Wed, Oct 28  •  6:30pm

Loss & Laughter

Gary Barwin and Ferdia Lennon

Laughter is the best medicine

Fiction
Conversation
Ticket or Pass Required
Passes available
Loss & Laughter
Loss & Laughter

Wed, Oct 28  •  6:30pm

Loss & Laughter

Gary Barwin and Ferdia Lennon

Laughter is the best medicine

Conversation
Fiction
Ticket or Pass Required
Passes available

About

Join Gary Barwin and Ferdia Lennon for a conversation about comedy in the face of death, and the surprising ways humour can help us navigate grief, loss and suffering. In The Comedian’s Book of the Dead, Barwin presents Death as a comedian whose journey into the underworld forces him to confront love, loss and fatherhood. In Lennon’s Glorious Exploits, two friends in wartime Syracuse turn to theatre, staging Medea with Athenian prisoners and discovering the power of art to create connection in a time of conflict. Together, they explore how storytelling, humour and human connection can help us hold on to our humanity.

A profound and imaginative underworld quest, and a fresh, funny page turner, from one of Canada’s most beloved and awarded storytellers. Death is a comedian and devoted family man, but everything falls apart when the Fates choose him to guide departed souls to the Beneath. Having to perform this new role erodes his humanity and causes him to do some perhaps unforgivable things, and when his only son dies by suicide, Death realizes he’s likely the one to blame.

Published by Book*hug Press

An utterly original celebration of that which binds humanity across battle lines and history. On the island of Sicily amid the Peloponnesian War, the Syracusans have figured out what to do with the surviving Athenians who had the gall to invade their city: they’ve herded the sorry prisoners of war into a rock quarry and left them to rot. Looking for a way to pass the time, Lampo and Gelon, two unemployed potters with a soft spot for poetry and drink, head down into the quarry to feed the Athenians if, and only if, they can manage a few choice lines from their great playwright Euripides.

Published by Macmillan Publishers Ltd.

Gary Barwin is a writer, composer and multimedia artist whose nationally bestselling novel Yiddish for Pirates was shortlisted for the Governor General's Award and the Giller Prize, and won the Leacock Medal. abcdefy

Ferdia Lennon was born and raised in Dublin. He holds a BA in History and Classics from University College Dublin and an MA in Prose Fiction from the University of East Anglia. Glorious Exploits is his first novel.

Dates & Times

Wed, Oct 28
6:30pm
7:30pm
A book signing will follow this event

Tickets

Full Festival Pass
SOLD OUT
Regular $159
Under 30 $79
5-Day Festival Pass
Includes 5-day festival events. Excludes Masterclasses.
Regular $159
Under 30 $79
1-Day Wednesday
Includes all Wednesday events.
Excludes Masterclasses.
Regular $29
Under 30 $15
Pass Information
5-Day Festival Pass includes Barbara Kingsolver and East West Street: A Song of Good & Evil .
2-Day Weekend and 1-Day Passes do not include Winter Garden Theatre events.

Venue

Emmanuel College Chapel, Room 319

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