For the month of July we covered George Saunders’ Lincoln in the Bardo. Winner of the 2017 Man Booker Prize, Lincoln in the Bardo is an experimental novel that takes place after the death of Abraham Lincoln’s son, Willie. The novel mainly takes place in the bardo, a purgatory realm in which spirits roam. The novel aims to tackle the themes of loss, grief and acceptance.
One of the delicate but poignant themes of the novel is obsession and how obsession can fester the inability for closure. A barrier is established that refuses individuals the ability to move on or seek enlightenment. In Lincoln in the Bardo, all of the ghosts are condemned to the bardo because unknown to them, they have yet to make peace with their deaths. Though they don’t expect to be one of the living in time, they do yearn to exist in some form or another under the same skies. We can see this through a few of our characters such as Vollman who yearns for his wife or with Bevins III who deeply regrets his suicide.
This sense of feeling can also be identified in our own personal lives and in society as well. When we think of the word “obsession” we often attach a negative connotation to it, however, there can be examples of when our obsessions can bring about our deepest joys and comforts. Resulting in no harm to ourselves or others. Today, we see this a lot with athletes or sports teams and musical artists. But the typical and largely accepted understandings of obsession are that it can be a destructive force that hinders personal growth and relationships, both internal and external. In the bardo, the ghosts exist with the later.
As Lincoln in the Bardo is also a historical text that follows Abraham Lincoln, a historical figure, we can identify obsession with how we record, analyze, revise and even study history itself. Lincoln himself is quite a polarizing figure who despite having many institutions, statues and even a coin dedicated to him, was merely a man who existed over a 100 years ago, just like our ancestors. Of course the difference is that Lincoln’s impact on the social fabric of America was perhaps greater. But how many other great leaders or individuals have had greater impacts around the world whose stories have never been recorded to such detail? In cultures where history is recorded through song, chant and storytelling, do the glories or impacts of those leaders or individuals lack significance? There are significant historical details to prove that despite Lincoln “freeing the slaves,” he was not an abolitionist. Lincoln believed that there were deep inherent differences between the races that condemned them from ever living together in social or political equality.
But today and for most of our modern history, our obsession with Lincoln and what he represented has created the barrier in which we can’t recognize past his accomplishments.