Ayad Akhtar: The Radiance w/ Dr. Orna Guralnik

Gaitskill, bestselling author of Bad Behavior). When a hit-and-run shatters more than his body, a writer is plunged into a spiritual awakening he can’t tell from madness. In its grip, he’s drawn to a brilliant campus colleague by an uncanny pull, and into a scandal that threatens to destroy them both. What begins as a provocative portrait of academic and cultural warfare deepens into erotic entanglement, the exposure of a family secret, and the mystery surrounding the narrator’s accident—both the violence and its aftermath. Moving between rural America and Europe, Islam and Christianity, the intimate and the metaphysical, The Radiance is of our American moment and beyond it—asking not only what has broken, but what radiance remains. Ayad Akhtar is a novelist and playwright. His work has been published and performed in over two dozen languages. He is the winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the Edith Wharton Citation of Merit for Fiction, and an award in literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, among other honors. Akhtar is the author of the novels American Dervish, a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year, and Homeland Elegies, named one of 10 Best Books of 2020 by The New York Times. He has also authored the plays McNeal, Junk, Disgraced,The Who & The What, and The Invisible Hand. Akhtar was named the New York State Author in 2021. Dr. Orna Guralnik is a clinical psychologist, psychoanalyst and writer. She is faculty of the NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychoanalysis, editorial board of Psychoanalytic Dialogues and is the therapist and consulting producer of Couples Therapy, airing on Showtime/Paramount+. Her upcoming book “Couples” will be released in February by Penguin. Event guidelines: Each ticket includes a signed copy of the book. Additional copies of the book will be available for purchase at the event. A signing line will follow the talk. The conversation will be livestreamed for free online here. As a reminder: If you are not feeling well, please do not come to the event, even if you have a ticket; email us and we'll work it out. If you have any questions regarding these guidelines or to request accessibility accommodations, please contact eventhelp@booksaremagic.net.