In the Presence of the Dead: A Conversation with Thomas Lynch on Living and Dying
Thomas Lynch is a critically acclaimed poet, essayist, and short-story author from Milford, Michigan where he is also an undertaker. His lecture will reflect on the intersection of living and dying and how our care for the dead reveals how we live.
Lynch’s work was the subject of PBS Frontline’s The Undertaking, which won the 2008 Emmy Away for Arts and Culture Documentary. He was also the subject of Cathal Black’s film, Learning Gravity, produced for the BBC, which was featured at the 2008 Telluride Film Festival and the 6th Traverse City Film Festival in 2009 where is was awarded the Michigan Prize by Michael Moore.
His numerous publications include The Good Funeral (Westminster John Knox 2013, with Thomas Long), The Sin Eater: A Breviary (Paraclete Press 2011), Walking Papers (W.W. Norton 2010), Apparition & Late Fictions (short stories & novella W.W. Norton, 2010), The Undertaking (Norton,1997).
Lynch’s work has also appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Washington Post, New York Times, Harper’s, Poetry, and Times of London.
The event is free and open to the public. For further information, please contact Jessica Keating at 574.631.9781 or email jessica.f.keating.34@nd.edu
Co-sponsored by the Notre Dame Character Project and the Office of Human Dignity & Life Initiatives at the Institute for Church Life.