HomeGroupsTalkMoreZeitgeist
Search Site
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

Loading...

Sleepless Nights (1979)

by Elizabeth Hardwick

Other authors: See the other authors section.

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
8592224,884 (3.63)67
Sleepless Nights is a scrapbook of memories: the first pangs of sexual longing, Billie Holiday holding forth in a cheap hotel, and the swagger and heartbreak of New York City.
Loading...

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

No current Talk conversations about this book.

» See also 67 mentions

English (21)  Dutch (1)  All languages (22)
Showing 1-5 of 21 (next | show all)
To be plunged into again. Heard distantly of hardwick before but didn’t really know about her. The Kentucky grounding was a nice surprise. ( )
  sirk.bronstad | Nov 14, 2023 |
Slim yet dense. So much goes on yet nothing happens. There's a story somewhere yet there is no narrative. I'm just running out of conjunctions over here.

It's obvious why this book is considered a seminal text among many of the authors that I love. The structure of Jenny Offill's Dept. Of Speculation is reminiscent of the random paragraphs in Sleepless Nights; there are tons of loose and fragmented thoughts with no sense of cohesion to the statements written just before. Rachel Cusk's protagonist in Outline also feels like the direct descendant of this novel in the sense that readers only learn about the narrators via their experiences with others. I even get some Maggie Nelson energy, but maybe I'm just grasping at straws.

This didn't floor me like I hoped it would. If push came to shove I'd describe the plot as nonexistent and the writing as uneven, but I appreciate its wit, intelligence, and significance.

OH - naming your protagonist after yourself? BALLER MOVE. Mother of autofiction ooooor? ( )
1 vote cbwalsh | Sep 13, 2023 |
Incredibly beautiful words that flow and captivate imagination and interest. I truly enjoyed reading this series of delightful essays with an exquisite almost magical take on ordinary people and scenes. A joy for the senses of a reader! ( )
  c.archer | May 25, 2023 |
Yeah, this is really beautiful. ( )
  jostie13 | May 14, 2020 |
What a nugget of a book. A slender novella/with some semi-autobiographical elements, the narrator, who shares the name of the author, Elizabeth, is traversing her memories, talking out loud to herself and in letters, about the people who have peopled her life. Shifting across the years, making random or no links, this plotless character driven gem has some fine lines. It's tone is mostly brittle and cool, with some warmth here and there. The eye for detail is very sharp. Early on I almost felt what it was like to BE Billie Holiday..

This essay is what sent me there:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jun/29/eimear-mcbride-elizabeth-hardwick-... ( )
1 vote Caroline_McElwee | Jul 4, 2019 |
Showing 1-5 of 21 (next | show all)

» Add other authors (1 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Elizabeth Hardwickprimary authorall editionscalculated
Broek, C.A.G. van denTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Canonical title
Original title
Alternative titles
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Epigraph
Dedication
To my daughter Harriet,
and
to my friend, Mary McCarthy
First words
It is June. This is what I have decided to do with my life just now.
Quotations
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Information from the Dutch Common Knowledge. Edit to localize it to your language.
Blurbers
Original language
Information from the Dutch Common Knowledge. Edit to localize it to your language.
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC

References to this work on external resources.

Wikipedia in English

None

Sleepless Nights is a scrapbook of memories: the first pangs of sexual longing, Billie Holiday holding forth in a cheap hotel, and the swagger and heartbreak of New York City.

No library descriptions found.

Book description
'I have always, all of my life, been looking for help from a man.  It has come many times and many more it has not.  This began early.'
This subtle and beautiful love, published in 1979, was hailed as a literary masterpiece.  The subject of this fictional autobiography is memory - the author's memory - vividly recalling the events, the places, the people of her lifetime.  Crossing and re-crossing the odd line between fiction and fact, this novel of one life yields a terrible truth about many: the freedom to live untied to others, however desired that freedom may be, is hard on men and hard on children and hardest of all on women.
Haiku summary

Current Discussions

None

Popular covers

Quick Links

Rating

Average: (3.63)
0.5
1 2
1.5 1
2 11
2.5 1
3 21
3.5 11
4 51
4.5 3
5 14

Is this you?

Become a LibraryThing Author.

NYRB Classics

An edition of this book was published by NYRB Classics.

» Publisher information page

 

About | Contact | Privacy/Terms | Help/FAQs | Blog | Store | APIs | TinyCat | Legacy Libraries | Early Reviewers | Common Knowledge | 202,657,465 books! | Top bar: Always visible