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I Can't Sleep
An attempt to feel and investigate the quality of time, with references to Jonathan Crary, Paul B. Preciado, Charles Baudelaire, and Walter Benjamin.
This book could have been called The Contemporary Condition of Sleeping and Reading in the Heart of (and in Spite of) the Logosphere and Various Media Streams, but frankly, I Can't Sleep sounds better, plus it's true.
—Lionel Ruffel
The diaristic form of I Can't Sleep is an attempt to feel and investigate the quality of time, making reference to Jonathan Crary, Bernard Stiegler, Yves Citton, Paul B. Preciado, Charles Baudelaire, and above all Walter Benjamin. Written in a style that borrows not from classical forms of theory or prose, but operates in between fiction and nonfiction to investigate the very concept of the contemporary, I Can't Sleep uses a quite old but often renewed method—in this sense a very contemporary one,—consisting of starting from one's own personal situation.
This book could have been called The Contemporary Condition of Sleeping and Reading in the Heart of (and in Spite of) the Logosphere and Various Media Streams, but frankly, I Can't Sleep sounds better, plus it's true.
—Lionel Ruffel
The diaristic form of I Can't Sleep is an attempt to feel and investigate the quality of time, making reference to Jonathan Crary, Bernard Stiegler, Yves Citton, Paul B. Preciado, Charles Baudelaire, and above all Walter Benjamin. Written in a style that borrows not from classical forms of theory or prose, but operates in between fiction and nonfiction to investigate the very concept of the contemporary, I Can't Sleep uses a quite old but often renewed method—in this sense a very contemporary one,—consisting of starting from one's own personal situation.
53 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 20, 2025
A lot of the literary theory and frameworks of study here are honest to god beyond me. My contemporary ethnic literature mind boggles at the references to French literary princes and classical European thinkers and writers.
I can’t speak to how profound or distinct this work might be, though there are some interesting things that stand out in its commentary regarding sleep as something beyond its biological utility.
I can’t speak to how profound or distinct this work might be, though there are some interesting things that stand out in its commentary regarding sleep as something beyond its biological utility.
July 17, 2023
I bought this book because there was a very cool book shop in Providence that had many volumes of this series. It looked kind of crazy and I tried this one. I picked wrong. I didn't understand what the hell this book was. He can't sleep because he is reading or something. Acaddemic claptrap. Sorry. But it is
June 6, 2025
More poetically than denotatively describes the condition of the world, ie can’t sleep, have to wind into interminable narratives to lull into something, if one reaches the end of something FORGET IT back into hysteria mania
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews