But first - I’ve received a number of emails at the Storyclubwithgeorge@gmail.com address, with fixes and additions to the master story list we’ve compiled. I’ll get a revised version out here over the next few weeks. Just wanted to let you know that… I’m on it.
So, Friday night, there was a reception at the Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress, and here are some photos from that.
Someone mentioned to me that this was “the most ornate building in D.C.” A dazzling and inspiring place, for sure.
Until the late 1980s, this was the office of the Librarian of Congress and apparently visiting writers and poets would give readings from this balcony, to an audience below.
Gutenberg Bible, yes.
A glimpse into a reading room…
Afterwards, I walked back to the Hay-Adams hotel along the Mall, hitting all the monuments, a walk I always find moving and inspiring, partly because my wife, Paula, and I came to D.C. the first summer after we were married and heard Roberta Flack on the Mall on (of course) the Fourth of July…
This guy actually looks a little like me when I was in my twenties except that he is fighting for liberty for all and I was, mostly, watching MTV while halfway looking for a job.
Visiting an old pal. Just a few minutes before I got here, I got an email from Missy Mazzoli, saying she’d finished a first draft of the opera of Lincoln in the Bardo. The timing was…kistmetish. I listened to it at the hotel and it is truly astonishing and original. I cannot wait for the world to hear it. And the libretto, by Royce Vavrek, is a masterpiece of compression and feeling. Working with these two masters has been one of the highlights of my artistic life so far, and we’re just getting started…
The aforementioned pal.
Next morning, I went to hear the amazing Jesmyn Ward give her talk on “Why Fiction Matters” at the Festival. It was a wonderment and was greeted with a standing ovation. The gist of it, beautifully rendered, was that telling someone’s story is an act of love, and that the love comes in the form of the small details that otherwise would be lost to time - she used the beautiful example of her grandmother as the centerpiece of the lecture. I very much hope she publishes it somewhere. As happens whenever I hear a beautiful talk by a writer, it made me proud to be a writer myself, and made me want to rush back home and get started again.
Jesmyn Ward, in conversation with Dr. Carla Hayden, Librarian of Congress.
On the way home, I stumbled on a bit of Lincoln history I didn’t know about - he attended the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church and this is the post (yes, the exact post) to which he used to tie his horses. Seriously.
And the pastor of that church was Phineas Gurley, who gave the eulogies at the funerals of Willie Lincoln and Abraham Lincoln (and was with the Lincolns after the assassination, consoling Mary.)
That evening was my event - during which Dr. Carla Hayden, the Librarian of Congress - a wonderful and gracious and gifted person indeed - presented me with the Library of Congress Fiction Prize for 2023 and I was interviewed by Clay Smith, the Literary Director of the Library of Congress.
This is the magical moment in my talk when always I break into “The Itsy-Bitsy Spider.” It kills, trust me. Photo by Erin Engle.
This is Clay Smith, who is not only an excellent, perceptive interviewer and an old soul but a fellow former resident of Amarillo, Texas. Photo by Jay Silberman.
This is Dr. Hayden, the Librarian of Congress, bringing the Festival to a close. I’m not sure why I’m reading over her shoulder like that, but if you’re going to read over anyone’s shoulder, it makes sense to choose someone as kind and intelligent and powerful as Dr. Hayden. Photo by Bob Attardi.
It was fun to be signing books again. This photo and the next by Erin Engle.
And here is solid proof that I am, in fact, a “current author.” It says so, right on the combination of those two signs. (Thanks to everyone who waited patiently in line. Every time I come away convinced that I have the nicest readership there could ever be.)
On Sunday, I got a tour of Oak Hill Cemetery, where Lincoln in the Bardo was set, from the wonderful and generous Laura Thoms, the Project Archivist for Oak Hill. We were joined by Bob Attardi, the Director of Programs at Politics and Prose, his wife, Dierdre Attardi, and Andrea Seiger, a tour guide and the author of 111 Places in Washington That You Must Not Miss, who leads the tours. Here’s their description of the tour:
“... Join Andréa Seiger , author of guidebook, 111 Places in Washington That You Must Not Miss, for a walk in this elegant and peaceful cemetery. We will step back to February 1862, when 11-year-old Willie Lincoln succumbed to typhoid fever, and to the stories from the White House and around the city from that time. The novel’s fictitious characters will be woven in as we visit, with actual residents of the cemetery who preceded Willie Lincoln in death, and who may have been there to welcome his arrival among them.”
The tours are schedule periodically throughout the year and tend to sell out. Contact Politics and Prose Bookstore for more information, or sign up here to get on their information list.
The front gate and “that dreaded iron fence.”
The front gates through which Lincoln would have entered all those years ago.
A photo of the gatehouse in the 1800s. Note the gatekeeper, later to be voiced, on the audiobook by Ben Stiller. :)
In another strange coincidence, you may remember that Willie’s funeral was held after a huge storm in DC had downed many trees…and here’s what it looked like on Sunday.
Here’s me, cleaning up the path - well, pretending, for a few seconds, to be cleaning up the path. Photo by Laura Thoms.
Laura had this waiting on a table of other historical Oak Hill artifacts. Presumably, this would have been the key Lincoln used to enter the Carroll crypt, which a friend of his, Judge Carroll, had loaned to Abe and Mary, so Willie’s body would be nearby.
This is the record kept of the Carroll crypt. By my reckoning, it looks, according to this, that there would only have been three coffins in the crypt in February of 1862, when Willie’s coffin was placed here. In yet another strange coincidence, some direct descendants of the Carroll family happened to be visiting (for the first time ever) on Sunday (!) and I got the chance to meet them. A really serendipitous and warm moment.
The path leading to the crypt (which is up there ahead on the left). So a lot of the action of the novel would have happened right here(ish), including the gathering of the ghosts who come to see Willie. But it’s funny, the disconnect between mental (i.e. imagined while writing) and actual space…
I first visited this spot around 2011 or 2012, I think and it was standing here, thinking, “Jeez, Lincoln stood right here, he actually did,” that I decided to give the book a try. My feeling was, trying it would, at the very least, stretch me, even if it was a failure in the end. There HAD to be a story there, I felt, having been in the actual (profound) place.
The door through which Lincoln would have entered.
This plaque was recently added to the inside of the crypt.
Me and Laura Thoms. Thanks, Laura, for an incredible visit.
I spent so much time here in my mind that it’s always strange to be here in person. This and the previous photo by Laura Thoms.
This is the “roof” of the crypt, where I imagined a lot of the novel’s action took place - Willie spent a lot of time sitting up here, for example.
Trying to reconcile the actual map with the one in my mind. Which was much simpler….Photo by Laura Thoms.
The chapel where Willie’s service was held.
The interior of the chapel, the scene of the climax of the book (Willie’s departure). The ghosts, I imagined, were pouring in through that back wall.
“The stained-glass windows responded dully but substantially to the dim moonlight shining through them… suffusing all with a bluish tint.”
One of these houses - I think the one on the far left - would have been the home of Isabelle Perkins, who sat up there in one of those second-story windows (I’m going, again, to say the leftmost of the two windows) watching the events of the night unfold…
In the office/gatekeeper’s house. Photo by Laura Thoms.
Oak Hill is such a beautiful place - when I’m there it speaks to me as much about life as it does about death.
Laura sent me this photo from awhile ago - but it perfectly captures the spirit of the place.
A heartfelt thanks to everyone who helped make this such a special and memorable trip, especially Dr. Carla Hayden, Clay Smith, and the Library of Congress, Erin Engle, Laura Thoms, Andrea Seiger, and Bob Attardi — whose generous gift of a Politics and Prose baseball cap saved me from some serious sunburn on the long walk back to the hotel.
Which, by the way: thanks to the beautiful Hay-Adams Hotel, where every single person I dealt with was a joy.
Sunday - we’ll get back to work on something (TBD).
Wonderful to see the places we've "seen" in Bardo.
Glad you're home George, and most sincere Congratulations on such Eminent Recognition.
It feels such a privilege to be in your company at "Story Club." Thank you for all you do.