On Tuesdays I'm a Buddhist: Expeditions in an in-between world where therapy ends and stories begin

Description

'Searingly honest, funny, self-deprecating, Harding's narrative seems to rest on the pulse of Ireland' Irish Times One day in the summer of 2016, Michael Harding's wife brought an unusual gift home from Warsaw. All of a sudden, he found himself falling back into the old religious devotions of an earlier time. The meaning he had found through years of engagement with therapy began to dissolve. Here, in On Tuesdays I'm a Buddhist, Harding examines the search for meaning in life which keeps him fastened to the idea of god. After many therapy sessions focused on an effort to uncover personal truth, and long solitary months on the road with a one man show, Harding is finally led to an artists' retreat in the shadow of Skellig Michael. Mixing stories from the road with dispatches from his Irish Times columns, On Tuesdays I'm a Buddhist is a spell-binding and powerful book about the human condition, the narratives we weave around the self, and the ultimate bliss of living in the present moment. 'What happens between one story and the next? That's the really interesting part. That's the space where we find bliss; where we float sometimes, suspended, and only for a brief moment. Perhaps only for a few scarce moments in an entire life.'

Michael Harding is an author and playwright. His creative chronicle of ordinary life in the Irish midlands is published as a weekly column in The Irish Times. He has written numerous plays for the Abbey Theatre, including Una Pooka, Misogynist and Sour Grapes, and has published three novels, Priest, The Trouble with Sarah Gullion and Bird in the Snow as well as several bestselling memoirs, including Staring at Lakes, which won three BGE Irish Book awards, Hanging with the Elephant, Talking to Strangers and On Tuesdays I'm a Buddhist.

Searingly honest, funny, self-deprecating, Harding's narrative seems to rest on the pulse of Ireland - Irish Times on On Tuesdays I'm a Buddhist A compelling memoir. Absorbing and graced with a deceptive lightness of touch ... Harding writes like an angel - Sunday Times on Hanging with the Elephant Hilarious, and tender, and mad, and harrowing, and wistful, and always beautifully written. A wonderful book - Kevin Barry on Staring at Lakes Wonderful ... Like many people who have achieved a great deal, [Harding] cannot recognise his triumphs. This book, like its predecessor, is one of them - John Boyne on Hanging with the Elephant A book that champions the kindness (or at least company) of strangers as essential for that elusive state known as happiness - RTE Guide on Talking to Strangers