It’s 2:30 in the morning and I can’t go to sleep. Somebody read me a bedtime story.
Ain’t it just like the night to play tricks when you’re trying to be so quiet?
-Bob Dylan, “Visions of Johanna”
My sickness, back then, was pride, rage and violence. These things (rage, violence) are exhausting and I spent my days uselessly tired. I worked at night. During the day I wrote and read. I never slept. To keep awake, I drank coffee and smoked. Naturally, I met interesting people, some of them the product of my own hallucinations. I think it was my last year in Barcelona.
-Roberto Bolaño, Antwerp
Well now, hold on
maybe I won’t go to sleep at all
and it’ll be a beautiful white night
-Frank O’Hara, “Five Poems”
One of the more interesting claims about Leonardo has been offered to explain his high level of productivity. It deals with his sleep pattern. Supposedly, Leonardo would sleep 15 minutes out of every 4 hours, which would give him a daily sleep total of only 1½ hours. The net result of such a sleep pattern is a gain of 6 additional productive hours in each day. If Leonardo followed this regime over his entire life it would have effectively added 20 years of productivity to his 67-year life span. It has been suggested that this might, in addition to his genius, explain the vastness and richness of his work.
-Stanley Coren, Sleep Thieves
I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death,
Beyond the walls of intelligence, life is defined, I think of crime when I’m in a New York state of mind.
-Nas, “N.Y. State of Mind”
The cubs and the lions are snoring,
wrapped in a big snuggly heap.
How is it you can do all this other great shit
But you can’t lie the fuck down and sleep?
-Adam Mansbach, Go The F**k to Sleep
The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
-Robert Frost, “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening”
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