Matthew McConaughey, Academy Award-Winning Actor and Author of GREENLIGHTS, to Publish New Book With Crown
Crown, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, announced the September 16 publication of POEMS & PRAYERS by Matthew McConaughey, an eternal optimist, Academy Award–winning actor, and bestselling author. An audiobook edition of POEMS & PRAYERS, read (of course) by McConaughey himself, will be released simultaneously by Penguin Random House Audio.
Matthew McConaughey (© John Russo)
McConaughey’s previous book, GREENLIGHTS, was published in October 2020 and was an immediate #1 New York Times bestseller. To date, more than 6 million copies have been sold worldwide across formats. The book spent 99 weeks on the New York Times hardcover bestseller list, 32 weeks (and counting) on the paperback bestseller list, and 55 consecutive months (and counting) on the audio bestseller list. The Financial Times described it as “a rollicking, contemplative trip,” and The Washington Post said it was “both calming and laugh, laugh, laugh-out-loud funny.”
POEMS & PRAYERS Jacket (©Robbie Fimmano – Trunk Archive)
With POEMS & PRAYERS, McConaughey shares an inspiring, faith-filled, and often hilarious collection of personal poetry and prayers about navigating the rodeo of life and chasing down what he calls the original dream, belief.
“I’ve always relied on logic to make sense of myself and the world. A prescriptionist at heart, I’ve always looked to reason to find the rhyme, the practical to get to the mystical, the choreography to find the dance, the proof to get to the truth, and reality to get to the dream,” McConaughey says. “I’ve been finding that tougher to do lately. It’s more than hard to know what to believe in; it’s hard to believe. But I don’t want to quit believing, and I don’t want to stop believing in . . . humanity, you, myself, our potential.”
POEMS & PRAYERS includes writings inspired by both proverbs and the Old Testament, daydreams in shady south-of-the-border hammocks and in Australian bathtubs with Lord Byron, nightmares we can’t outrun, 400,000 miles traveled in an Airstream, the gifts of guilty stress, a court appearance to restrain a stalker, Matthew’s desire to be the best friend, husband, father, and man he can be, and more. The book’s chapters reflect on themes such as these, among others:
- Man Up
- Love Stories
- Faith & Doubt
- Compassion, Forgiveness & Raining Grace
- Sunrise Intentions & All-Day Appreciations
Matthew McConaughey, in the Introduction to POEMS & PRAYERS: “In our age of politics, AI, plastic surgery, and high-frequency fix-it-in-post deepfake deceptions, I often find myself walking away from all the knowledge and reality more confused, more frustrated, and less well-advised than I was before I consumed it. As an optimist and a believer, I’m a man of strong spirit and great faith, but if it’s belief we seek, let’s admit it: we’re not going to find it looking to the evidence. Forget logic, certainty, owning, or making a start-up company of it; let’s go beyond what we can merely imagine, and believe, in the poetry of life.”
So, in McConaughey’s words, “let’s flip the script on what’s historically been our means of making sense and instead open our aperture to enchantment and look to faith, belief, and dreams for our reality. Let’s sing more than we might make sense, believe in more than the world can conclude, get more impressed with the wow instead of the how, let inspiration interrupt our appointments, dream our way to reality, serve some soul food to our hungry heads, put proof on the shelf for a season, and rhyme our way to reason.”
Matthew McConaughey announced the news on his social media channels:
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