Joshua Ferris reads George Saunders's "Adams" and discusses it with The New Yorker's fiction editor, Deborah Treisman.
This is the New Yorker fiction podcast from the New Yorker magazine.
I'm Deborah Treisman, fiction editor at the New Yorker.
Each month we invite a writer to choose a story from the magazine's archives to read and discuss.
This month we're going to hear a story from 2004 called Adams by George Saunders.
All day that look was in my mind, that look of hate.
And I thought, if that was me, if I had that hate level, what would I do?
Adams was chosen by Joshua Faris, author of the novel.
Then we came to the end.
Two of his stories have appeared in the New Yorker, and one of them, the dinner Party, was nominated for a national Magazine Award last year.
Hi, Josh.
Hi.
So George Saunders has published about 18 stories, well, not about exactly 18 stories in the magazine since 1992.
When we first talked about it, you mentioned wanting to do a story of his called from 2005, which was great but too long for this purpose.
What was it about Adams that made you choose it next?
I think that it's a deceptively complex story and that there's a lot of things that are going on in a short amount of time.
How did you first start reading George?
Did you find him in the magazine or somewhere else?
No, I found him at a Barnes and noble after.
I don't know what exactly prompted it, but some incredibly glowing review that made it clear that this guy was really writing wonderful fiction.
And I picked up civil war land in bad decline, and I knew right away that he was an original voice because I didn't want to read him.