like in, in a phased approach, you know, in other words, when someone is in full denial, they're here. What are the steps they go through as they get closer to admitting the truth? And that was a really interesting. Because of course, you know, you can look at yourself to figure that one out.

[Interviewer / Podcast Host]

Yes. And a lot of the justifications. That's why even though you didn't speak to an executive and you simulated this exercise through your understanding, it is the kind of stuff that they actually go through in reality. There is this truth that comes out even in a fictional context. And which is why I enjoyed reading Vigil quite a lot. Thank you, George.

[George Saunders]

It was such a pleasure. You've got an amazing mind. I hope to encounter it again sometimes.

[Akshat Rathi]

And thank you for listening to Zero. Now for the sound of the week. That is the sound of a new long distance express train being inaugurated in India. India is planning to build out a huge network of new and improved train lines to better the service across the country, including its first bullet train line which is due to start running in 2027. If you like this episode, please take a moment to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts, YouTube and Spotify. This episode was produced by Oscar Boyd. Our theme music is composed by Wonderly. Special thanks to Gautam Naik, Swamar, Saadi Moses Andam, Laura Milan and Sharon Chen. I'm Akshat Rathi. Back soon.

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