One of the major themes
of In Persuasion Nation is advertising and its effect on
American culture. The biting satires in this book focus on the downfalls of
modern America and a major theme is how we are affected by the commercials that
bombard us constantly. Several stories focus on this, while others feature
subtle references to the insidious nature of consumer culture.
One of the first stories in the book is “Jon.” This story is set in a
semi-dystopian world and is told from the perspective of a teenager who has
been living his entire life as a member of some sort of permanent focus group
for the products and advertisements to which the rest of the world is exposed.
The main character knows by memory an immense catalog of advertisements and
uses them as analogies to relate to his daily life. He even goes so far as to
describe his first sexual experience in terms of a cereal commercial. This
exemplifies, albeit to an extreme degree, how the advertisements we see stick
with us and how an effective advertisement will pop into your head at seemingly
inappropriate times.
A discussion of advertising in this story would not be complete without an
analysis of the titular story, “In Persuasion Nation.” Perhaps the most surreal
of all (although that would be a hard distinction to make for this collection),
this story is about the trials and tribulations of characters in the
advertisements that we watch. One of the main aspects of this story is a
critique of the violence that pervades advertising, often for comic effect. By
personifying the injured polar bears and decapitated workers, Saunders
effectively makes us question why these images are successful in inspiring us
to buy things.
In In Persuasion Nation, Saunders is critical of many aspects of
American culture. “Brad Carrigan, American” focuses on television entertainment
with a critique very similar to Saunders’ discussion of advertising. Needless
and excessive violence is used to make the American public laugh in “Brad
Carrigan” much like it is used to sell things in “In Persuasion Nation.” In
short, George Saunders use satire, wit, and polemic to show us how pervasive
persuasion is in our consumer culture.