Tom Wolfe Weekend Seminar: Vigil

Featuring Author George Saunders

Schedule for the Tom Wolfe Weekend Seminar: Vigil featuring author George Saunders to come.

This considerable preamble is only fitting to introduce our novel and writer: George Saunders, generally known as America’s most influential short-story writer until he wrote his first novel, “Lincoln in the Bardo,” in 2017 and became the second American ever to win the prestigious Man Booker Prize. Now he is known as simply one of America’s most influential, and most unique, writers. His highly anticipated second novel, “Vigil,” published in January 2026, has already garnered the kind of buzz that guarantees conversation and a wide audience. The novel relates the bedside conversation between a dying oil company CEO and his angelic guide as he is ushered from our world to the next. “Vigil” confronts the value of a life well-lived, the philosophical question of regret and the consequences, environmental and cultural, of a single individual. Praise in advance has noted that the novel is “wise, playful, and electric,” and it seemed an appropriate choice for the most storied book club on campus.

During the Tom Wolfe Weekend Seminar, Saunders will address us on writing, responsibility, and ethics on Friday night and then will be with us for a delightful reception and dinner. On Saturday morning, we will hear from professors handpicked by the faculty and the Mudd Center to discuss “Vigil” from different perspectives. We will then have a chance to hear Saunders respond to our W&L scholars in a Q&A, panel discussion, and lunch. The 2026 Tom Wolfe Weekend Seminar is sure to be one for the ages as we get to hear from one of the most exciting, forward-thinking, and brilliant writers of this generation.

Sponsored by the Class of 1951 in honor of classmate Tom Wolfe ’51, the Tom Wolfe Weekend Seminar continues to cement a rich tradition in its 21st year. Each year, the program invites a writer who exemplifies Wolfe’s tradition of careful elocution and observation of America, its people, its institutions, and its ideas. This year, the Tom Wolfe Weekend Seminar will join forces with the Roger Mudd Center for Ethics, which was established through a gift by Wolfe’s contemporary Roger Mudd ’50. Every year, the Mudd Center picks a context and theme through which to examine ethics in public and professional life. This year, the theme is environmental ethics.

Program Cost: $275 per person
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