Pas dormir

by Marie Darrieussecq

« J’ai perdu le sommeil. Je me suis retournée sur mes pas et il ne me suivait plus. Il s’était détaché de moi, et j’errai sans lui dans la nuit. »

Marie Darrieussecq souffre d’insomnie depuis des années, comme beaucoup d’entre nous. Elle raconte dans ce livre l’aboutissement de vingt ans de voyage et de panique dans la littérature et dans les nuits. Vingt ans de recours désespérés et curieux, parfois très drôles, à toutes sortes de remèdes – pharmacopée, somnifères, barbituriques, méditation, exercice physique, tests, chamanisme, technologie, recettes et expédients divers… Mais ce livre est surtout hanté par une question magnifique : « Qui est-ce qui ne dort pas quand je ne dors pas ? » Pas dormir est ainsi une autobiographie d’un genre nouveau : raconter « l’autre qui ne dort pas » et qui est aussi soi. Marie Darrieussecq mène évidemment l’enquête dans la littérature : « J’ouvre les livres et tous me parlent d’insomnie. Woolf ! Gide ! Pavese ! Plath ! Sontag ! Kafka ! Dostoïevski ! Darwich ! Murakami ! Césaire ! Borges ! U Tam’si ! Sur tous les continents, la littérature ne parle que de ça. Comme si écrire c’était ne pas dormir. » Elle raconte ses voyages dans le monde entier, les chambres d’hôtel où le sommeil ne vient pas. Jusqu’au Rwanda, où la mémoire vive du génocide témoigne d’une autre insomnie : devant l’horreur. L’insomnie nous éveille à l’altérité du monde – présences effacées, fantômes, espèces vivantes en voie de disparition, mondes perdus : « D’autres êtres ont les yeux ouverts. D’autres yeux regardent. L’insomnie se nourrit de ce sentiment confus : il y a autre chose. »

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Essays, France, Biography Memoir, Autobiography, Psychology

302 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2023

About the author

Marie Darrieussecq was born on January 3, 1969. She was raised in a small village in the Basque Country.

While finishing her PhD in French Literature, she wrote her first novel, Truismes (Pig Tales) which was published in September 1996 by Paul Otchakovsky-Laurens (POL), who have published all her subsequent novels as well. After the success of Truismes, Darrieussecq decided to quit her teaching position at the University of Lille to concentrate on writing her novels. Her first husband was a mathematician, her second is an astrophysicist. She gave birth to a son in 2001 and to a daughter in 2004.

She endorsed Ségolène Royal's candidacy during the French Presidential Elections of 2007.

Reviews

[Adina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Based my last couple of reviews you might think I have something against philosophical/literary referenced books. It is not true in many cases, and this collection of essays is a proof of it.
Marie Darrieussecq is a French author with a big problem. She can’t sleep. What does she usually do when sleep eludes her? She reads. Many things but mainly books from authors who suffer(ed) from the same affliction, or novels with insomniac characters. Sleepless is the result of her long nights spent with a book in her hand. It is a dreamlike, claustrophobic account of her waking hours, of her efforts to go to sleep and the result of her failures. These often philosophic and feverish reflections are punctuated by a long list of literary references.

I enjoyed her writing style. I found it quite ironic that this book was my companion to sleep for many nights. After reading a few chapters, I was pleasantly falling sleep, not without being grateful that I am the Other, that loathed person who can sleep whenever, wherever and for many hours, if I am allowed by my family and chores.

The book contains spoilers to some books but I did not care much because it was to titles that I already read or had no intention of opening. Some readers were annoyed by it, though.

[Paula Mota · Rating 4 out of 5]

# WIT Month

Os que nasceram antes dos anos 1990 lembram-se do tédio. Para viver, era preciso sair do quarto a todo o custo. (…) O tédio é substituído pela impaciência.

“Não Dormir” é um problema que não me assiste. Como costumo dizer, eu não adormeço, desfaleço, e nada me impede de fechar os olhos quando o sono se abate, nem lugar, nem hora, nem condições. Já fiz belas sonecas em matinés de teatro e cinema, os comboios e os carros embalam-me instantaneamente, já adormeci em dois concertos, já adormeci em pé após várias noites de farra seguidas (outros tempos), mas também por privação de sono após os partos, sendo o momento mais glorioso da minha maternidade aquele em que me apaguei à mesa com a cara apoiada na mão enquanto comia sopa. Por outro lado, para um sono reparador, preciso de silêncio e escuridão total, tenho um sono extremamente leve a partir de uma certa hora e, nos últimos 10 anos, é pela calada da noite que os meus problemas me assaltam e me despertam como se fosse meio-dia. O verdadeiro sono dos justos é, decididamente, uma coisa complexa, frágil e mutável, e é sobre isso que discorre Marie Darrieussecq, de quem só tinha lido “Estranhos Perfumes”, uma das obras mais incómodas de horror corporal que habitam nas minhas estantes e que calculo que seja fruto de um pesadelo ou da sua mente insone.

Ocultando-se nas nossas águas furtadas, escondida debaixo dos nossos colchões, enfiada entre as ripas do tempo, de onde vem a insónia? Dos fantasmas? Do cérebro? Das dores da alma? Do mundo? Quem é que não dorme quando eu não durmo?

“Não Dormir” é um relato que abrange 20 anos de insónias, a busca de soluções através de tentativa e erro e noctívagas viagens pelos livros de outros insones, cujo patrono é Franz Kafka. Darrieussecq polvilha o seu texto com citações literárias…

A literatura é toda ela formada por paraísos perdidos e insónias. O erro dos insones é acreditar que se pode, não reencontrar o sono, não sonhemos, mas recuperar o sono perdido. Ora, o sono perdido nunca se recupera. O somo perdido, tal como o Paraíso, é uma Idade de Ouro e uma nostalgia.

…mas também referências cinematográficas e musicais, mais precisamente com os nomes daqueles que combateram insónias e outros demónios com a artilharia pesada:

Quantas estrelas morreram assim, na esperança de adormecer? Michael Jackson (Lorazepam e Propofol), Prince (Fentanil), Jimi Hendrix (álcool e 9 cápsulas de Seconal, Judy Garland (álcool e 10 cáspulas de Seconal)… E depois, puros produtos do matadouro hollywoodesco, um número inifinito de starlettes.

Até lhe ser diagnosticada a hipervigilância por uma sonologista, Darrieussecq tentou todos os recursos pensáveis e impensáveis para invocar o sono: um cão para caminhadas, tisanas, acupunctura, osteopatia craniana, psicanálise, ioga, jejum, hipnose, álcool, ASMR, gravity blanket e outros métodos com nomes estranhos, dois casamentos (teve graça aí), a literatura (infalível comigo) e, obviamente, o álcool e os soporíferos. Obedecendo então a uma rígida higiene do sono que implica usar a cama com um único propósito e num único horário, a autora menciona um facto histórico que sempre achei curioso.

Na Idade Média (…) as pessoas iam para a cama ao pôr-do-sol. Era a primeira noite. Acordavam algumas horas depois, acendiam o fogo, comiam, faziam amor, conversavam. Depois, tornavam a adormecer para a segunda noite. Era um ritmo normal.

“Não Dormir” é uma obra bem pensada e consubstanciada, ainda que pudesse ser mais curta, já que a inclusão dos últimos capítulos parece um tanto forçada. Abordando causas (muito meritórias) que lhe são caras também por formação, visto que é psicanalista, aborda o assunto do sono em situações de sem-abrigo e de trauma e também os problemas que nos podem tirar o sono, como a nossa relação predatória com os outros seres vivos.

É preciso amar profundamente a Capela Sistina, a Pirâmide de Quéops e o som de Coltrane e o traço de Shi Tao e toda a literatura para continuar a amar os homens. (…) E não nos tira um pouquinho o sono dispor dos animais como objectos? Ou fingir que há nós e os outros? Não nos impede isso de dormir, de agir como se eles não existissem?

[Vartika · Rating 3 out of 5]

My  father is an insomniac, and I grew up with traces of his troubled sleep reverberating all over the house: snatches of canned T.V. noises floated out of the living room in the middle of the night, packets of namkeen left open and crumpled on the kitchen counter, and one side of the bed he shared with my mother often and incontrovertibly unslept in, just like the bed in the spare room he would sometimes retire to with hope. I was unsettled by his behaviour on nights like these, and curious enough to try and emulate it sometimes, stifling my yawns for hours on end so I could possibly imbibe a sense of camaraderie, or at least empathy. I eventually dozed off on each of these occasions, and woke up to find that he did not.

It was only in December 2021, after contracting coronavirus for the first time, that I actually experienced insomnia for myself. I rested well while I was sick—I slept as if my recovery depended on it, which it did—but the very night I tested negative, I lost my ability to fall asleep. I tried counting sheep, ate healthier than ever, drank warm milk at night, purchased C.B.D. supplements, gave up coffee, listened to my G.P. and to every podcast that promised to lull me into the deepest, most relaxing slumber—and yet found myself wide awake and turning over in bed until well after the sun had come up. I went on walks that got longer and worked out religiously till my limbs ached. Though I ended up tired and exhausted beyond belief, beyond what I had thought was survivable, I would still lie awake at night, eyes shut, trying to imagine sleep into existence and feeling frustrated and defeated by how earnestly it eluded me. After a week, my imagination gave up, too: I grew forgetful and sensitive to sounds, to light, to the slightest rustling in my surroundings; I found myself unable to do anything. I became perpetually irritable, and my housemates went from showing concern to leaving me completely alone. None of it prevented me from not sleeping.

Looking back, I can hardly believe that could have been the case, that I went completely, entirely sleepless for well over a month. It all sounds simply impossible, and I must have passed out for a few moments without knowing, and there is no way my body wouldn’t have shut down from the stress of it all—but I was awake all the time, thinking all the time, and so, so weary. And then, one day, just like that, I drifted off and slept for nine hours. I woke up, worked on an overdue college essay for two hours, and fell back asleep. I haven’t struggled a single night since.

It was worse for the French novelist Marie Darrieussecq, who entered the realm of insomnia shortly after the premature birth of her eldest child and to this day continues to battle the way it compresses time and erases meaning. In Sleepless , a work of nonfiction newly translated into English by Penny Heuston, she weaves together her own experiences as a citizen of this “unremitting here and now” with those of other writers like her—Kafka, Duras, Woolf, Proust, Ovid, and several other notable “champions of fatigue”—who felt both ennobled and over-strung by their inability to sleep.

Reading through what she calls “four-in-the-morning literature”—for when else does the weight of this hypnagogic limbo feel more crushing?—the author here creates a bricolage of tortured feelings and desperate, and only occasionally successful, bedtime rituals that, more often than not, involve sedation: Proust lined his walls with cork but never gave up his café au lait, Cioran resorted to a morphine suppository, Philip Roth allegedly mixed fistfuls of sleeping pills with chocolate soy milk, and Woolf once had to be whacked awake with a wet towel after taking too much Veronal. Huysmans had his most famous protagonist fill the interminable hours by sorting through his collection of Goya paintings, while Hemingway had his characters ceaselessly making lists. Darrieussecq herself has been “running with barbiturates” for three decades having previously failed to find relief in yoga, gravity blankets, and herbal teas, and is now “incapable of falling asleep without [her] red wine”. All of the writers she speaks of seem to have become their insomnia—the name Simenon, we learn, is a near anagram for the French insomnie—but the tenor in which their misery is recounted here makes it hard to romanticise that condition.

Further, Darrieussecq seems aware that insomnia, even as it privileges writers and creatives, is keen to haunt all varieties of people, and the appearance of its spectre is not always random or meaningless. That “the world is divided into those who can sleep and those who can’t” seems like a truism, but that statement gains more seriousness and weight as the author goes on to explore how sleeplessness is as much a cultural condition as an individual one. Like most cultural currency, sleep—and the inability to sleep—are also political and unequally distributed. “The possibility of sleep, rest, depends on owning something, or at least having something at your disposal,” the author states as she moves focus from the insomniac writer tossing and turning in the refuge of their beds, and considers how such “prolongation of misery” afflicts the migrant, the homeless, the impoverished, the imprisoned (sleep-deprivation, we are told, is still used as a torture technique in several parts of the world), and all others who are denied those bourgeois comforts.

In her travels across the world—from Congo and India to Rwanda and the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone—Darrieussecq’s groggy self is faced with the more acute suffering created by the “enforced wakefulness” of western-style capitalist ravaging in these parts. There is an uncomfortable, white saviour-fantasy at play in the way she writes about oppressed people and their culture in this section, which is not helped by her supplementing the narrative with a double-spread of photographs featuring all the hotel rooms that she hasn’t slept in. The point that Sleepless does succeed at making, however, is that capitalism runs on wakefulness, which, like the “hypervigilance” of the insomniac, is endlessly inhibiting for life. Insomnia, according to her, is aggravated by capitalist logic: “‘To sleep’ or to be ‘on sleep mode’, the same vocabulary for humans and machines, the same requirement for alertness and efficiency”, in a world where rest is not rest but a means to prepare for another day of work, where sleep is not sleep but “a structural attention deficit”, where boredom is unheard of, and where true recuperation is afforded to no one. The demands of a capitalist framework permeate the rooms of those who have them—here the author considers how the proliferation of mobile phones and digital devices means that “time spent in the bedroom is itself evaluated, judged, measured, approved or disapproved, according to the demands of work, communication, or health”—but at least they can appropriate a ritualistic or sedative function in such a setting. For those without the shelter and safety that the writers and readers amongst us take for granted, there is an even lesser chance of reprieve from either the self or the world.

Sleepless is a peculiar book, one that continuously moves between the critical and the autobiographical, between the bodily and the broadly structural, and sees insomnia everywhere. Darrieussecq’s writing is self-indulgent in all the right and wrong ways, and for those who have known the failure to sleep, it promises an abstract but good-humoured sense of camaraderie. But this is a fulfilling and enlightening read even if you aren’t losing sleep in the literal sense: there is consolation to be found within these pages for those plagued by climate anxiety, existential malaise, or simply a hunger to know more about the lives of 20th-century literary luminaries. Whatever side of the reading public you may be on, this is an exciting volume to keep by your bedside table—if you have one. As afraid as I am of not being able to fall asleep again, I did find myself burning the midnight oil over it.

[This review originally appeared in The Cardiff Review]

[emily · Rating 1 out of 5]

‘Please leave me oysters. With a glass of Chablis.’

A disappointing read. For starters, it's so stuffed with spoilers (be it of literature/film). Being 'robbed’ like that was just unacceptable. If you want to read Perec, Simenon, Kafka, Colette, Proust, Jean Rhys, Kundera, Beckett, Zweig (to name a few from the massive list) for the first time anyway, then I wouldn’t recommend reading MD’s book. Truly bizarre ‘how’ she had done it as well. She literally tells the readers (down to the littlest details) which character(s) dies in those novels (and how/ and why). And I don’t even want to rant about the film spoilers, it just makes me mad. A very clever book title, deceptive. If this was ‘MD’s Diaries’ (which would be most appropriate), it would be terrible in terms of marketing, but at least the ‘spoilers’ would have been more excusable.

Laden with ‘references’ to ‘celebrities’ who had experienced (or died from) insomnia. Lots of photos, so actually not a very ‘long’ book. But some of the things she mentioned, and some of the photos she had chosen to have in her book? Suspiciously like ‘trauma porn’ (and kind of uncomfortable because it’s not even ‘her trauma’ — for instance there are photos of the ‘Chernobyl’ nuclear accident, and a photograph of a razor cutting a human eye). And then she waffles those photos with (A LOT of) photos of her hotel rooms/‘travels’ (she even links her website on the page just to note that MORE can be found there). I don’t even know what to make of it. And honestly, I don’t want to either.

’Yes, it was too much. But I was incapable of stopping. A life of abstinence is not a life. And as to reducing, alas, my superego was not up for that. It was too much to ask: it was already looking after my figure, my exercise, my self-discipline, my manners; it needed — in order to contend with all that.’

But most of all, I didn’t like how she romanticised medication and substance abuse in the first half of the book. I am not easily triggered by these ‘topics’ (including self-harm and ‘suicide’), but I can imagine there are people who can be. And it’s just kind of messed up that it was written the way it was written. It’s the ‘tone’ and how it was phrased, really (and maybe if it was darkly comic, it would have been more acceptable, but this was just sort of disturbing — in the sense that the writer’s extreme ignorance is just so — shocking). It even feels like the writer actually ‘idolises’ the dead and famous writers/artists who were insomniacs. As if to validate her own self-destructive behaviours when she tells the readers about theirs?

And at one point, quite early on in the book, the writer confessed about how she ‘almost killed’ her ‘insomniac friend’ once by basically prescribing for him and encouraging him to take some pills. And she wrote it in a way that is meant to be funny (and as if like is a completely ‘normal’ and friendly thing to do)? Or not? Because if it’s not meant to be ‘funny’, then I don’t sense any kind of apologetic or guilty feelings from the writing either, which I can’t decide if that’s better or worse? And following that, she added a photo of her and a different insomniac friend and captioned it ‘Insomniac selfie’. And later on, the bit on her experience in the ‘forests’ of Cameroon was — I can’t even — . Will just have to leave it at that.

‘Air France, so white, so beautiful, — I have my French passport and I have money. — the crowd is alarming, the rain is adding to the racket, — I feel dizzy with how exhausting, rushed, and also comic everything here is, because the Kinshasans flying out to Panama are making fun of the whole situation, and of me in particular. — an Air France stewardess gives me a glass of champagne — and I already feel infinitely safer, and I am infinitely grateful for the existence of France — .’

To conclude and clarify, I’m rating this based on how ‘I feel’ about the book. This is definitely a well-composed book. ‘Clever’, I would even say. But ‘careless’. And I’m definitely not the ‘suitable’ insomniac and/or reader for it. This is probably the first (and hopefully only) book published by Fitzcarraldo Editions (one of my favourite (if not my favourite) publishers of all-time) that just doesn’t make sense to me. It’s not even because ‘the writing did not resonate with me’. I should have known better knowing that the intro of the book includes an endorsement by ‘Elle’ (presumably the magazine).

‘A funny, moving, metaphysical, and novelistic self-portrait that is also a portrait of our times’ — Elle

‘Our times’? Surely not applicable to 'everyone'. But perhaps someone who reads Elle magazines often might be able to appreciate MD’s writing better.

[Kate O'Shea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've not read any of Marie Darrieussecq's work so her name was new to me. This is not a work of fiction but a discourse of the problem of insomnia which she has suffered from for many years.

The book covers the experiences of other insomniacs eg Proust, Woolf, Kafka wondering if it is the act of writing that causes the insomnia; Ms Darrieussecq herself says she used to sleep well until children came along but even after the initial exhausting feeding stages sleep continued to elude her.

Another idea is that sleeplessness becomes a habit as taking sleeping tablets or alcohol eventually lose their efficacy.

Towards the end is a whole section about our relationship with the animal world and perhaps our knowledge that we destroy everything we come into contact with is disturbing our sleep.

Thankfully I've only suffered sporadic bouts of insomnia at stressful times in my life. This book wouldn't provide any solutions but the contemplation of why is just as fascinating.

Thanks to Netgalley and Fitzcarraldo for the advance review copy.

[The Reading Bibliophile · Rating 5 out of 5]

Énormément de références littéraires. Beaucoup de considérations sociologiques. Un dernier chapitre remarquable.

[Brendan Monroe · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm eternally fascinated by sleep and the sleep-adjacent — dreams, darkness, and, yes, one's inability to sleep. I, too, often find it hard to sleep. I don't have insomnia, at least not a severe case, but I often do find myself waking up in the middle of the night.

On such nights, the longer I lie there, struggling to sleep, the harder it is, the more the thoughts I've kept at bay throughout the day begin to flood in, growing in number and degree of paranoia until, finally, I give up, get out of bed, and move into the other room to read or, if I'm especially troubled, write.

A book about our inability to sleep? I didn't hesitate. It would fit in nicely with all the other titles on my shelf about things we do, or don't do, in the dark.

Unfortunately, reading this turned into something of a chore, until finally, last night, having awoken at 12:47 and deciding, after another hour, that I wouldn't be sleeping anytime soon, I pulled it back off the shelf and finished it.

Half of this book reads like a list of insomniacs and insomniac passages ("Kafka was an insomniac, see this entry from his diary") while the other half feels like a sort of insomniac's bucket list, where the author goes into far too much detail telling us about all the many places she's traveled to and not slept in — Patagonia, Rwanda, the Congo, etc. etc.

It made me uncomfortable at times what a pharmaceutical shopping list this book can come off as. Long sentences listing all the many drugs the author takes to combat her insomnia, all of which seem to have little to no real effect.

While I enjoyed this one enough to ultimately finish it, though "enjoyed" feels like the wrong word, and the many references to other titles have expanded my Goodreads' Want to Read list, my sense is that this will be quickly forgotten, akin to a half-remembered dream from a bad night's sleep.

[Rosamund Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Marie Darrieussecq discusses her own insomnia, and how insomnia is understood in society. She places sleeplessness in the context of trauma, societal upheaval, the relentless light of modern cities, and the commodification of sleep. It is a wide-ranging, compelling book, and oddly comforting for those who also suffer from sleeplessness.

[Text Publishing]

The following book reviews have been shared by Text Publishing – publisher of Sleepless

‘Sleepless is a feast. Darrieussecq brings a world of personal experience to an examination of insomnia from every possible perspective, from the bodily to the cultural. Her range of reference is extraordinary. The result is intoxicating.’
Michael McGirr, author of Snooze: The Lost Art of Sleep

‘Sleepless is intellectually fierce, but also funny. Wide-ranging and constantly surprising in its interweavings, it is built from beautiful sentences as much as big ideas. It is a book that stays with the reader long after it is read.’
Fiona Wright

‘Darrieussecq sees sleeplessness everywhere, and on the page it is a fruitful madness. She rereads both literary canon and popular culture through bleary eyes, finding the insomniac in illustrious company…[Her] stylish bricolage is thrilling in its breadth...There is refreshing candour in Darrieussecq’s self-inquiry, detailing how she, like so many who find themselves in hypnagogic limbo, seeks relief in risky cocktails of booze and barbiturates.’
Monthly

‘…This wonderful work of nonfiction is a veritable prism through which interconnected and complementary ideas are refracted simultaneously…This book is as lucid as it is literary, and it is not just for insomniacs. If you’ve ever felt existential dread prompted by the threats of the Anthropocene, or wondered about the 4am lives of 20th-century writers, you’ll find much in Sleepless to contemplate and enliven…’
Readings

‘Splendidly translated by Penny Hueston, this is a brilliantly creative and playful meditation on the disturbing reality of insomnia, one that weaves together Darrieussecq’s own experiences with quotations, images and biographical anecdotes from other sleep-deprived writers.’
Guardian

‘Sleepless...captures the skittering, jittery mood of an insomniac’s “white forgetfulness”, of what it’s like to be simultaneously over-stimulated and over-stretched.’
Telegraph

‘Written in clear but sometimes almost dreamy prose, there are moments when the sheer tiredness comes off the page and becomes felt. But there’s affirmation too, for out of this experience has come an intriguing portrait of the Kingdom of Insomnia.’
Sydney Morning Herald

‘The translation by Penny Hueston is pellucid, with snatches of prose-poetry that evoke the limbo land the sleepless inhabit...The book is a treasure trove of literary fragments. One of the solaces of literature is the realisation that others in times long gone have felt what we are feeling now...Darrieussecq conjures a cultural kaleidoscope...Darrieussecq shares with us an elegant journey that finds beauty in the despair of insomnia.’
Spectator

‘Darrieussecq is exceptionally well-read and her prose is roving and referential. The effect is decadent and dexterous...The reading experience is exhilaratingly lucid…[She] writes with great compassion about the sleeplessness of others, of those who do not have a safe place to rest…[and] writes with such frankness the reader is jolted, again and again, by the life force that thrums through this memoir. Sleepless is an achingly beautiful and thrilling read. It awakens the mind to new planes of thought.’
Saturday Paper

‘[A]n intellectually rich, formally inventive consideration of insomnia...Bad sleepers do not necessarily make great writers, and vice versa, but in Sleepless, Darrieussecq shows she is a great writer, one who is very much awake, and that maybe all those nocturnal hours were not lost after all; she has provided us with a luminous exploration of life after dark.’
Buzz Magazine

‘A sleepless text, company and comfort for insomniacs, and instruction for those heading off to a good night’s sleep. It is ever-awake and ready for the exhausted and the good sleepers alike to pick up in the morning.’
Words Without Borders

‘Dancing on and off the page, appearing, disappearing, and re-emerging throughout her book, Darrieussecq spins a heady web...Intoxicating and disorientating, her style works perfectly when she writes about the spiralling anxiety of insomnia, and the dizzy voids of sleeplessness. It lets her capture the internal cacophony, the sense of isolation and the tide of dread that destabilises those of us who battle for sleep...Darrieussecq’s writing is faultless.’
Conversation

‘[A]n anatomy of insomnia in the tradition of Robert Burton’s The Anatomy of Melancholy. An eclectic mix of literary criticism, medical history, social commentary, travelogue and phenomenology, Sleepless is organized around Darrieussecq’s many stratagems for achieving a state of being many of us take for granted…For her readers, whether they are insomniacs or not, Sleepless is a meditation on a condition that is more widespread than is generally acknowledged, and impinges, at least philosophically, even on those who do not have it.’
The Times Literary Supplement

‘The poetic, stream-of-consciousness style resonates and embraces the shared human experience of sleeplessness…The delightful enjoyment of Sleepless is the author’s unique, unexpected, and subjective point of view and voice, translated into English from the original French.’
Good Reading (4 stars)

‘Desperate to find respite in the form of affinity, Darrieussecq has created a rich literary archive of insomnia. Beloved writers are crowned insomnia’s ambassadors…Darrieussecq’s memoir is a meditation on the pleasure of sleep stolen, and a reminder to relish every moment of rest.’
BOMB Magazine

‘While her sociological and anthropological studies are engrossing in their own right, it is the creative nuance of Darrieussecq’s prose, its fragmentary structure, and the lucid, lyrical translation by her longtime translator Penny Hueston, that successfully weaves them together.’
Rumpus

‘Sleepless treats insomnia as a question with no answer, an itch with no salve. Darrieussecq’s account of it is by turns hectic and meandering and erudite and feral: Here is, word by word, the addlement of the endlessly wakeful…Sleepless is at its most lyrical when it is at its most intimate—a primal scream, rendered in words.’
Atlantic

‘Darrieussecq offers a wide-ranging reflection on insomnia — her own and other people’s — which approaches sleeping and not sleeping from multiple angles. Along the way, she considers literary representations of insomnia, remedies (some more effective than others) and much more besides.’
West Australian

[Negativedialecticsandglitter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Genial: el listado de insomnes y de pasajes escritos por insomnes, el rango amplísimo de temas que permiten a Darrieussecq abrirle el tratamiento que hace de la existencia insomne (ese eterno aquí y ahora), la voluntad de interdisciplinariedad.

No tan genial: cómo introduce lo autobiográfico (sobre todo los viajes y el consumo de fármacos), cierta superficialidad en el uso de las otras voces con las que arma el libro, partes que se hacen pesadas.

Echo en falta la lucidez de la insomne.

[Aurelija · Rating 3 out of 5]

Žiauriai daug info, citatų, nuorodų jūra, parašyta lyg iš tikrųjų būtų nemigos demonas apsėdęs.skaičiau net tokį vieną juokingą atsiliepimą čia, kur skaitytojas(-a) piktinosi, kad čia vien spoileriai (nes tos nuorodos, literatūros kūrinių, filmų komentarai) ir traumaporn. Man gal taip nepasirodė (apskritai, spoileriai, so overrated), bet tai liūdna, padrika knygelė, kurioje radau gražių, bet skaudžių minčių, ypač paskutiniam šimtuke puslapių, kur autorė galiausiai išlipo iš faktų ir citatų centrifūgos ir kažką kristalizavo

[Afi (WhatAfiReads) · Rating 4 out of 5]

The irony of reading this in the midst of sleeplessness as well.

"The world is divided into those who can sleep and those who can't.

Insomnia and all its glory.

Sleepless is a memoir on being an insomnia; the journey of the author having insomnia for the past 30 years - in the indulgence of drugs, alcohol and anything that can get her to sleep. A quiet-chaotic mess of thoughts on the world and mostly of being (not) able to sleep.

I find as someone who suffers what the author has gone through for the past 10 years of my life, I can say that reading this was like calling me out in various languages and names. Insomnia can be a lonely journey, and not everyone will understand the fights you have between the voices in your head throughout the night, knowing that you want to sleep, but you simply; just, can't . There is almost a comical way in somewhat being seen by reading this memoir. I felt that I wasn't alone in this journey, and that there were loads of others - big big names - that suffered the same problem as well.

"Sleeping means trusting the night, believing in a reunion after the commotion of dreams."

The author had done a thorough research on everything that is related to sleep. The infamous works from Woolf and Kafka, were amongst the many that were quoted in here. One of the things that I liked was that, not only the author had written about her own struggles; she had also written about sleep and the state of not being able to do so in different context. There was a chapter in the book that spoke on 'forced insomnia' ; where privilege plays a part to actually let people know that you are in a safe place; seemingly awake with your own demons - whilst there are other who couldn't sleep not beacause they didn't want to, it was because they dint't have a choice but to stay awake. Its these themes that made this book an enjoyable read. She not only delved into her own state of mind; but also became reflective of the circumstances that she was born into.

Its also interesting to read through her state of mind - one I can imagine writing the book at 4.04 AM. Its almost comical how 4.04 AM its like a universal time for insomniacs. There is a sort of solidarity reading this book but it didn't feel self-victimizing, instead; its written in just a matter-of-fact way and paired with loads of references that made it a very insightful and educating read as well.

I do recommend reading this. Its a deep dive into the world of insomniacs; and its in the matter of being able to understand those who are stuck in their beds with their thoughts. Definitely an interesting one.

4🌟 for this !

Thank you to the publisher for a copy of this ARC! I highly appreciate it :)

[Lula · Rating 2 out of 5]

Une perspective très bourgeoise des choses. Certains passages sont intéressants et ont mis des mots sur des choses que je ressens aussi par rapport à mes propres insomnies, mais souvent c'était parce qu'elle citait Kafka. Donc finalement c'est même pas ses mots à elle qui m'ont touché.e. Du reste la plupart du livre est juste... chiant de ouf. Plus on lit plus on est face à une atmosphère étrange de nausée-malaise qui donne envie de se plonger dans autre chose le plus vite possible, un mélange du thème et de l'écriture elle-même. Mais le truc qui m'a fait complètement décrocher c'est cet espèce de fantasme très blanc sur les personnes opprimées et leur culture mêlé à un peu de white savior-ism je peux pas prendre au sérieux quelqu'un qui écrit avec cette perspective non déconstruite c'est juste pas possible.

[Mélanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pas de loup, Marie traverse ses nuits dans les splendeurs de la pensée et les gouffres de l'intranquillité.
Une insomnie comme un rituel qui chevauche les plus hautes cimes de l'esprit.

[Abigail Thompson · Rating 4 out of 5]

interesting! I love this kind of book that’s a mix of memoir and lit review and cultural criticism - reminds me of The Recovering a lot. didn’t really give me any ideas on how to cure my insomnia but I might try hypnosis

[Sarah Mc Neil · Rating 4 out of 5]

« Rien ne perturbe l'insomniaque. Aucun événement. Aucune étincelle diurne ne vient illuminer son rapport à la nuit. Rien n'empêche l'insomniaque de ne pas dormir. »

[Cody Stetzel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Profoundly touching for any who’ve struggled with sleep.

[Sasha Mottaghi · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic collection of essays from Marie Darriessecq that address insomnia in a personal, collective, and more philosophical sense. It was fascinating to read of her own personal insomnia and the various interventions attempted to improve her sleep and the coverage of famous insomniacs (literary and real) made for excellent context.

The broader essays on insomnia were often the highlights of the collection, reflecting on broader societal factors and the narrative context of those sleep disturbances. The last of these essays was the hardest read, perhaps because of the nature of the context chosen, but it was a very poignant way to end the collection.

In all, wholly worthwhile and very interesting.

[Titus Hjelm · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating combination of literary reference, travelogue and biography, all the strands come together in the tragedy of insomnia. Ironically (or not) I read most of this in the early hours of dawn, unable to sleep. It doesn't matter if your experience is different, just hearing about others with the same condition makes the prose powerful.

[Isabella · Rating 4 out of 5]

Schlaflosigkeit war selten schöner.

[Olya Grigoreva · Rating 4 out of 5]

Калейдоскоп бессонницы, настоящий художественный каталог, который выходит далеко за пределы заявленной темы

[Pante · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anything is preferable to permanent wakefulness, to that criminal absence of forgetfulness…’ In this ‘vertiginous lucidity’, having a break from oneself, even for a few hours, is an impossible dream.

[Mat Ve · Rating 3 out of 5]

Je n'ai pas trop accroché.. j'ai lu les trois quarts et piouf c'était suffisant, j'ai feuilleté la fin et lu la dernière page. C'était quand même intéressant et très actuel! Convient très bien aux insomniaques haha

[Ceri Graham · Rating 1 out of 5]

So confused by the whole thing

[Marc Nash · Rating 4 out of 5]

Video review https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwpxZ...

[Ruza · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one is for all those who struggle with sleep. I love Marie’s humour, I find her funny, strange and eccentric. I loved this book, I laughed, the laughter of identifying and I remembered that I too used to sleep in a way that these days I can only dream about. Marie’s journey and research puts words and describes so well a state of been, the lives of insomniacs.

Like Marie I too in my 20s and 30s, I slept. I slept long hours, on the back of trucks while I was on top of grain bags or gas bottles, or what ever, my backpack as my pillow. I would sit up and the dirt dropping of my face as I looked at my fellow travellers, who seemed puzzled I could sleep. I slept as donkeys pushed my hammock and dropped ticks on me. I slept on balconies when I couldn’t find a bed and once wake to big toadstools around my head. I slept sheltered in rocks on an active volcanos, while been watch through binoculars by ‘Colombian army’, they seemed surprised I could just fall a sleep just before reaching the top, I said I felt tired. I slept standing leaning into strangers on crowded buses. I slept as my room was broken into. And I still slept after that experience. In my 30s when travelling for work alone or with colleagues, I would say to the people seated next to me, I will be a sleep soon, sorry if I snore, and my mouth might be open and I might dribble. I didn’t care, I fell asleep before the plane took off and only woke when the wheels hit the runway. And went to meetings so refreshed. My colleagues who traveled with me seemed always surprised at my ability to sleep. In my 30s one of my lovers confessed to pinching me at night to see if I was alive, as he lay beside me suffering his own insomnia.

And then I stopped sleeping, and my mind stopped resting, and I have been suffering a new normal and I don’t even know when it started. Unlike Marie, I cannot pinpoint the moment my mind started to stop me from sleep. Work used to normalise my insomnia, but when I stopped working and had free hours to sleep and still couldn’t sleep, I finally realised something was not right. I miss that deep sleep, I try different things (I even painted my bedroom a womb pink, Colin is a saint) and there is a bit more success these days, but nothing like the sweet sleep of my 20s and 30s that I remember. But been reminded to think back on those times, makes me feel a little more rested.

[Katheryn Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sleepless is a collection of essays that muses on the state of insomnia. Marie Darrieussecq (translated by Penny Hueston) recounts her own experiences alongside those of fellow insomniacs, weaving endless literary references to insomnia throughout her writing, as she ponders its possible causes and its possible cures.

Collections of essays don't always work for me, as I find it can be difficult to strike a balance between fragments and cohesion, personal experience and broader applicability, but Sleepless makes it look easy. I love the idea of centring an entire collection of essays on sleeplessness, and Darrieussecq takes the topic to places I couldn't have imagined, tackling some hard-hitting themes, including suicide, post-traumatic stress, and anthropocentrism. The range she covers is phenomenal, and yet the writing always feels purposeful, deliberate, and cohesive. I was particularly struck by how many writers suffered from, and wrote about, insomnia. I love the way Darrieussecq uses insomnia to write about writing, and she has made me rethink so many works of literature.

I liked how readable Sleepless is, the writing broken down into chunks without ever feeling fragmented, and supplemented with some powerful images. There is also a streak of black humour running through the book that I appreciated, which especially surfaces in Darrieussecq's anecdotes of her attempts at insomnia cures. I gulped down Sleepless in two sittings, haunted by its words and images in the moments in between. This is one of those books that I wanted to start rereading as soon as I had finished it, and I will definitely be seeking out more of Darrieussecq's and Hueston's writing.

[Cam david · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*

‘’ J’ai perdu le sommeil. Je me suis retournée sur mes pas et il ne me suivait plus. Il s’était détaché de moi, et j’errai sans lui dans la nuit.’’
‘’ "je n'en ai pas dormi de la nuit", disent les dormeurs aux insomniaques, qui ont envie de leur répondre qu'eux ne dorment pas de la vie.’’

Je ne lis pas souvent d’essaie et si je suis très honnête le sujet ne me concernait pas particulièrement, ne souffrant pas moi-même d’insomnie. En fait j’ai même un problème de sommeil que l’autrice détesterait, si je manque constamment de sommeil c’est parce que je ne donne pas la chance à mon corps de dormir, parce que trust me lui il veut dormir! Mais mon ami.e m’a conseillé se livre en me disant qu’il en valait la peine et qu’il était bien écrit, alors je lui ai donner sa chance!

Mon gros problème avec cette essaie est qu’elle va citer plusieurs œuvres et artistes, elle va en enchainer sans doute une centaine dans son œuvre complet, et que non seulement plusieurs d’entre eux sont soit des artistes super problématiques (agresseur, pédo criminel, fachiste, sexiste…) ou des œuvres qui sont extrêmement inapproprié et problématique (genre raciste, utilisation du N world, ouvertement sexiste…). Bref, vous voyez le genre, je pense que cité un auteur ou un œuvre dans son livre c’est s’associer à lui et donc qu’il est impardonnable de ‘’séparer l’homme de l’œuvre’’. On ne devrait pas donner de notoriété, de publicité à ces criminels peu importe ce qu’ils ont réalisé ou depuis combien de temps ils l’ont fait. Je ne peux pas croire qu’elle n’était pas au courant, qu’elle cite des gens et effectue une recherche aussi approfondit sur leur œuvre sans jamais avoir mis leur nom dans google. C’est donc un choix délibéré et très problématique de sa part qui m’ont tout de suite fait perdre de l’estime pour l’autrice. En plus, tous les noms qu’elle citait était tous très blanc (mis à part exactement 2 exceptions), dans la liste très complète d’ouvrage qu’elle a trouvée pour parler de l’insomnie, elle n’a trouvé aucun ouvrage hors de l’occident (USA et genre 3 pays d’Europe), quand on sait que le plus gros taux d’insomnie est recensé en Asie de l’Est? On ne parle pas du tout du Japon et Corée du sud qui ont reconnu avoir un problème au niveau national d’insomnie et que même moi sans recherche je peux te trouver des œuvres qui en parle…

Il y a bien une partie où on sort de l’occident, où elle va au Rouanda, mais je l’ai trouvé un peu indélicate. Après 300 pages à parler de son insomnie, la comparé à l’insomnie de gens qui ne dorme plus parce qu’ils ont vécu un génocide et vu leur famille mourir c’est un peu grotesque. Surtout en leur donnant moins de 6 pages pour s’exprimer et j’ai trouver qu’elle se donnait trop de place dans leur histoire. Encore une fois, même en parlant des souffrance Rouandaise, elle n’allait citait aucun expert, œuvre ou artiste de là-bas pour appuyer les genre 2 témoignages recueillis, elle n’allait même pas prendre des œuvres à cité de gens ayant eu des drames similaires, mais encore des occidentaux. Il y a de très bonnes œuvres d’artiste venant du Rouanda qu’elle aurait pu nommer, tant qu’à parler d’un sujet aussi difficile, et ne pas le faire leur retire la parole pour encore la laisser au blanc (ça fait très colonialiste tout ça). Pour l’aborder aussi légèrement elle aurait été mieux de ne pas l’aborder surtout que l’insomnie et les PTSD sont pas la même chose et que de tout évidence elle n’était pas équipé pour en parler. Ça faisait juste regardez je suis allé en Afrique je suis full ouverte d’esprit et non pas j’ai réellement quelque chose à dire sur le sujet.

Mis à part cela, car j’ai effectivement commencé sur une note très négative, c’était un essaie très facile à lire, je ne me sentais pas bombarder d’information et bien qu’il y en eût ça se faisait fluidement. Il y a même des passages où j’aurai aimé avoir plus d’information notamment sur les œuvres ou auteur cité que les notes en bas de pages ne me fournissaient pas. Mettre les ajouts d’information supplémentaire en bas de pages était une bonne idée, car ainsi il n’alourdissait pas le texte et laissait la discrétion au lecteur si iel les lisait ou pas. Par moment la lecture était tellement fluide que j’avais plus l’impression de lire son journal qu’un essaie se que j’ai beaucoup apprécier. J’ai aimé l’impression de proximité que j’avais avec l’autrice et le principe qu’elle nous amenait dans sa vie au travers de ce livre.

Si le sujet de prime à bord ne m’intéressait pas, et que je ne voyais pas vraiment l’utilité d’en faire un essai, elle me l’a rendu intéressant et m’a fait développer une réelle compassion envers les insomniaques. J’y ai appris plusieurs informations que j’ai trouvé plutôt enrichissante et j’ai aimé le large éventail de ressources qu’elle a dû consulter montrant sa maitrise du sujet. La grande force de se livre et le style d’écriture incroyable de l’autrice. C’est se qui m’a fait accrocher dès la première page. Elle écrit extrêmement bien, c’est super fluide et constant, mais il y a également une recherche de vocabulaire et de formation grammaticale super intéressante. La lire rendait tout de suite son roman plus agréable et je sens qu’à un certain point elle aurait pu me faire lire n’importe quoi.

Bien que je reste mitigé sur ma lecture, je pense que cela reste un des essaie les plus accessible que j’ai pu lire et que même si le sujet ne vous intéresse pas elle peut le rendre intéressant. Je pense juste qu’elle aurait dû faire plus d’effort pour s’ouvrir au monde, car je crois qu’elle a un réel talent et j’aimerai la suivre dans sa carrière. Je ne pense pas que se fut conscient de sa part et c’est pour cela que j’ai pas arrêté ma lecture au premier agresseur cité, mais c’est quand même une grossière erreur de sa part.

[Amanda Rosso · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolute achievement. As usual, Marie Darrieussecq turns an everyday topic into a majestic journey. She has the vibrant and lively mind that we need as readers, but also as people. Using insomnia as a starting point to delve into literature, poetry, art, politics, antispecism, psychology, social justice, motherhood and womanhood. This is one of those books to keep close, to skim through several times, just to find the quote, the sentence, the vignette, the moment to reread, one more time. Marie Darrieussecq came into my life very late, and yet I could not stop looking for her books and find myself in perpetual awe of her ability to transform every word in a honest, dazzling, profound and interrogative fable.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un peu hiératique. Des citations, des photos, une pharmacopée. Particulier. Ai appris un nouveau mot: Hypnagogique (endormissement)