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George Saunders Facts & Worksheets

George Saunders is an American writer of short stories, children’s books, essays, and a novel.

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George Saunders is an American writer of short stories, children’s books, essays, and a novel. He has written eleven books, the majority of which are collections of short stories. He has one full-length novel which won the 2017 Man Booker Prize for best work of fiction in English. At present, he works as a professor at Syracuse University and continues to write for The New Yorker.

See the fact file below for more information on the George Saunders or alternatively, you can download our 23-page George Saunders worksheet pack to utilise within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

EARLY LIFE AND INFLUENCES

  • George Saunders was born on December 2, 1958, in Amarillo, Texas. He grew up in Oak Forest, Illinois on the South Side of Chicago.
  • His parents were his early influences. His father, who worked for Peterson Oil and Coal, would return from work with frightening stories. His mother, on the other hand, had a West Texas sense of humor and used invented voices in the exaggerated scenarios of her stories.
  • His third-grade teacher introduced him to Johnny Tremaine by Esther Forbes. It was the first time that he read a book and the style of writing had a big impact on him. According to him, Forbes’s sentences made the world; it did not (merely) describe it.
  • He attended the Colorado School of Mines and finished a BSc in geophysical engineering in 1981. However, his heart was not in this as he prioritized reading Hemingway rather than studying for his differential equations exams.

SAUNDERS’S CAREER

  • He worked as a field geophysicist in Sumatra, Indonesia. During his time in his jungle camp, he attempted to write about his current life imitating Hemingway and Thomas Wolfe’s writing style but later realized that he needed to write like himself.
  • He returned to the United States after suffering from a stomach-related illness in Indonesia in 1983.
  • He did different jobs such as slaughterhouse knuckle puller, convenience store clerk and a guitarist.
  • He discovered Stuart Dybek’s stories, which showed him that writing could be a possible vocation.
  • In 1988, He finished his MA in Creative Writing at Syracuse University. The faculty was concerned about his lack of literary background.
  • He worked as a technical writer in an environmental agency, Radian Corporation in New York, from 1989 to 1996. Stealing some worktime from his job, he wrote his first volume of stories, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline and published it in 1996. He was one of the finalists in the PEN/Hemingway Award for this work.
  • He joined the faculty of Syracuse University in 1997 to teach creative writing in their MFA program. He continued to write and publish stories and has been with the University until now.

LITERARY WORKS AND ACCOLADES

  • Since 1992, his stories have appeared regularly in The New Yorker. He also wrote for Harper’s, McSweeney’s, Esquire, American Psyche and the weekend magazine, The Guardian.
  • In 2000, he wrote another short stories collection, Pastoralia and a children’s book A Very Persistent Gappers of Frip.
  • His book, a collection of short stories, In Persuasion Nation, was published in 2006 and was shortlisted for the Story Prize.
  • His most famous book, Tenth of December, was published in 2013 and was nominated for multiple awards. The New York Times Book Review selected it as one of the top 10 books of 2013 and one of the finalists in the National Book Award.
  • His experimental book and first full-length novel, Lincoln in the Bardo, won the Man Booker Prize in 2017 and was the number-one New York Times Best Seller. The book was a huge success critically and commercially.
  • Aside from this, Saunders also wrote many critically acclaimed short stories such as the National Magazine for Fiction Awardees “The 400-Pound CEO” and “Bounty” published in Harper’s Magazine in 1994 and 1996, respectively, “The Barber’s Unhappiness,” published in The New Yorker on 2000 and “The Red Bow” published in Esquire on 2004.
  • Saunders was also a great essayist; he wrote his first non-fiction collection, “The Braindead Megaphone”, in 2007. It was about Saunders’ travel essays based on his trips to Nepal, Dubai, and Mexico.

INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT GEORGE SAUNDERS

  • George Saunders met his wife Paula Redick, a ballet dancer and fellow writer, while on his MFA program at Syracuse University.
  • They got engaged after three weeks. His wife was the first one to read every story he had written. They have two daughters, Caitlin and Alena Saunders.
  • He once procrastinated when Syracuse University asked him to deliver a commencement address, and ended up using the talk on kindness he had given to his daughter’s middle school class.
  • The speech, which includes “What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness”, struck a chord – it became the basis for his book “Congratulations, By the Way”.
  • Saunders won four National Magazine Awards for fiction. He was also a MacArthur Fellowship and Guggenheim Fellowship recipient.

George Saunders Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle which includes everything you need to know about George Saunders across 23 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use George Saunders worksheets that are perfect for teaching students about George Saunders who is an American writer of short stories, children’s books, essays, and a novel. He has written eleven books, the majority of which are collections of short stories. He has one full-length novel which won the 2017 Man Booker Prize for best work of fiction in English. At present, he works as a professor at Syracuse University and continues to write for The New Yorker.

Complete List Of Included Worksheets

  • George Saunders Facts
  • Saunders’ Bio
  • Matching Books
  • Saunders’ Inquiry
  • Pre-Writing Career
  • Literary Influences
  • Missing Pieces
  • Your Own Short Story
  • Saunders’ Quotes
  • Tenth of December
  • Inspiring Works

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Use With Any Curriculum

These worksheets have been specifically designed for use with any international curriculum. You can use these worksheets as-is, or edit them using Google Slides to make them more specific to your own student ability levels and curriculum standards.

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