George Saunders interview on the power of empathy in the world

Well earlier we reported on the rising gun sales among Americans who fear their rights are under threat. But there’s another side to this increasingly divided nation – tolerance, and the ability to talk to those who disagree.

That’s the conclusion which author George Saunders arrived at, after travelling across the States meeting Trump supporters. His debut novel, Lincoln in the Bardo, is a supernatural tale set at another time of dramatic divison: America’s civil war. Fatima Manji went to meet him.