George Saunders

Read this memoir for a glimpse of a vanished country (ours, circa 1940s/1950s/1960s) that had an entirely different notion of education and the arts, i.e., a country that valued them and honored them and supported them with money and muscular institutions, which institutions, in turn, produced courageous and original national artists like Glass – who is also, turns out, a wonderfully gifted, honest, and amiable writer.