Lincoln in the Bardo

Just finished the book Lincoln in the Bardo which was awarded the 2017 Man Booker Prize in UK and is in the New York bestseller list. The novel began with the death of Willie Lincoln the son of Abraham Lincoln at age 11 of typhoid fever. It also happened at the peak of the American Civil War with great losses of men on both sides. Although the word Bardo never appears in the whole book except in its title, bardo in Tibetan Buddhism is a state before rebirth. Reading the book it becomes clearly obvious that George Saunders, the author is a Buddhist as many Buddhist concepts are subtly interwoven into the story line and yet so well exemplified. The narrators are mainly 3 ghosts that are stucked in the Bardo because of their inability to detach from their previous lives and their refusal to acknowledge their death. The book is also full of citations from the press and various writers of that period relating to the death as well as the waging civil war and the toll of both on Abraham Lincoln.

As it turned out Abraham visited his son's grave at night and promised to be back again. Willie  hence refused to leave for the next world. As per the story children who die should depart as quickly as possible to avoid being entrenched and rooted by beings from some realm. Hence the 3 ghost narrators tried their best to help both father and son to stop holding on to each other. The grief of the father is written in such heart wrenching words. One critique of the book explained that the poignant grief also represents the grief for all the sons lost during the civil war and the great guilt upon the President. "Some blows fall too heavy upon those too fragile"

There are also many sub plots about a whole host of other ghosts who were dying to narrate and keep retelling the stories of their lives. You get the general sense of it, the regrets, the vengeance, the unfulfilled dreams, the guilt and the inability to let go. "So many wills, memories, complaints, desires, so much raw life-force".

 "Universal heartbreak.... part of human condition". In my mind one word sums it all "Durkha" - the universality of sufferings from attachment which George Saunders so deftly articulates in the book. He also also weaves in the concept of impermanence when he describes Abraham Lincoln's thoughts of his son:

He came out of nothingness, took form, was loved, was always bound to return to nothingness.
Only I did not think it would be so soon.
Or that he would precede us.
Two passing temporariness developed feelings for one another.
Two puffs of smoke became mutually fond.
I mistook him for a solidity, and now must pay
........
All alter, are altering, in every instant.


Truly a book with words that linger.


















thinking of the great unwritten story of our country is that community’s resilience, and the faith in the American ideals, in spite of the shit that was being piled on them relentlessly.”