When Push Comes to Shove: Stories by George Saunders

Selected Shorts

Symphony Space

Arts, Fiction, Books, Society & Culture

4.4 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 12 January 2023

⏱️ 61 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On this Selected Shorts we turn the show over to universally beloved author George Saunders. Saunders somehow finds the good, or at any rate the imperfectly human, in his characters. The result is a catalog as funny as it is moving, as devastating as it is hopeful. On this program, two stories that perfectly illustrate this. “Love Letter” is from Saunders’ latest collection Liberation Day. In it, an anxious grandfather who is ambivalent about the state of the world counsels an older grandchild. “Love Letter” is read by Stephen Colbert. And a favorite from our archives, “The Falls,” shows us two flawed men given a chance to do the right thing. Rene Auberjonois reads. Meg Wolitzer interviews Saunders at the end of the show.

Transcript

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0:00.0	The
0:01.8	The
0:02.8	The
0:03.8	The
0:04.8	The
0:05.8	The
0:06.8	The
0:07.8	Stephen Colbert used his day off from the late show to come to selected shorts and perform
0:12.6	a short story by masterful satirist George Saunders.
0:16.4	Why?
0:17.4	To find out, you'll have to stick around.
0:20.2	I'm your host, Meg Wallitzer, and you're listening to selected shorts where our greatest
0:24.4	actors transport us through the magic of fiction, one short story at a time.
0:29.5	Short story writer George Saunders is always looking for the ray of light.
0:41.8	Whether writing satires about hellish theme parks or heartfelt tales about ailing octogenarians,
0:47.6	Saunders somehow finds the good or at any rate the imperfectly human in his characters.
0:53.0	The result is a catalog as funny as it is moving, as devastating as it is hopeful.
0:59.0	Like many readers, we had selected shorts were drawn to Saunders' fierce, fascinating voice
1:03.6	right away.
1:05.1	Over the years, we featured many stories from Saunders collections, including the much-love
1:09.4	10th of December, and even a bit of the Booker Prize-winning novel Lincoln in the Bardo.
1:14.8	We've also been lucky enough to host the author several times at Symphony Space in New
	...

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