George Saunders Brings Morality Back to Fiction

George Saunders Brings Morality Back to Fiction: A Review of “Vigil”

Books have long been seen as vehicles for both aesthetic pleasure and moral improvement. By Julius Taranto, January 27, 2026, 8 AM ET
In the early days of the novel, authors such as Samuel Richardson’s Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded (1740) made it clear that they intended to not only entertain but also educate their readers. This tradition was upheld by many 19th-century writers who openly engaged with moral and social issues in their works.

However, the modernist shift towards “show-don’t-tell” storytelling has often sidelined this aspect. George Saunders is an eminent exception to contemporary literature’s broader retreat from wisdom-seeking. The Booker-winning author has not embedded direct philosophical musings within his fiction, but he is distinctive for thoroughly embracing the role of moral guide—and for seeing his preacher-writer role resonate with a large audience.

Saunders’s latest novel, Vigil, takes on this mission with a heavy hand. While it showcases his great gifts for voice, farce, and tick-tick-tick plotting, the work suffers from an all-too-human foible of claiming high ideals while failing to actually abide by them.

The Ethical Thrust of Saunders’ Work

Saunders’s fiction has always had an ethical thrust. His inventive short stories often explore the lives of economically weak and exploited individuals, providing a stark moral commentary on society. His publisher has also compiled standalone works such as Congratulations, by the Way , which enjoin kindness, and A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, a course about Russian writers who view fiction as “a vital moral-ethical tool.”
In A Swim, Saunders gives critics a tidy summary of his message: “that every human being is worthy of attention and that the origins of every good and evil capability of the universe may be found by observing a single, even very humble, person and the turnings of his or her mind.”

The Disappointment in Vigil

However, Vigil disappoints as it sets out to do just that. The novel’s protagonist, Jill, is essentially a supernatural priest who visits the minds of the dying to provide “comfort” and “elevation.” Set on the spooky cusp between life and death, the novel centers around an 87-year-old oil tycoon named K.J. Boone.

The first pages introduce a wall of photos depicting Boone’s success. As Jill enters his mind, she finds “a steady flow of satisfaction, even triumph.” She scans for doubts but finds none. In fact, Boone is as sure of himself as ever.

This stark contrast between the public image and private reality sets up an inquisition that is more like a mobbing. Boone is relentlessly hounded by figments of his guilty memory and other ghosts, all emphasizing his nefarious role in delaying action to combat climate change. The lead ghost campaigner, a slapstick Frenchman, pelts Boone with apparitions: odd weather patterns, extinct birds, a starved man from a decimated Indian village.

Boone’s daughter, praying at his bedside, veers into thinking about a documentary her “libdope” friends tricked her into watching. Boone refuses to admit error despite repeated opportunities. Although the prosecution of Boone is often funny and sometimes moving, it is unmistakably unkind.

Analysis and Critique

Saunders’s perhaps fanatical loathing of oil executives—Boone bears many similarities to former Exxon CEO Lee Raymond—is not tamed by the reality of how people find their roles in the world and justify the (sometimes villainous) choices those roles might require. Jill, Saunders’s impossibly sentimental and pure-hearted ghost, remains so even as she grows horrified by Boone and considers abandoning her effort to comfort him. Boone is self-made but his memories of a dirt-poor childhood are undercut by scenes where he berates employees and enjoys it.

He snaps at his “chubby bimbo” oncology nurse, calls Jill a “stupid bitch,” and repeatedly insists that in his whole life, he “had done nothing wrong.”
The failure to credit Boone with commonplace human thoughtfulness is echoed by his allies who damn him by association. His fond daughter’s prayers reveal her to be a haughty, materialistic racist, and the ghosts of his former collaborators are transparently demonic.

Conclusion

Saunders has done far better in works such as Lincoln in the Bardo and stories like “Pastoralia” and “The Semplica-Girl Diaries,” both at depicting the morally compromised and at humanely deflating the apparently righteous. While Vigil’s prose is swift, witty, and striking, its malice in staging a deathbed inquisition that reduces the decedent to clichés undermines Saunders’s own moral purpose. Thank you for supporting The Atlantic. Explore more topics on literature.