The Triumph of a Heart: Garth Greenwell in Conversation With Brian Gresko

Join novelist Garth Greenwell and frequent Poets & Writers Magazine contributor Brian Gresko for a reading and discussion of Greenwell’s new book of fiction, Small Rain. This event took place on Thursday, September 5, 2024.
In “The Triumph of a Heart,” a profile of the author in the September/October 2024 issue, Gresko explores the origins of Greenwell’s new novel, Small Rain, in which “an unnamed narrator enters the hospital during the height of the pandemic for a torn aorta, a painful and potentially fatal condition not often experienced in middle age. To treat the problem requires knowing what caused it, and that mystery catalyzes the narrative,” Gresko writes. “In some sense, writing Small Rain was my trying to deal with mortality,” Greenwell says. “At the heart of this book is the question, ‘Okay, if this is it, then what has my life meant? How does one measure the value of a life, and how would I measure the value of mine?’”
In this virtual event, Greenwell reads from the new book and discusses with Gresko its resonant themes of mortality and meaning-making, asking deep questions about what it takes to live a full life oriented toward art, open to the bewildering beauty of our own humanity.

[@jedblore7742]

One of the most important conversations on art & life that I've ever heard. Thank you! 💙

[@zunaidmansoor4194]

Dear Kevin Larimer and Brian Gresko, I trust you’re both well in health, in spirit and all areas of your lives at this time! I am so grateful that I joined that outstanding virtual launch at 1am from South Africa! And, it’s been on my mind every day since! It was my first time live virtually with Garth Greenwell - my favorite writer! Thank you for gifting this beautiful opportunity to us readers, scholars, academics, artists etc. internationally!!! I salute you, from South Africa, and look forward to many more opportunities! Sending you all peace, blessings and prosperity!